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In most agrarian societies, autumn is for harvesting.  The cooling weather and crisp air bring to mind warm meals made with the best of nature's bounty, of preserving abundant harvests to last until spring, of celebrating family and friends and loved ones by feeding them, fattening them up against the coming cold.

But in Seoul, the lingering warmth of Chuseok is snuffed out like an oxygen-starved flame by the annual Snow Soirée, an elegant name for the brutal harvest celebrated by only one man:  Xiumin the Snow King.

He's not actually a king, of course.  Korea is a modern society, long past all those Joseon dynasties.  These days, the leaders have fancy, democratic titles like "President."  But Xiumin may as well be a monarch, because on the flip side of the shiny coin that is Korea's meteoric rise from a third-world country to a first-world powerhouse, there is the tarnish of corruption.

Xiumin is the biggest player in the ever-changing game that is Seoul's criminal underworld, and he's not bound by silly things like elections or public opinion.  What he says, goes. What he wants, he gets. And what he wants at the beginning of every winter is a beautiful, promising young life to pluck like a ripe, red berry.  Something pretty to savor for a season, and, come spring's thaw, to crush in his icy fist.

The Snow Soirée is the formal affair in which the criminal overlord announces which bright young star of Korea's most powerful mafia families he will claim as his due; which young heir will inherit only pain and death.  A few minutes before midnight on December 20th, all the tuxedo-clad members of the underground wait, frozen like the icicles spiking from the eaves of the lavish manor in which they have gathered. Equally-motionless, smartly-dressed families are shielded behind their patriarchs as if that is any protection against the coming pronouncement.

"Thank you for coming as always," Xiumin greets, as if his guests had been given a choice.  He bows to the assembled, looking ethereal and untouchable in his pristine white suit. His snowy ensemble, down to the pale silver hair on his head, is a deliberate contrast to the black-on-black worn by most of the crowd.  The gloating little glint in his wide feline eyes is certainly not reflected by the downcast eyes of his terrified subordinates, nor is the tiny smirk on his full, naturally down-turned lips or the jut of his pointed chin below a deceptively-pure heart-shaped face.

He's not a big man, but it doesn't matter.  As he moves through the crowd, everyone bows ninety degrees, forming a silent, somber wave as he makes his leisurely way to the dais in the center of the room.  His height may fail to hit the national average by a few centimeters, but his reach is vast and his power nearly absolute. Those in this room are painfully aware of how easily this pretty little man can turn their lives ugly.

He steps up onto the wide plinth of white marble, now able to physically look down on the lives he controls.  "This year's honored family is the Kims," Xiumin states, voice like midnight velvet. "Specifically, the Siheung branch."

Silence reigns for several fluttering heartbeats, but the atmosphere in the room goes from frosty to merely frigid as most of the families breathe an internal sigh of relief.  There's still a knot of nervously-shifting formal wear in one quadrant of the room, and Xiumin's gaze locks on to his quarry like a fox with a rabbit.

The rabbit in question is quaking a little, muscles rigid to keep him upright.  Xiumin approaches, and the entire family bows to him again before their eldest son squeezes tears out of his eyes as he kneels before the god of Seoul's underworld.

"Junmyeon, is it?" Xiumin asks, and the boy nods, eyes still shut as if he could make the nightmare end by refusing to look his destiny in the face.

Frowning, Xiumin moves around the boy, inspecting his new plaything.  The kneeling young man might be a bit taller than the Snow King when on his feet, but he wouldn't be on his feet very often.  He looks sturdy, so his body might be able to withstand the most brutal of Xiumin's favorite games. But he's already crying, flower-boy face made ugly by his obvious grief.

How disappointing.

Xiumin likes to break his little snowflakes, likes to take something beautiful and prove it to be fragile, likes to take something perfect and unique and crush it under his thumb like he'd pinned all of Seoul with his ruthless leadership.  If his new toy is already broken, it's not nearly as fun, but this is the family that's currently the most powerful aside from himself. Besides amusing himself, this annual reaping is a way to level the playing field again, to kick down those who reach for too much power, and the Kims need to be taken down a peg.

So he reaches out a hand, elegantly manicured nails on the end of sturdy fingers grasping the now-sobbing youth by the pointed chin and tilting the heart-shaped face up to meet his gaze.  Funny, the young heir resembles Xiumin in a superficial way. Or maybe not so funny, if one knew that Xiumin's surname at birth had also been Kim. It's possible that they share a common ancestor, but that certainly isn't going to save him.  And if it's true, Xiumin got the better deal out of their shared DNA—their similarity is vague, and the Snow King's visuals are far superior.

Kim Junmyeon cries harder at the touch, and it's evidently too much for some member of the Kim entourage.

"Take me instead," comes a voice, clear and strong, and Xiumin's dark feline eyes flick away from a sobbing face to meet a defiant gaze.

Now here is someone

interesting

.

The boy who has the audacity to meet the Snow King's eyes and challenge his choice is young, with cheekbones as sharp as his onyx stare.  His face is set into hard lines, yet his eyelashes are long and soft and almost feminine. And under his black tuxedo jacket, the boy is wearing a red shirt.

Red, in a sea of mourner's black and death-shroud white.  Red, like berries in the snow. Red, to match his thin, angry lips and adrenaline-flushed cheeks.

Red, like his blood will be against the ice come March.

"And you are?" Xiumin tilts his head imperiously.

"Kim Jongdae."

"The second son?" the Snow King confirms.

Jongdae nods once, still meeting Xiumin's gaze.

The Snow King considers.  He's never changed his choice before.  But this boy is far from disappointing.  He's not as sturdy-looking as his older brother,  but he's clearly made of sterner stuff. Here is a spirited little toy, a bold little kitten, and Xiumin idly wonders how many strokes of the cane he'll withstand before he drops that burning black gaze.

"Done," the Snow King decrees.  "But let it be known that Kim Junmyeon kneels here as a sniveling coward while his baby brother saves his life.  You may survive, but your reputation may not."

Xiumin pivots on a white Italian leather shoe.  "Come, my little snowflake," he commands. "It's time you were dressed properly for this party."
 
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Jongdae's brain is chanting a steady litany of

fuckfuckfuckfuckshitfuckfuck

but his body, thankfully, moves with dignity to follow the beautiful, cruel man in the perfect white suit.  When he'd woken up this morning, decision solidified in his mind, he'd felt noble for the first time in his selfishly-squandered life.  But now?

Now he just feels terrified.

He doesn't even look back at his family, at his sobbing brother, stricken mother, stoic father.  If he does, his fierce facade will shatter like ice on a pond and the lazy, childish fuckup that is Kim Jongdae will be released to run screaming into his mommy's arms, and he can't do that, not after the Snow King condemned his poor hyung for crying.

He hates Xiumin for that, more than he hates Xiumin for claiming and eventually ending his own life.  Junmyeon works hard for their family, always has. Mostly because Jongdae himself never has, and his older brother has had to pick up his slack, learning to run the family business at his father's side.  Meanwhile, Jongdae just drinks and carouses with his friends, other second sons, spare heirs, unruly rich boys like himself that have too much time and too much money. Countless times, Jongdae had left his family's villa in the back of a limo only to be brought home in the back of a squad car.

But Junmyeon is an angel and the family would be lost without him, which is why Jongdae knew that if his brother were to be selected, he'd have to force the Snow King to accept him instead.

Thankfully—or maybe unfortunately—the Snow King hadn't been difficult to convince.  He'd looked Jongdae over like he was choosing a rack of lamb, then nodded his acceptance.  And now Jongdae is following him through the icy white curtains at the end of the hall to be stripped of his clothing, his name, and his dignity.

The stripping is done by two silent female servants before the Snow King's appraising gaze, and Jongdae isn't sure if he's pleased or disgusted by Xiumin's satisfied nod once his eyes have raked his new snowflake's nude body.  Then he's given a clingy white thong that outlines his junk clearly, making Jongdae wonder why Xiumin even bothers with the scrap of fabric at all. And finally, a cold metal collar, probably platinum because this Snow King seems too snooty for anything simpler, is fastened tightly around his throat, the branching limbs of the polished snowflakes digging into his Adam's apple whenever Jongdae swallows.

And he's swallowing a lot, because while his gaze is hot, his fear is an icy fist in his gut.  He's just signed himself up to be tortured for three months and then be brutally killed. He did it to save his brother from the same fate, but that doesn't mean Jongdae wants to die, especially not in a bloody public spectacle as an example to the entire criminal underground.  He only wants to finally honor his family.

He's never been a good son in life, but his decision to be a good son in death is cold comfort.

A diamond-encrusted chain is snapped to the D-ring attached to one of the linked snowflakes of his collar, and he's tugged behind the Snow King back out into the ballroom.  Xiumin is trailing the leash casually over his shoulder, and Jongdae follows obediently, ignoring the stares of people who've worked with his father for decades, who have known Jongdae since childhood.  He resists the urge to cup his hands over his barely-covered junk and somehow finds enough fury to stand straight and walk tall behind the man who just claimed his life.

Xiumin leads him back up onto the marble dais, parading him around the raised circle once before stepping to the center and shoving Jongdae roughly onto his knees.  He grits his teeth against the pain in his patellas as his new master introduces him to the gathered crowd.

"Behold your scapegoat, my newest snowflake.  Look at him and know that your safety and prosperity are bought with his suffering, that he'll pay for your peace of mind with agony and blood.  Witness his pain and humiliation and know that next year, it could be your own beloved son kneeling before us all."

With that, Xiumin grabs Jongdae by the hair, pulling his head close enough to rub his face on the Snow King's groin.  The fingers tangled in Jongdae's hair are pulling it hard enough to hurt and Xiumin's cock is hard enough to feel through the layer of snowy fabric that separates it from Jongdae's cheek.

"Your rosy kitten lips are going to look so good stretched around my cock.  I hope your asshole's just as pretty," Xiumin murmurs low enough for Jongdae alone to hear.

He holds Jongdae against him for a long moment, rolling his hips into the kneeling man's face.  Then he steps back, yanking on the leash so that Jongdae pitches forward, catching himself on palms dented by his own fingernails.

"Crawl," Xiumin commands, then strolls back toward the shimmering white curtains.

Jongdae stokes his hatred, suppresses his rage, thinks of his brother's teary face, and crawls.
 
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Xiumin's little snowflake proves to be quite entertaining, indeed.  He's so obviously full of rage, yet he obeys instantly, without question, without protest.  He kneels between the Snow King's legs during business meetings, warming Xiumin's cock with his throat for hours.  He scrubs the marble floors until they shine, kneeling to wait for his master's inspection while radiating quiet fury, and he wordlessly scrubs them again when Xiumin disdainfully urinates on both surface and slave.  Xiumin likes to think that pretty little ass is so hot around his erection because it's burning with hatred when the Snow King fucks him. His eyes certainly are, because though he bows for Xiumin, kneels for Xiumin, submits for Xiumin, those black brands silently inform the Snow King that he does not

belong

to Xiumin.

Except, of course, that he does.

But Xiumin finds it delightful, this little spark of defiance.  His previous little snowflakes usually started off more stoic than the sobbing Junmyeon, but after a week or two, they became cowed little things, fearful and flinching whenever Xiumin came anywhere near them.  And he'd thought he'd liked that, liked being able to condition a man to terror in his presence, liked treating the quaking little things with extreme kindness, touching them gently, giving them treats, loved all the trembles and tears as they waited for the cruelty, convinced it was only a heartbeat away.

Sometimes it was, sometimes it wasn't.  But they quivered in apprehension the entire time either way.

But Xiumin has spent a month with his newest snowflake, and he still hasn't found the edge of what the glaring man can take.  He takes

everything

Xiumin dishes out, not even crying out until way past the point where the others were gibbering, screaming messes.  And he obeys so fucking well, even as he burns holes in the Snow King with those indomitable eyes. He clenches harder around Xiumin's cock as he's fucked, sprawled out on top of a frozen hog in the meat locker, shivering and frost-bitten on face and fingers and toes.  He kneels in the snow, soundless as Xiumin rubs the stinging frozen crystals on his chest and cock and ass. He sucks Xiumin off, anytime, anywhere, in front of anyone, even his own father once.

And though the Snow King knows his little toy is seething, he never complains.  And whenever he can, he looks right into Xiumin's eyes.

The old adage really is true.  Cowards die a thousand deaths before the end finally comes.  But this little snowflake has obviously accepted his fate. He knows he'll die on the first day of spring, is resentful but resigned to suffering every day until then, and while he carries out his duties with the same self-sacrificing sense of honor that prompted him to trade his own life for his sniveling brother's in the first place, he's not afraid of Xiumin and he doesn't care if Xiumin knows it.

After all, what is the Snow King going to do?  Beat him? Rape him? Torture him? Kill him? That would be his fate regardless.  Besides, having a fearless toy for the first time is rather invigorating, and for the first time in almost a decade, Xiumin will be a little sorry to spill his snowflake's blood across the ice.
 
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It wouldn't be so bad, this new life of Jongdae's, except for a few key points.

When you can have anyone you want, willing or unwilling, vanilla sex becomes less exciting after the teenage fuck-frenzy has run its course.  Jongdae is no stranger to BDSM, and has previous experience on both ends of the leash. He's never been a natural sub, but he can play the role, and Xiumin would be the most skilled lover Jongdae has ever had, except for that of course love has nothing to do with it, and he never lets Jongdae come.  The cruel man uses his body without regard for anyone's pleasure but his own of course, and Jongdae isn't even hard during most of their encounters. But sometimes, Xiumin enjoys riling him up, working him to the edge repeatedly, making him crazy with need and almost biting his tongue off in the struggle not to sound as wrecked as he feels, only to eventually and abruptly throw him cock-first into a snowbank or an ice bath or a meat locker packed with some suspiciously-long-limbed carcasses.

But Jongdae could deal with the orgasm denial, could deal with the brutal beatings, could deal with the pointless chores that are meant to be demeaning, could deal with the public attempts at humiliation if they were part of a scene.  He could handle a lover that had a megalomaniacal streak, who had a big ego, who needed to constantly be in control, if ever they demonstrated any regard at all for Jongdae as a human being. He could accept being

treated

as an object if he knew he wasn't actually

viewed

as an object, but of course, that's all he is to Xiumin.

The other problem, of course, is that Xiumin is going to kill him.

But the fact that this prelude to his eventual murder is actually quite tolerable has made it much harder to accept his fate.  He'd assumed he'd be so miserable that he'd welcome the release of death when it came, but that's far from the reality. Jongdae had enjoyed an idle lifestyle, but that doesn't mean he likes when things are easy.

He'd preferred going to clubs where no one knew who he was, pulling partners with his own charms rather than his father's money or reputation.  He'd actually gotten a college degree just for the challenge, though it had been in vocal performance rather than anything actually useful to his father or the family business.  But the grades he'd earned had been genuine and not paid for, and that's a source of satisfaction for someone who could so easily have things handed to him. For Jongdae, triumph is meaningless without effort.

Jongdae strongly suspects Xiumin feels the same way.

He'd seen the flash of disappointment and disgust in Xiumin's eyes when his hyung had lost control of his tears.  And he'd seen the flicker of interest when Jongdae had met his gaze, unbowed. At the time, he'd been angry at the Snow King for judging his brother so unfairly.  Junmyeon hadn't been crying for himself. He'd been crying for his family, for his new wife, for his unborn child. He'd been crying for their parents, who'd worked so hard to build up the family business only to have the best chance at a successful future ripped away with their oldest son's life.  Jongdae had never been good at business, but Junmyeon is a natural, able to make hard choices and slice a path through complications to get the result he requires.

After several weeks of seething, Jongdae has come to a decision.  He'll take a page from his brother's book. Junmyeon may have cried in the face of the inevitable—no one has ever defied the Snow King and lived—but when it comes to the family business, he never backs down from a challenge.  And that's how Jongdae has decided to view his current situation. It's time for the spoiled second son to grow the fuck up. He'd saved his brother's life and his family's future, and now he's determined to save his own.

He could live this life forever if it meant his family's safety, but

live

is the key word.  He needs to make himself valuable to the Snow King so that when spring comes, he'll spare his life.  He's not foolish enough to believe that the frozen overlord harbors anything soft or gentle inside. He knows he needs to prove to the icy man that he's interesting, that he's the most fun the Snow King has ever had.  He needs to meet every sadistic need, cater to every egotistical whim, but at the same time he needs to keep the powerful man on his toes. He needs to be shockingly unique, prove himself irreplaceable, keep Xiumin wanting more.

He may ultimately end up laboring in vain, but it's comforting to have a plan.  Unconsciously, he smiles to himself. Equally unconsciously, he lifts his head when Xiumin enters the bathroom he's scrubbing.  The man does a double take when he sees Jongdae where he's hunched over the huge claw-footed tub, Xiumin's beautiful features distorting oddly away from their usual impassive state.

Then it's Jongdae's turn to wear an odd expression as Xiumin urinates in the toilet instead of on him, washes his hands without kicking or spitting on or harassing him in any way, and walks wordlessly out of the elegantly-appointed room.
 
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Someone is

singing

.  In the middle of the day, randomly, the silence that reigns over the house is nudged aside by a soulful tenor.  Xiumin cocks his head for a moment, wondering if a radio or TV is on somewhere, but the servants know better. The only one who would possibly be stupid enough to disturb the Snow King's peace is currently scrubbing the floor of the foyer on his hands and knees, a heavy chain tugging on his nipples with every movement.

Xiumin sets his reports aside and steps out of his study to peer over the carved wooden railing to the vast entryway below.  Sure enough, the melancholy melody is bouncing off the polished floor and sailing up the grand staircase, and for a moment, the most powerful man in Seoul is frozen in awe.

"If I think about it, I can fill the world with you.  Each snowflake is a drop of your tears. The one thing I can't do is bring you back to me.  I wish I didn't have this useless power anymore."

This is just too much.  First, he caught his little snowflake smiling—actually

smiling

the other day.  Not a smirk, not a grimace, but a soft, sweet smile that emphasized the upturn of those kittenish lips, and even his usually-molten eyes were softened by a slight curve.  It was gone almost before it fully registered, but Xiumin knows what he saw. What he doesn't know is

why

.

And now his snowflake is singing.  His nipples must feel like they're about to fall off, must be feeding him near-constant jolts of pain, but the little fucker is

singing

.  Sure, it's a whiny ballad rather than some idol-pop love song, but still.  Nobody fucking sings where the Snow King can hear them. No one would dare risk his irritation.

Xiumin listens for another moment, just to be sure that it's actually the boy generating the maudlin sound.  He should go down there and make his position on the matter crystal clear.

But what is the Snow King's position?  The sound isn't strident or grating. It's not even very loud.  If Xiumin shut the door to his study, he's sure he'd barely hear it at all.  The kid actually has a decent voice—too bad for the little fucker that he ended up naked and having his nipples tortured on the Snow King's floor rather than being signed to some entertainment company.

Then Xiumin snorts.  This is probably actually a less cruel fate.  At least Xiumin's going to put him out of his misery in another two months rather than enslave him for

years

.

Shaking his head, Xiumin goes back to his study and his reports.  He does not shut the door.
 
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Jongdae's lip is bleeding badly, but he sucks it into his mouth and swallows the trickle of blood rather than risk a drop of it marring the freshly-scrubbed white marble floor of Xiumin's favorite playroom.  The room is designed for blood, of course, floor gently angled toward a drain in the middle and containing a hose neatly coiled in a cabinet on the wall. But it's Jongdae who will have to clean it when the Snow King is done with him, and he's trying to save himself a little trouble.

It seems he has plenty of trouble already, because this is the worst beating he's ever endured.  Xiumin isn't just trying to deliver pain, isn't using his array of abusive tools, has cast aside his favorite flogger in exchange for feet and fists.  Jongdae's fairly sure his ribs are cracked, and he's absolutely sure his left arm is broken—he heard and felt one of the bones snap when he reflexively raised his forearm to shield his face from Xiumin's heavy boot.

The fact that the Snow King is targeting Jongdae's face at all is also out of the ordinary.  The cruel man seems to relish leaving bruises all over Jongdae's body, but he's always been careful not to mark up his toy's face.  Yet now, in addition to the bleeding lip, Jongdae's left eye is swelling shut, and that, more than the broken bones, is making him idly wonder if he'll leave the playroom alive.

But there are still six weeks left before spring, and while the Snow King never fails to destroy his snowflakes, he's never killed one early.  Maybe they all receive a savage, disfiguring beating halfway through their ordeal, as a sort of sneak preview for the main event. A brutal little taste of how being systematically broken will feel before a slit throat ends their suffering.

He wonders if his family will pay the price of mercy, if their otherwise-useless son's selflessness is worth the exorbitant bribe the Snow King demands to slice his victim's throat early.  It's surely not a good return on investment to put forth the entire year's worth of profits it would take to get Xiumin to end him before the breaking begins, but perhaps they'd be willing to hand over a month's profits to spare him the very worst of it.

He's pretty sure he can endure having each bone in his limbs broken without embarrassing himself too much.  His arm barely registers anymore. And though he deems it unlikely to occur in reality, in this moment he chooses to believe his family values his sacrifice enough to give him the honor of ending his life while he still has some dignity remaining.  After all, it would reflect better on them, especially after Junmyeon's breakdown, if Jongdae didn't die shrieking and sobbing and covered in his own shit.

But deep down, in the shadows of his heart, he understands that is the fate he deserves.  If he'd been a better son to begin with, he could see his family justifying the cost. But he's just the fuckup, the degenerate, the one adding stress and subtracting respectability, and it must be such a relief to them to not only have their scion spared, but to have their parasitic son eradicated.

Xiumin gives him another vicious kick to the ribs that sends him sprawling, then he can hear the panting man loosening his belt.  Jongdae pushes himself up on all fours, tilting his hips to present his asshole for the Snow King, arching his spine and looking over his shoulder with his good eye as he flexes and relaxes the ring of muscle Xiumin's thick cock is about to breach once again.

The Snow King stares at this display, hard cock in hand, scowling down at Jongdae where he waits on hands and knees.  Nothing happens for a moment, so Jongdae lifts a brow, wiggling his hips a bit in invitation.

With a growl, Xiumin pounces, slamming his cock deep without preamble as usual.  Jongdae relaxes into it as he always does, keeping his muscles slack to accommodate the brutal invasion of his body as easily as possible.  It still fucking hurts, of course, but the pain would be much worse if he tensed against it, if he let his body resist this dehumanizing assault.

The Snow King is more violent than usual, evidently today's ongoing theme.  He grabs a fistful of Jongdae's hair to force his head back, twisting Jongdae's gaze off of him, bowing neck and spine while forcing him to support most of his weight on his buckling broken arm.

And Jongdae doesn't usually resist, usually suffers stoically as Xiumin gets off on his pain, but he can feel the bones in his arm shifting, and the first thought he has is that if the fractured ends slip out of alignment, he'll have a much harder time scrubbing the floors.  So he flexes an abdomen made strong by frequent gym visits and then toughened further by six weeks of spine-jarring abuse, absorbing the force of Xiumin's vicious thrusts with his steel-sprung core rather than his fractured forearm.

Xiumin growls, twisting his neck further, forcing more of Jongdae's weight to shift toward the injured arm.  But Jongdae is stronger than his tapered torso would lead a casual observer to believe, muscles lean and toned instead of bulky but still tough and wiry.  He lets his spine flex to follow his neck's forced torsion, and dares to pick his injured arm up off the floor completely, supporting himself with three limbs and a counter-sprung torso.

If the Snow King is going to be unexpectedly hard, so too will the snowflake.

Just for good measure, Jongdae clenches his ass in rhythm with Xiumin's brutal thrusts, wearing a smirk beneath the swollen eye that sees the Snow King's snarl only as a smear of icy white teeth in the blur of an exertion-reddened face.

Xiumin releases his grip on Jongdae's narrow hip to punch him in ribs already cracked and tender, using his fistful of hair to pull Jongdae's twisted spine back to meet his punishing thrusts.  Jongdae pants through three successive blows, abs and back muscles in agony as they flex hard to save his damaged arm.

"Scream," the Snow King demands.  "Just fucking scream already."

"

You

scream," Jongdae shoots back, breaking his habit of stoic cooperation.  He's never let the man cow him, but he's also never directly antagonized the Snow King, seeing no reason to inspire further scorn against his family.  He's here to be a good son, to endure, to make them proud, to give them a chance to rebuild their reputation and hold their heads up high among the other families.

But he's also ultimately here to die, as today's particularly cruel treatment has made as clear as the ice on a placid pond, and his endorphins and adrenaline are distorting his self-preservation instincts into conflicting tangles.

Save your arm, so you can scrub the bastard's floors.

Piss him off, and maybe he'll beat you to death now instead of delaying the inevitable.

But Jongdae still wants to survive the changing of the seasons, still wants to prove himself worthy of life.  So he also clenches harder on Xiumin's battering cock, uses his good arm to push his ass back to meet the slap of the Snow King's hips, and drags a tongue over his swollen lower lip as he smirks back at his assailant.

Xiumin shouts as he climaxes, pulling out to spatter his triumphant victim with his release, jerking himself until he's emptied his balls all over Jongdae's contorted body.  He stands up, righting his clothing before giving Jongdae half a dozen more kicks to his ass and thighs, ending by jamming a toe between his legs.

"Fucking clean this up," the Snow King commands, nearly ripping the soundproof door off its hinges as he storms out.

Jongdae waits until the slamming door cuts off the sound of Xiumin's stomping boots before he lets out a sardonic laugh.
 
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Fucking infuriating little shit.

Xiumin can't

believe

his snowflake defied him so blatantly, had the nerve to squeeze his orgasm from him with those Cheshire-cat lips stretched into an actual

grin

.  How fucking dare the little brat deign to order

him

about?

"

You

scream," his plaything had said, as if he had any say, any control over anything that happened to him once his family had surrendered him to slavery and death.

Except that, to his fury, the Snow King

had

screamed, had let his snowflake's hot little ass and burning gaze melt his icy control, had almost planted his seed deep inside that tightly-squeezing body instead of striping his personal whore with his spend as he deserved.

And the boy is surprisingly strong and freakishly flexible, somehow able to support himself and even fuck back against Xiumin instead of collapsing onto his face and smashing his cute little nose to bleed scarlet over the pristine marble floor.

What a fucking uppity little cunt.

The Snow King has half a mind to return to the playroom with his favorite breaking bar, the one with the business end wrapped in barbed wire.  Then they'd see who screams. But disturbingly, the other half of his mind is cataloguing all the shibari stress positions that springy little spine could probably endure.

With an exasperated sigh, Xiumin drops into the burgundy leather embrace of his high-backed desk chair, slumping forward to rest his elbows against ebony and scrunch his shaking fingers into his hair.  A few coarse strands tumble to the surface of the desk, snow white against satin black, and his frown only deepens. His snowflakes are supposed to relax him, entertain him, not stress him the fuck out, but at this rate, he'll be fucking bald by spring.

He should have stuck to the plan and taken the quivering, sobbing rabbit instead of this shameless, smirking fox.

Taking slow, deep breaths until his voice comes out cool and steady, the Snow King forces himself to regain his icy calm.  Then he lifts the receiver on his old-fashioned desk phone, inhaling the calming scents of books and wood and leather as gentle ringing fills his ear.

"Yixing," he says when the call is answered with a quiet greeting.  "I have a patient at the villa for you. He'll need an x-ray and a forearm cast, and you'll probably want to wrap his ribs."

"Having fun without me?" the doctor laughs.

More like losing my fucking mind.

"Just administering some discipline.  Be here within the hour."

"Of course, Boss," the doctor says before Xiumin hangs up.

It's nice to deal with someone who respects him.  The doctor's easy acquiescence goes a long way toward soothing the Snow King's frazzled nerves.

But there's still an insidious whisper circling his skull.

Why not let the boy suffer?

it hisses.

Why bother to repair what you'll eventually destroy?  Do you still crave his blood spilling over the ice? Or will you regret snuffing out such a brightly-buzzing little spark?

Didn't that sassy little slut just make you come harder than you ever have in your life?

Xiumin closes his eyes, inhaling slowly through his nose and exhaling through gritted teeth.  Somewhere down the hall, a bright tenor voice croons a maudlin melody.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
"The selfish me, who always knew only myself, yeah.  The heartless me, who didn't even know your heart. Even I can’t believe that I changed like this—"

A drop of bright blood spatters to stud the pale polished stone of the hallway with tiny beads of crimson, and Jongdae runs his tongue over his split lip yet again, trying to soften and smooth the broken skin so the stretch of his wailed words won't re-open the fresh wound, knowing the gesture is futile even as he does it.

Pressing his lips together firmly to staunch the trickle of blood, Jongdae sprays the offending drop with the bottle of floor cleaner in his left hand, wincing as the tendons that move his fingers jostle his fractured bone.  The pine-scented mist drifts down to dilute the blood drops into smears of watercolor, easily absorbed by the microfiber cloth in his right hand.

His back is on fire and his cracked ribs are screaming, torso tensed horizontal over the floor without support since his left arm isn't able to safely hold his weight or effectively scrub the floor.  But the long hallway is his assigned task for the day, his work already interrupted by Xiumin's playtime. He's sure the sadistic Snow King isn't going to cut him any slack, injured or not, and if he fails to finish his duties to the cruel man's satisfaction, he'll be denied his only meal for the day.

It's going to suck enough trying to get a good night's rest with the sparking pain in his arm competing for attention with the throbbing in his lip and eye socket, not to mention the stabbing pain in his ribs every time he attempts a deep breath.  He'd rather not be painfully hungry on top of it.

Firm footsteps approach, brisk and businesslike in contrast to the Snow King's usual saunter.  Jongdae doesn't assume the formal inspection posture but keeps his head down as he continues his work.  Slaves are to be inconspicuous unless purposefully displayed for guests, and he's received savage kicks from the Snow King's visitors before for daring to meet their eyes.  Ordinarily, he'd do it out of principle. But today, he's not sure he can take much more abuse and still work well enough to earn his supper.

"I presume you're my intended patient," an amused voice says.

It takes a beat for Jongdae to realize he's being addressed directly by a stranger, and surprise makes him flick his eyes up to see who's acknowledging his presence.  A handsome blond in a long white coat is giving Jongdae a considering smile, dimples flashing in the man's cheeks.

Pain making him short-tempered, Jongdae bites back a retort, silently continuing his work.  The man appears to be a doctor, but it's unlikely the Snow King actually intends to have his snowflake's wounds treated.  He never has before, and Jongdae's broken bone isn't poking through the skin or otherwise endangering his life. Maybe Xiumin hurt his back pounding into Jongdae so hard or something.

"Diligent little thing, aren't you?" the stranger chuckles.  "Just gonna ignore everything and scrub the floor?"

"He is the hardest worker I've had," Xiumin states, familiar swaggering footfalls approaching from the direction of the Snow King's office.  "I generally have to foul his work myself if I'm in the mood to punish him."

The stranger laughs.  "Does that make him a good slave, or a bad one?" he muses as Jongdae assumes the formal inspection position, kneeling with his ass resting on his heels and his hands resting on his thighs, back straight, head up, eyes forward.  And Jongdae actually keeps his eyes locked on the wall opposite him today instead of letting them follow Xiumin's figure, glaring hotly as the man decides whether or not to make his slave re-do the appointed task.

But today the Snow King doesn't pace around and hem and haw in an attempt to toy with Jongdae's anticipation.  Today he comes to stand beside the doctor, both of them looming before Jongdae's unfocused gaze, looking down at him with unconcerned faces.

"His left forearm, obviously," Xiumin says conversationally.  "And a rib or two, most likely—might as well wrap him."

"Pity about his face," the doctor remarks.  "He'll be all bruised up for the Lunar New Year ball.  I could drain the hematoma over his eye so he could see better, but it'd leave a scar."

Jongdae suppresses a snort.

"Don't lance it," the Snow King instructs.  "Just cast his arm and bind his ribs." Jongdae can see Xiumin's frown on the edge of his peripheral vision.  "And give him something for the pain so he stops that annoying whimpering."

Jongdae hasn't been whimpering, and the look the doctor tosses his boss indicates he knows it.

"Just shut up and treat him," the Snow King commands.  "Then get the fuck out."

He turns on his heel and strides back to his office, leaving the doctor to shake his head.  "You must be a special little snowflake, indeed. Come along then."

Stashing his cleaning supplies in the base of a pedestal holding an alabaster bust of the Snow King, Jongdae trails behind the doctor to the treatment room on the first floor.  He'd been surprised to encounter the medical suite on his cleaning rotation, but of course it makes sense that a criminal overlord isn't going to submit to a hospital full of strangers and possible law enforcement when he's injured, vulnerable, and possibly unconscious.  Instead, the doctor comes to the King.

Thankfully, this doctor is quick to stab him in the ass with a syringe full of an anti-inflammatory and slap a transdermal pain patch on Jongdae's upper chest.  By the time the man has x-rayed the fractured arm, wrapped it in layers of cotton and plaster, and fitted his torso for a pair of wide elastic belts, the pain has dulled to a background throb.

"We don't generally wrap broken ribs anymore," the doctor says conversationally as he's putting away his supplies.  "But you won't be taking it easy until they're healed. So even if it fucking hurts, try to take a few deep breaths, deep as you can, every hour or so.  If you don't move enough air, you're at risk for pneumonia, and if you think you're miserable now..." The doctor shrugs, flashing a smile. "Take the rib belts off when you shower and when you sleep.  I'm leaving you three sets because the Snow King likes to make a mess of his little flakes, so you'll probably be washing them often. And I'd say I'd be back in six weeks to take off your cast but the Snow King will probably do that himself right before he straps you to the Iceterisk."

The doctor smiles broadly as he hands Jongdae a container of pills.  "Take one of these every six hours and ice your eye and lip if you can to help the swelling go down faster.  You've got four days before the Lunar New Year ball, and the Snow King always likes to show off his little snowflake then.  Gotta have you looking your best." He pats Jongdae on his unbruised cheek, then sends him back to resume his duties.

It's a little easier to hunch over the floor with his ribs braced by the elastic belts, and he's able to tentatively support some of his weight on his cast arm.  Optimistic about his chances to finish his task in time to earn himself a decent meal, Jongdae can't help but sing as he scrubs.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Xiumin finds himself whistling as his stylists get him ready for the Lunar New Year ball.  One of the tiny, silent women ties his white satin bow tie with nimble fingers while the other sweeps silver powder over his closed eyelids.  They've outdone themselves this year with the white-on-white brocade jacket, swirling silver embroidery sweeping over his shoulders and down his arms.

It's echoed by the embroidery down the side of the close-fitting white trousers that hug him enough to display his masculinity without being uncomfortable or obscene.  He has an inverted platinum teardrop dangling from an earlobe and several platinum rings of varying widths on each hand, and he looks powerful, ethereal, untouchable. Perfect.

Tonight is one of his favorite parts of his favorite season, an immensely symbolic start to the new year.  He loves taking his little snowflake to the ball that's always hosted by his plaything's former family, where everyone can watch Xiumin lounge in a throne with that family's erstwhile brightest star frozen at his feet.  The mothers

always

cry, and the other families do their best not to make eye contact with the hosts.  Everyone is so delightfully on edge and palpably uncomfortable as the Snow King subjugates them all with the blatant flaunting of his power, and he likes to make little wagers with himself as to whether or not the snowflake will shed tears before the evening's out.

He doesn't bother this year.  The stubborn little thing hasn't cried yet, and doesn't seem likely to do so until Xiumin breaks him over the ice.  He wonders how much it will take to draw the tears from those molten eyes, and how much the Siheung Kims will pay him to shorten his snowflake's suffering.  Maybe they won't bother, seeing as they'd let him take his brother's place without a single protest.

Xiumin ignores the sudden weight in the pit of his stomach.  If the Siheung Kims won't spare the boy, it will be his delight as usual to draw the execution out as long as he can.  This snowflake has proven incredibly resilient. He's sure he can make it take hours.

His snowflake has also provided his stylists with quite the challenge to beautify him to the Snow King's standards, but they've managed it so well that he hadn't even threatened to kill any of the beloved fluffy dogs he'd given them when they'd become his.  This particular pair of stylists has proven exceptionally talented. He'd only ever had to kill one dog, but they'd pleased him so well afterwards that he'd replaced it on White Day, tripling the return like the gentleman he is with a trio of snow-white bichon pups wearing diamond-studded white gold bangle bracelets for collars.

It pleases him to occasionally let it be known that the Snow King is the master of the carrot as well as the stick.

And it pleases him to look upon this year's snowflake, wearing only a white spandex thong, his platinum snowflake collar, and white ermine leg- and arm-warmers from ankle to knee and wrist to elbow, beautifully disguising the cast over the boy's forearm while still leaving his lean body on display.

That body is beautifully spangled with adhesive crystals over the flawless milk-and-honey skin, lingering bruises airbrushed away with makeup.  He's wearing makeup on his face, too, and his still-puffy left eyelid is obscured by a glittering crystal-studded half-mask from brow to cheekbone, adhered to the skin beneath without straps.  The stylists have made it look like the clear crystals are spilling from the mask down the side of his face by adhering more crystals over cheek and jaw and suspending a single dangling diamond earring from his left ear, and they've frosted his unblemished eyelid with shimmery pearl eyeshadow.

The makeup looks great with his bleached-blond hair, toned a pale gold to compliment the warmth of his skin tone and the amber contact lenses that fail to obscure the heat in his snowflake's eyes.  He's bright to Xiumin's pale, a spark against ice, and the Snow King loves the illusion that his once-vivid snowflake is frosting over, color leaching from his body in an echo of how frozen and pale he'll be when his blood is drained onto the ice.

It'll almost be a shame to watch the heat fade from those so-intense eyes.

That heat is in searing evidence as the Snow King snaps the diamond-encrusted leash to his snowflake's collar, as Xiumin leads the boy barefoot through the snow, as he kneels at his master's feet in the back of the white limousine, and as he's paraded into his former family's ballroom.  It's always a pleasure to saunter through a crowd that folds in half around him, and the Snow King allows himself a little smile as he makes his way onto the dais at the head of the room.

The throne the Siheung Kims have provided for him is a pleasing white powder-coated wrought-iron filigree with tufted silvery cushions.  It compliments his ensemble so well he immediately knows that someone bribed his stylists for hints before designing the chair, but as it's not tacky or too matchy-matchy he decides not to threaten any of their tiny dogs.  It's also quite comfortable, further improving his mood.

Someone has evidently spared a thought for his snowflake as well, because there's a matching silvery kneeling cushion waiting to the left of his feet.  The Snow King jerks the diamond chain, tugging his snowflake down to kneel on his right. The boy's expression is blank, his hot gaze on the Snow King's face as he offers his bare knees to the laminated wood of the dais and assumes the proper inspection position.

Xiumin smiles down at him.  So many of his snowflakes dissociate if they don't crumble, sending their minds far from their humiliated bodies when subjected to degradation.  But this one never does—he's always present, always defiantly compliant, body obeying even as his spirit rebels. He doesn't even blush but remains entirely unabashed while observing his oppressor with accusatory eyes, as if to say,

You're doing this.  Any shame this act generates is yours.

But the Snow King is entirely shameless, and only smirks at his obedient, indomitable little snowflake.

The mother does indeed cry, but the older brother manages to hold it together this time, greeting the Snow King at the head of his family with a deep bow and only a brief glance at the boy kneeling where he should rightfully be.  But the replacement flake stares at his former family with a different sort of heat in his eyes than usual, making Xiumin curious as to the boy's hidden thoughts.

"Snowflake," the Snow King calls, tugging the leash to get the boy's full attention.  "You may address those you spent your life for, if you wish."

The snowflake directs his gaze to the man who was once the boy's father.  "It is my honor to finally be of use to our family," he says, voice soft but steady.  "Please remember me kindly."

The Snow King feels a brow twitch at the boy's unexpected self-memorial, then rolls his eyes as the sobbing mother has to be dragged away by a member of the Kim entourage.  He expected the sobbing, but he'd also expected this snowflake, like most of the others, to request their family pay the mercy price, though he wouldn't have been too surprised if the self-sacrificing boy had instead instructed his family not to waste the money when he'd die either way.

But instead, he hadn't mentioned mercy at all.  And his self-minimizing words are received with stoic nods from both male heads of the Kim family before they bow deeply to the Snow King and step aside.

It's as if his snowflake truly believes the bright spark of his young life is best used dying for his former family rather than living alongside them.  As if his suffering is unimportant.

And the man that had raised him and the man that had grown up with him had both nodded, in unison, without hesitation.  As if they agree.

And then they'd turned their backs and walked away without a backward glance.

It's a cold enough condemnation to send a chill down the Snow King's spine.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Jongdae can feel the eyes on him as he kneels semi-nude at the Snow King's feet, directly across from a cushion he's able to see but not use.  It's a fitting tribute to tonight's theme, where he's able to smell the food Xiumin eats but not taste it, able to see his mother but not comfort her, able to speak to his family but not reach them.

He mostly doesn't mind the stares and furtive glances, nor does he particularly mind how the Snow King himself rakes his eyes over Jongdae's exposed figure from time to time, between imperiously surveying the crowd.

But he really wishes his hyung would stop watching him with pitying eyes.

He doesn't need to be there in their limousine on the way home to know how that conversation is going to go.  Junmyeon, so guilt-ridden he could barely even look at Jongdae when the family greeted the Snow King, is going to beg his father to pay for mercy.  And his father is going to refuse. His mother will cry all night, probably making herself ill. And in the morning, Junmyeon will agree that Jongdae's death will remove a major financial drain on their family, and that throwing good money after bad rubbish is unwise and unnecessary.

But his angel hyung will feel guilty about Jongdae's death for the rest of his life.  Even in death, he'll be a burden to his family.

One more reason why he has to convince the Snow King to keep him alive.  Not to be returned to his family, of course, but just to be used by the criminal overlord for as long as he can make himself interesting and indispensable.  He'd felt a flicker of hope kindle faint in his gut earlier this evening when he'd realized the Snow King was whistling one of the songs Jongdae often sings while he cleans.  And he'd stopped the stylists as they'd dressed him, sticking a fresh pain patch to Jongdae's forearm to be covered by a furry gauntlet.

But the absolutely frigid glare he'd given Jongdae's family when they'd accepted his wish to be remembered well was more than a little disconcerting.  It makes him suspect that the Snow King plans to make Jongdae's death

very

memorable for his family, indeed.

Jongdae refuses to give in to despair though, instead letting his suspicions further motivate him to lodge himself so firmly into the Snow King's life that killing him will be as foreign an idea as falling in love for the heartless man.  
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
"Do you really think that wretch of a rabbit is better than you?" the Snow King interrogates when his snowflake is kneeling on the limo floor, shivering from his nearly-nude walk through the icy winter night.

The chilled boy gives him a look that implies that Xiumin is an idiot for even asking.  It's only on his face for an instant before it's back to the habitual blank frame for his simmering gaze, and his snowflake's voice only trembles a bit from the cold as he answers.

"I am the devil to Junmyeon's angel," the boy says.  "He would never be able to give you as much pleasure as I do."

The Snow King evaluates the boy at his feet.  "That isn't what I asked. I do not doubt that you are more entertaining than the one you sacrificed yourself to save, and I do not harvest from the same family if they have no more heirs to spare.  The Kim scion's child would need to be a decade old before I'd consider taking his sire, and two decades old before I'd consider harvesting him. Removing all leadership is bad for business, and I have no interest in children."

Xiumin shifts to rest his elbows on his splayed knees, pressing his fingertips together in contemplation.  "Your former family is safe, little snowflake. So tell me: Why do you believe yourself only useful to them as a blood sacrifice?  And why did none of you mention mercy?"

His snowflake shrugs, steadily meeting his gaze as he always does.  "I have no head for business, nor do I have a child to raise. And it's not truly mercy if I die anyway."

The Snow King purses his lips.  "I will not spare you," he says, voice more gentle than he meant it to be.  He hardens his voice and his face as he regards his self-dismissing snowflake.  "You are far braver, much tougher, and more steadfast than the Kims' current heir.  Business can be taught; character cannot. They were idiots to allow you to take his place."

His snowflake's face flickers between scowl and smile, settling again into neutrality before he speaks.  "If he weren't doomed to die to demonstrate your power, what would you do with a man of this character?"

The Snow King blinks, feeling the melancholy radiating from the boy like a frozen fist in his own gut though his snowflake's heated gaze never wavers from his face.  It truly is a shame his former family made such a regrettable mistake. This steel-spined boy could have gone far in the organization.

"A wise father would have kept you close and trained you well," Xiumin says eventually.  "You'd have made a good arbiter, I'd think."

The Snow King leans back, unbuckling his belt and unzipping his fly.  "We'll be home in twenty minutes. You'd better have swallowed my load by then."

His snowflake gets to work with even more dedication than usual, and despite his best efforts to hold off, the boy is choking on his spend with three minutes to spare.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
It requires serious effort, but Jongdae manages to have all of his offerings wrapped and laid out neatly in the Snow King's favorite playroom before Xiumin drags him into the room by his hair.

"What the fuck is all this?" the Snow King demands to know, tugging his snowflake's hair with more force.  "Did

you

make this mess?"

"Yes," Jongdae answers, not bothering to suppress the pride in his voice.  "Happy Valentine's Day."

For a full thirty seconds, the Snow King may as well be an ice sculpture.

"Fucking

why?

"  Xiumin's fingers are still snarled in Jongdae's hair, keeping him kneeling at an awkward angle that is making his cracked ribs shriek in protest.

"Why not?" Jongdae answers.  "I'm not a girl, but I'm the one getting fucked, so I figured this was my day."  He manages not to laugh at his double entendre.

"Oh, you're getting fucked, alright," the Snow King snarls.  "And then you're going to clean all this shit up and throw it away."

Having anticipated a similar reaction, Jongdae sets the trap.  "Can I at least eat the muffins? They're dark chocolate blueberry, and I worked really hard on them."

There's a pause, then Jongdae's hair is released as the Snow King crosses the floor to the stainless steel ledge that runs along the back wall of the playroom.  He picks up one of the little muffins from the tidy pile on the white bone china plate, stripping it of its wrapper and taking a cautious bite. Jongdae has to keep his eyes on the slanted cement floor in order not to grin at how much the powerful overlord resembles a cautiously-curious chipmunk.

"I'm keeping the muffins," the Snow King declares.  "But this 'bouquet' of weeds is disgusting, and I don't even want to know what random shit you've wrapped up and strewn about.  Throw it out."

"If you insist.  But if you don't want the jewelry, could I give it to the stylists?  It's way too masculine for them, of course, but they worked really hard to get it here and if the effort was wasted, they may as well get a bonus for their trouble, anyway."

The Snow King grabs a paddle from the rack on the wall, and Jongdae braces both hands and both feet flat on the floor, shoving his bare ass in the air to be swatted.

Xiumin delivers two stinging strikes.  "How dare you use

my

stylists to bring you anything?  And where the fuck did you get this supposed jewelry?  Is it made of noodles?"

"Of course not—it's some of my own jewelry, from my old life, only it'll look way better on you than it ever did on me.  And your stylists were bringing it to

you.

I get nothing from this.  I just asked your stylists to talk to mine, told them what pieces I had in mind for you, and let them basically keep what they wanted from the rest of my stuff."

Two more strikes land on his ass.  "You gave them all your jewelry?"

"They probably didn't take

all

of it.  I had some really tacky pieces."  Jongdae shifts his weight slightly to favor his casted arm.

Another two strikes rain down.  "Why would you give away what's legally your former family's property?"

"My family doesn't care much for legal when it comes to things they want.  And I wanted to give you something I once enjoyed, something valuable enough not to insult you."

Three swats this time.  "Is this your attempt to buy mercy for yourself since the disloyal family you had the bad luck to be born into hasn't made any inquiries at all in that direction?"

Jongdae doesn't let his face fall at this news.  It's what he expected, after all. "Of course not.  I meant them as gifts. I just want you to have something to remember me by."

A pause, and then the paddling begins in earnest, making Jongdae close his eyes and grit his teeth to keep his sore arm braced and his asscheeks relaxed.  He counts a dozen blows before Xiumin stops, breathing heavily enough to be heard from two meters away.

"The fuck else is in those boxes, and where did you get it?"

"It's all from my old room.  There's a framed photo of me in my best suit, since you seem to have a thing for snazzy formal wear.  And there's a memory stick with my final vocal performances from when I earned my degree, since you seem not to hate it when I sing."

The snow king pelts him with blow after blow until Jongdae's ribs and arm are protesting more than his battered ass.  He loses count after twenty, having to concentrate entirely on maintaining his position and breathing through the pain.

The wooden paddle hits the cement floor with a clatter.

"Get the fuck out," the Snow King commands.  "The master bathroom better be fucking

immaculate

."

Jongdae gets the fuck out, stumbling and wincing, adding a grin to the mix as soon as he's safely out of the Snow King's sight.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King scowls down at the pair of bracelets, handful of rings, half a dozen necklaces, and scads of earrings that occupied the painstakingly-wrapped packages his snowflake had left on the stainless steel shelf.  It's all tasteful, attractive, and undoubtedly valuable, and the kid wants to give it to the man that's going to kill him. On a holiday for lovers, no less.

What the

fuck

is wrong with this kid?

He could have easily bought at least some minor mercy with all of these trinkets.  Xiumin would have happily accepted it. This snowflake is more like a shard of ice, hard and glittering and beautiful.  He endures everything so well, but forcing tears from those molten eyes has become a challenge for the playroom, not the Iceterisk.

His former family

really

fucked up when they'd let him go.

He picks up the memory stick that evidently contains his snowflake's crowning achievement.  He'd sounded so proud when he'd told Xiumin what it was. And this stupid photo—the kid displaying the bright, sunny grin Xiumin has only caught the barest glimpse of, heated eyes stoked into gleeful crescents.

It's downright painful how desperate the boy is to be remembered.  Does he truly believe himself so forgettable?

More importantly, why do you care?

He shouldn't.  He never has before.  He's quenched life after life without emotion, so why is he dreading the start of spring?  Why does the thought of blood sliding over ice set his stomach churning instead of igniting his desire?

Why are these fucking muffins so fucking delicious?

Abandoning his snowflake's treasures on the steel shelf, Xiumin strides out of the playroom, pausing for a moment to lock the door behind himself.  He has the only key, so nobody will disturb anything while he threatens to make his cook roast one of the stylist's dogs. Nothing happens in Kyungsoo's kitchen without his knowledge, which means he's got to know about this muffin-baking nonsense.

"I didn't help him," Kyungsoo denies.  "I just let him look through the cookbooks and answered when he asked what your favorite flavor was."

"You allowed him to shirk his duties," Xiumin accuses.

"He came down here at the asscrack of dawn, and he set a kitchen timer so he could scurry back to his pallet and be there when you woke up."

"You let him waste ingredients."

"He paid for them.  Or rather, I did, once he gave me this bracelet."  The chef twists his wrist, showing off his new trinket.  "And he only ruined two batches before he figured it out.  Plus I made him write down his final recipe, so I could make them again for you since they turned out so well."

The Snow King scowls.  He's frustrated but not surprised that his fearless chef has set himself as a shield for his equally-fearless snowflake.  He really can't allow this insubordination to stand.

"One of your precious egg hens will be on the table for dinner tonight," Xiumin informs his chef, feeling a surge of gratifying power at the flicker of dismay that oh-so-briefly distorts his chef's impassive face.

"Yes, Boss," he bows.

Xiumin turns on his heel and marches to find his fickle stylists.  Ignoring their screams, he shoves all five of their little beasts into a too-small kennel, hauling it away despite their desperate pleas.

Three hours later, he returns the dogs, alive and well but with short, unflattering, uneven haircuts and ugly random patches of piss-yellow and shit-green dye.

They'd given him courtesy chocolate that morning, after all.  And they hadn't revealed his secrets or cost him time or money.  The insult was only to his dignity, and only in private, so this time, the puffballs can live.

Unlike his snowflake.  That boy definitely has to die.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Jongdae doesn't see the Snow King for three days.  He gets up from his thin pallet in the laundry room, performs that weekday's scheduled duties, then finds something to clean for the rest of the day, singing all the while.

At some point long after the sun has set, Kyungsoo comes to tell him he's been permitted supper.  Jongdae eats his only meal in the back of the kitchen, chatting a little with the chef who's taken a liking to him.  Yet he doesn't linger in the company of the petite, handsome man. He doesn't want to get the chef in trouble, and he has no idea where the Snow King is or when he's likely to appear and drag Jongdae off by the hair.

On the fourth day, Jongdae is starting to worry a little bit.  He'd thought he'd had the volatile criminal overlord figured out.  Every time he'd managed to surprise the Snow King into seeing his snowflake as a person, even for a moment, Xiumin had retaliated by asserting his absolute power more strenuously than usual.  Then he'd retreated for the rest of the day, only to treat Jongdae like nothing had happened in the morning.

Evidently, the Valentine's Day gifts had been too much for the heartless man to handle.  He'd punished everyone that had had anything to do with Jongdae or his plan in one way or another, and now he's been ghosting his entire household for half a week.  Kyungsoo himself hasn't even seen the Snow King, merely leaving food outside his bedroom or study and removing empty dishes later.

The first day, Jongdae had been deliberately avoiding the Snow King to give him space to cool off.  He doesn't need two broken arms. The second day he'd gone about his usual business, and the third day he'd actively searched for Xiumin, deducing he'd been holed up in his study all day.  However, even though Jongdae could hear the man shifting in the room beyond the closed door, he hadn't been brave enough to disturb the Snow King's solitude.

But today, Jongdae is going to seek him out and interrupt him.  He needs to force himself back to the forefront of the Snow King's mind, because he only has four weeks left to convince the cold, unfeeling man to let his snowflake live.

Yet perhaps "unfeeling" is an unfair descriptor, because it's clear to Jongdae that over the last eight weeks, Xiumin has come to have if not feelings, then

opinions

about his snowflake beyond his prowess at making the Snow King climax.  He's still scornful of Jongdae's family, but now it seems to be for giving him up, for not paying for mercy.  He compliments Jongdae on more than his sexual appeal. And once or twice since the Lunar New Year ball, he's asked Jongdae's opinion on something business-related while fucking him.

Jongdae's not sure that last thing is a good sign.  On the one hand, opinions aren't sought from sex toys or furniture.  On the other, if Jongdae's doing his job, the man buried in his ass or mouth shouldn't have brainpower left to think about business, and he should be moaning too much to ask about it.

But still.  It's at least proof that Xiumin

notices

Jongdae, even if there's little evidence—aside from the medical treatment—that the hard man actually cares.

Jongdae must make him care within the next twenty-seven days.

So it's Jongdae rather than Kyungsoo who delivers the lunch tray to the Snow King's study, rapping on the carved satinwood door with confidence he's not sure he actually feels.

"Just leave it," comes Xiumin's voice.

Jongdae doesn't leave it.  He tries the door handle, finding it unlocked, so he pushes the door open and strides into the elegant study wearing a bright smile.

"Your lunch, Boss," he announces.  "And your cockwarmer."

Feline eyes stab into Jongdae like frozen knives.  "Get out."

But Jongdae only sets the tray on the desk, smiling wider as he rounds the wide slab of ebony.  "Or what? Gonna beat me? Fuck me? You should—you seem quite tense. Let your snowflake help you to relax."

Jongdae drops to his knees and attempts to crawl beneath the desk, but he's stopped with a fist in his hair.

What does it say about Jongdae that the painful tug against his follicles is a huge relief?  That the fingers tight against his scalp feel like old friends?

"I said, get out," the Snow King reiterates through a snarl.

Jongdae can't lift his head so he just smirks up at Xiumin through his lashes.  "Make me."

The Snow King explodes up out of his seat, still gripping Jongdae's hair painfully.  Jongdae has no doubt that Xiumin is stronger and will easily overpower him, but while he has the element of surprise, he steps forward, pressing himself against the Snow King's body, one hand cupped over his groin, the other curving around the nape of his neck to pull him in for an open-mouthed kiss.

Almost as soon as their lips touch, Xiumin releases Jongdae's hair in favor of delivering simultaneous sharp strikes to his shoulders with the heels of his hands, sending him flying to the floor, ass and ribs and elbows stinging on impact.

"The fuck is wrong with you?" the Snow King interrogates.  "Why are you like this?"

Jongdae shrugs, assuming the inspection position.  "It's my duty to make you want me. To keep you entertained.  To relieve your stress." He smiles up at the furious overlord.  "It's my honor to perform that duty."

"It's your duty to suffer and die," Xiumin spits back.  "Are you honored to perform that, too?"

Jongdae purses his lips.  "I'll do my best not to shame my family if you insist that's to be my fate.  But I honestly think you'd benefit more from keeping me alive."

"Of fucking course you do," the Snow King dismisses.  "And your former family is already shamed. They could partially redeem themselves by buying you mercy, but as it is, whether you're stoic or screaming, the underworld will forever remember how the Siheung Kims threw you to the wolves without blinking and never looked back."

"Good," Jongdae says, jutting his chin out.  "The other families will see them as unsentimental and uncompromising.  If they care nothing for the life of their son, they'll think nothing of ending a rival's life."

Xiumin throws his head back and laughs, a harsh, derisive sound.  "If they'd treated their eldest as they're treating you, then perhaps.  But since baby hyung cried and let his brave little dongsaeng replace him without a word, 'sentimental' and 'compromised' are probably the least harmful things the underground whispers."

He sobers, then frowns at Jongdae.  "But that was good. You're clever, think well on your feet.  Whether the Siheung Kims thrive or fail after you've paid their price, they'll still have lost the better son."

Jongdae scowls right back, tired of letting his family bear censure for his own decision.  "This was my choice," he reminds the Snow King. "I don't want to die, but I also wouldn't want the situation reversed.  Having to live in my brother's shadow, raise his child, take over his duties—I'd forever be living

his

life, not my own.  I'd be so guilt-stricken that I'd dissolve into my father's puppet, doing or saying whatever he told me to for the family's benefit, forsaking all original thoughts for the rest of my days yet still never measuring up to their canonized eldest son."

Jongdae shakes his head.  "My life is forfeit either way, but at least this way, I'm still

me

, and I only have to measure up against myself."

Xiumin gazes at him for a long moment, thoughts inscrutable behind unblinking eyes.  "Your logic is sound. You want to relieve my stress? Sort this fucking mess out."

He gestures to the rainbow of sticky notes marching across the ebony surface in a tidy grid.  While Jongdae's still standing up to lean over the desk in an attempt to ascertain what the Snow King wants from him, the man picks up the tray of food and strides out, shutting the door behind him.

Jongdae slides the burgundy leather chair off to the side so he can kneel behind the desk, body supported over his knees so he can see the note-covered surface.  It takes him several read-throughs of the evidently color-coded notes, but he eventually understands that it's a diplomatic nightmare.

Three families are fighting over control of the money-laundering branch of Xiumin's empire.  They're all equally good at it, but there are too many cooks in the kitchen and they all have different preferred methods.  Each family has at least an heir and a spare, and Xiumin seems to want to form an alliance between two of the three families via a marriage, consolidating the operations and reducing the posturing, feuding, and squabbles for superiority.

Of course, there are several problems with this plan.  First, whichever family isn't included in the alliance will violently object to being ousted, even though Xiumin plans to reshuffle them into another branch of operations.  And then there's the issue of which children could marry—in this underground world, the gender of the participants is irrelevant, as is whether they want to be married to each other.  As Jongdae well knows, children—especially second children—exist to strengthen the family through any avenue required.

But Jongdae knows the kids in question.  Most of them are his drinking buddies, one of the girls is his ex, and one of the boys is a long-time crush.  And he knows their families, and as Xiumin has carefully noted, many of their relatives have clan conflicts that would complicate a marriage.

Jongdae may be a fuckup, but he's generally well-liked in his former social circle, and one of the reasons for that is his ability to anticipate and meet a companion's needs.  He can do that because he pays attention, because he gets to know people really well, so he's grinning in triumph as he starts to rearrange Xiumin's neatly-written notes.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King spends his afternoon in the gym and at the shooting range, honing his body and centering his mind.  His life will return to normal in a mere four weeks, he'll demonstrate his power and prove his dominance. And he's set himself a nice little treat when he gets home, giving himself an excuse to beat his snowflake bloody when he discovers the boy hasn't solved all his problems for him.

Except that he can hear his snowflake singing when he pauses outside the office door.  But the boy sings almost constantly, seemingly unconsciously, regardless of mood or predicament, so that could mean nothing and probably does.

He throws the door open with a bang, smirking when the boy jumps even as he chides himself for being so childish.  But then his snowflake's face lights up with a brilliant grin, lips curling up at the corners like a banner unfurling.

"I'm so glad to see you!" he crows.

Xiumin snorts.  There are a handful of people in the world that he expects to be glad to see him, and the snowflake he's going to slaughter isn't one of them.

"Look—I've solved your little puzzle

and

planned out the wedding seating so none of the feuding clans have to interact."

The Snow King lifts a brow, casting his eyes over the sticky notes.  The other brow joins the first as he takes in his snowflakes proposed plan.  "You're recommending three weddings and two hits?"

The boy nods.  "That's the tidiest.  You could leave Mr. Kim alive, but he's an asshole and nobody will miss him.  His daughters certainly won't, and once he's dead and they're married off, there's one less Kim family to keep track of.  And to be honest, while the second hit is politically useful, it's also for my own vindication, because I know Baek's wife is the worst kind of terrible human being, trapping him into marriage with a pregnancy that isn't even his.  He'll be much happier married to Yeol, even if neither of them are gay."

"Wait.  You want to put out a hit on a pregnant woman?"

His snowflake shrugs.  "That's up to you. If you kill her before the kid is born, then the Chois lose everything.  They have no claim to any of the Byun assets without the kid. But if you want to give them a chance to save some face, keep them committed to the organization, then wait for the kid to be born or at least old enough to survive a C-section.  Use DNA testing to prove that the kid isn't Byun's, but then he and Park could graciously adopt the child as their heir, since they're certainly not going to be producing one together."

The Snow King snorts.  "You really think forcing two straight men to get married is a good idea?"

The boy nods.  "I mean, I know them.  They're loyal to their families, so they'll accept the on-paper marriage as dutiful sons.  And they're also best friends, so they'll love sharing a home even if they never share a bed, and they'll be great parents.  By declaring the kid their heir, any future dalliances on either side won't be as likely to be motivated by a pregnancy-power-grab, nor will either family feel like the heir is more one family or the other's, since it's genetically related to neither of them.  Then the Chois can play the doting grandparent role but be unable to raise the child as horrifically as they raised their own."

Xiumin considers.  "And then marry Taeyeon and Hyoyeon to the Park or Byun of their choice?"

His snowflake nods.  "The families will be linked—probably under Byun's name since he's a few months older, and having a less common name helps keep things sorted a little better.  So it won't really matter who the Kim girls marry, just that they tie their assets and allegiances to the new Byun-Park conglomeration somehow. Hell, if they don't want to marry, they could just be adopted."

"Hmm."  Well, now if Xiumin wants to beat the snot out of his snowflake, he either needs a new excuse or to admit he's itching to break something.

Eh.  His snowflake takes it so well regardless.  As soon as the Snow King makes any motion to punish or fuck him, he assumes the position.  He's so fucking

good

for Xiumin, and now he's proven himself well connected and socially adept.

The Siheung Kims' eldest might have business acumen and an heir, but the younger brother has wit and charm.  He doesn't need stodgy skills himself, because he probably knows someone who does, and if he can talk the Snow King's staff into doing him favors while wearing nothing but his snowflake collar and a cast, how fucking formidable would he be in elegant clothes with a wallet full of cash?

Hell, he's fucking formidable

now

.

Well, fuck.

At least he has a good reason to punish the hell out of his snowflake now.

"Tonight, you get dinner

and

dessert.  This has been driving me mad for days," Xiumin pronounces.

Jongdae beams at him, and Xiumin hates how much the expression suits his snowflake.

"But first, it's a good thing that you spend most of your time on your knees, because I'm about to cane the fuck out of the bottoms of your feet."

Was that a pout?  The protruded lip is pressed into stoic alignment so quickly, Xiumin isn't sure.  The boy says nothing, but those molten eyes are burning with a far different fire than had lit them a moment ago.

"I'd like to be able to reward your brilliance and leave it at that, but some spunky little asshole decided his life was worth shit.  Now instead of breaking some spoiled, over-educated, sniveling husk of a human being, I have to personally eliminate what could have been the greatest asset this organization has seen in a long time.  This is really starting to piss me the fuck off."

For the first time, Xiumin's snowflake drops his eyes.

"You don't

have

to kill me," he mumbles, sweeping those luxe lashes off chiseled cheekbones to look the Snow King once again in the face.  "You know I'd work hard for you, however you wanted to use me."

And now the Snow King is livid, because his snowflake is deliberately attempting to evade his fate.

"I

do

have to kill you," Xiumin asserts.  "

You

made this choice, remember?  You don't want to take your former brother's place in life, so you're taking his in death.  Now march. The playroom with the cement floor, this time. It's harder to get blood off of it, and you'll be on your knees for days."

Onyx eyes hot as brands, Xiumin's snowflake marches.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
It's not so bad, being unable to walk.  Jongdae can still get his work done, and his knees are quite callused at this point, anyway.  Both feet are bruised and swollen and he's fairly sure that his right one is actually broken, but no dimpled doctor comes to x-ray and cast the injured limb this time.  He's just grateful beyond words that Kyungsoo came into the musty laundry room where he sleeps and slapped a pain patch on his arm a half hour before he was supposed to get up.

As long as he can function, as long as Jongdae has a purpose.

So he sings as he crawls through the villa, scrubbing, dusting, nudging a rolling step stool around so he can knee-walk up the rubberized steps to reach the tops of things, gritting his teeth as the metal edges dig into his shins.  He sings as he scoots down the stairs on his bare ass, polishing the spindles of the banister. He's silent, eyes squeezed shut and counting his breaths to distract himself as Xiumin fucks him while squeezing the broken foot in both hands, knowing he'd be screaming if the pain patch weren't doing its job.  And he sings again as he cleans himself up, alone in the playroom where he'd scrubbed cement with a toothbrush yesterday.

Jongdae sings with his entire soul, because he'd succeeded in his goal.  He'd gotten the Snow King to find him worthy of life. To see him as a person.  To acknowledge his value. But Jongdae is still a fuckup, so this success is just as useless as all his other triumphs.

The Snow King is going to execute Jongdae anyway.

"I stop time and go back to you.  I open your page in my book of memories.  I am there inside; inside that winter."

Jongdae sings so he doesn't sob.

"I try to find you, whom I can't see...  I try to listen to you, whom I can't hear..."
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King throws his third phone of the week against the marble pillar in the foyer, relishing the way the device shatters against the stone, sending pieces flying everywhere.  A shard of glass ricochets to nick his cheek just below his eye, and he wipes away the fragment along with a smear of scarlet.

Fitting that he should be crying tears of blood.

He's never been more fucking pissed in his whole fucking life.  And on top of that, he feels fucking

helpless.

He's the motherfucking Snow King.  He is

anything

but helpless.  He makes the fucking rules, sets the fucking bar, calls the fucking shots.  When he's this pissed, he finds whoever fucked up, whoever failed him, and then somebody dies and he feels better.

Except that he failed his own fucking self when he broke his own fucking rules, when he spared the rabbit and claimed the fox.  And somebody's going to die, alright.

But Xiumin definitely won't feel better.

He's going to have to send his stylists and Kyungsoo away for at least a month after the vernal equinox.  They're useful to him, good at their jobs, and he's sure he's going to find a reason to kill anyone around him after he has to end his snowflake.

Not just end him, but break him.  Force that always-singing throat to finally scream instead.

As if on cue, his snowflake's voice drifts from the landing above him.

"A very small and weak person, your love has changed all of my life, everything, all of the world..."

The Snow King snorts, grinding the ruins of his phone under his heel.  Fucking

love

has nothing to do with it, and his snowflake is far from weak.

He

has

managed to change fucking everything, though.  Somehow he's gone from plaything to... what? Pet?  Protege? Certainly not a partner.

Hell and fucking damnation.  Ten fucking days are all the kid has left.  It's the tenth of March, and the kid dies on the twentieth.  In fucking

agony

, because his worthless former family won't spare their plentiful profits to spare the kid his plentiful suffering.

Fucking

assholes

.  The Snow King has a long memory, and he won't forget the Siheung Kims' lack of mercy.

Memory

...

Xiumin's heel stills mid-crunch.  Fucking White Day. The kid's stupid gifts.

Leaving the wreckage of his phone scattered over the gleaming floor, the Snow King all but runs from the foyer to his bedroom, fingers shaking as he tears open the safe at the back of his closet.  He grabs the velvet bag into which he'd dumped all his snowflake's gifted trinkets, and grabs a new phone from the stack of devices on a closet shelf. He'd felt it wise to plan ahead, knowing his mood would only disintegrate further over the coming weeks.

Pausing in the foyer long enough to pluck his SIM card out of the debris, the Snow King summons his chauffeur as he darts outside without bothering to grab a coat.  Cursing in the cold, Xiumin once again rakes the Siheung Kims over the coals of his wrath. No, the Snow King will

not

forget their lack of compassion.

It'll make for a nice justification when he shows them absolutely none.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Jongdae is scrubbing the toilet in the master suite, trying to keep his voice steady as he works.  He's not having particular success, finding it harder to be stoic the closer his death looms. There's less than a week left, and Jongdae knows exactly what's coming.  He's attended the executions since he was sixteen, his father thinking it a good way to harden his flighty son.

That first year was the worst.  Every year after that, Jongdae had managed to get totally blitzed before being forced to stand glassy-eyed and blank-faced in the crowd of witnesses.  Sometimes he can remember bits and pieces, but usually the alcohol works to put a gauzy film between his brain and reality.

It's really too bad Xiumin has an alpha-dog's aversion to anything going near his asshole.  Jongdae would rim the Snow King all day long if he'd let him walk away from the Iceterisk.

It's not the pain he dreads.  He's fairly confident in his ability to face that like a man, for a while at least.  It will be systematic. He'll know what's coming next. He's learned a lot about breathing through pain and relaxing muscles.  He's sure he'll end up screaming eventually, but no matter how much it hurts, he'll never wish for it to be over.

The pain will mean he's still alive.

Then he's snickering into the sparkling porcelain bowl, because he has a head start.  At least two of the bones in his foot are already broken.

His sardonic laughter is interrupted by fingers in his hair.  They tug, but they don't yank, and Jongdae glances up to try to gauge the Snow King's mood.  It's been erratic lately, Xiumin alternately ignoring and abusing him, and it seems like they're about to enter another abuse cycle.

But the Snow King just urges Jongdae to his feet, frowning when his snowflake balances unsteadily on his left leg.  Then he bends to catch Jongdae behind waist and knees, actually lifting him into well-muscled arms and carrying him.

And before Jongdae can recover from the surprise of

that

, Xiumin deposits him onto the soft gray coverlet that graces the Snow King's own bed.

Then Xiumin fucks him, which he was expecting ever since the Snow King grabbed his hair.

What he's not expecting is for Xiumin to do so face-to-face, or for the man to prep him first, with actual lube and everything.  He's not expecting the frosty man to press hot lips against his throat below the platinum collar and suck marks against his skin.  He's not expecting the Snow King's hand around his cock, and he fights off his orgasm desperately, biting his lip when Xiumin changes angles to start providing Jongdae with prostate stimulation.

He's not expecting Xiumin to actually let his snowflake come.  Yet the Snow King murmurs, "Let go, Jongdae-yah," and that's all it takes.

He comes apart beneath the familiar-yet-foreign assault, because Xiumin said he could, because the mighty, frigid Snow King knows his fucking

name

.

Jongdae whimpers and sighs and moans, practically yelling his satisfaction to the sky as his dick throbs again and again in Xiumin's fist.  And then the Snow King is grunting his own release, pouring himself into Jongdae's body rather than striping his spend over his snowflake's skin.

And then he leans down and fucking

kisses

that snowflake, just a brief slide of panting mouths against each other, Jongdae almost too stunned to respond.  But respond he does, sucking Xiumin's plump lower lip between his lips for a slick caress before the Snow King pulls back and pulls out.  Then he disappears from sight, leaving Jongdae clenching his ass desperately, trying not to foul the Snow King's bedding and also trying to figure out

what the fuck

just happened.
 
❆❅❆❅❆

You should

not

have done that.  That was a fucking

mistake.

Panting, Xiumin leans over the bathroom sink, bracing himself against the porcelain with one hand while scrubbing his softening cock clean with a flannel in the other.

What the fuck had he just done?  It was meant as a sample of his mercy, but evidently watching—and fucking

hearing

—his snowflake climax made him lose his motherfucking mind.

Now everything is going to be so much worse.

He throws the soiled rag in the wicker hamper in the corner, then gives himself a final rinse before shrugging into the silk dressing gown hanging neatly on the hook behind the bathroom door.  He knots the navy blue garment closed before grabbing two more flannels, wetting one and soaping up a corner. Jongdae is still panting bewildered on the bed and Xiumin can't look at his wrecked face because if he does his mind will replay the sweetest moan he's ever heard, the loudest sound his snowflake has ever made beneath the Snow King's hands.

Fucking

hell

.

He cleans his snowflake up efficiently, telling himself he cares about his comforter rather than the boy's comfort, then goes to toss the rags in the hamper and retrieve the whole point of this stupid little "date."  He dumps the velvet bags of jewelry over the bed, spilling shining rings, bracelets, chains, and earrings over the matte gray fabric.

His snowflake only blinks at him, supporting his torso on bent elbows.

"Happy White Day," the Snow King says.  "A gentleman should return thrice what he's given on Valentine's Day, so I had your jewelry appraised and bought three times that amount."

His snowflake licks his stupidly-tempting kittenish lips.  "Why?"

"Because your former family fucking sucks, that's why," Xiumin snarls.  "This isn't enough to spare you all of it, but it'll save you from at least the last third.  I won't go easy on you, but I will try to pace things so that you can take it, and I won't draw it out.  I'll do my best for you, so we'll be far enough along that I can justify ending you when you start to struggle."

"I'd rather struggle than die.  Unless these trinkets can buy my life, I'm not interested," the boy says.

Xiumin scowls.  "Why the fuck not?  You know I can't spare you.  At least spare yourself some needless agony."  When the boy doesn't respond, Xiumin tries a different tack.  "You wanted me to have something to remember you by, right? That's what you said when you gave me your jewelry.  So accept mine and use it to buy enough mercy so that I can remember you by that sexy fucking moan instead of your screams of pain."

But his snowflake only looks at him with those molten black eyes, liquid with something softer than fury.  "I don't want a merciful death. I don't want death at all," he states. "If you insist on killing me, I'm not going to make it easy for you.  I'll let you know exactly how much agony you're putting me through, sear my suffering into your skull."

The boy tilts his head back, displaying the hickeys Xiumin had given him and pinning him with onyx lasers shielded by thick lashes.  "Keep me alive, and I'll moan for you whenever you want."

"Get the fuck out," the Snow King snarls.  "I offer you mercy and instead you promise to be a pain in my ass?  How fucking dare you."

"How fucking dare you foolishly end 'the greatest asset this organization has seen in a long time?'" his snowflake spits back as he slides off the bed to land on his knees.  "You'll never find anyone like me, anyone who'll take your cock so well, anyone that can take all the beatings you can dish out and smile when you offer more. I'll happily be your punching bag, your personal cumdumpster, your very own whore, ready anytime and anyplace to make you feel so fucking good."

"Get out!" Xiumin demands, rising from the bed himself to literally kick the boy out of his room.

"You'd better fucking keep me alive," his snowflake shouts as he's slid over hardwood on his knees.  "You'd better fucking

use

me, let me solve your problems, let me suck your stress away."

Xiumin shoves the boy out into the hallway and slams the heavy door behind him.

"You said my family were idiots for letting me die," his snowflake yells through the polished wood.  "So what the fuck does that make you, if you're the one so fucking eager to end me?"

The Snow King yanks the door back open.  "

You brought this on yourself!"

he roars.  "You fucking volunteered, and I'm not called the fucking Snow King because I'm soft and fluffy and full of empty threats.  I may look like a white-capped mountaintop, quiet and still and distant, but I'm a motherfucking avalanche, cold and deadly and unstoppable.  Seoul's elite cannot be allowed to forget that I will fucking

crush

any competition.  I

will

break you down to keep their spirits broken."

"So fucking break me," the bold, black-eyed boy yells back.  "Shatter my bones, spill my blood, make your fucking point. Just don't fucking

kill

me."

They glare at each other, panting in syncope, for several long moments.

Then the Snow King steps back into his room and slams the fucking door, sending the mirror on the wall beside it crashing to the ground.

Ignoring the mess, he storms to the ornate French doors that dominate the eastern wall, throwing them open and stepping out into the brisk March night, letting the cold air sap his rage.

Idiot boy

.  The Snow King would never get the same respect from breaking his snowflake down but failing to kill him, especially for no reason at all.

No reason except that Xiumin couldn't bear to silence his snowflake's song forever.

Fucking soft.

Fucking

weak.

How the fuck did this happen, anyway?  He's the motherfucking Snow King, damn it.  He's hard and frosty and implacable, not an angst-ridden teenager.  The boy means nothing, just like they all had, and if the boy won't accept his mercy, then none will be given.

The Snow King grits his teeth against the chill seeping beneath the navy blue silk robe, but he lifts his face to meet the snowflakes beginning to drift down over cement and steel, tile and turf.  They land soft as a whisper against eyelids and cheekbones, frozen crystals forced to melt against his heated skin.

When he finally sighs and drops his head, droplets stream down his cheeks, snowmelt mixed with saline, sparking his snowflake's glowing tenor to twist through his mind.

Each snowflake is a drop of your tears

, the boy often sings, and now it's literally true.

Swiping at his face with impatient hands, Xiumin goes back inside, frowning when he sees the shards of gleaming glass strewn over the bamboo and rosewood parquetry.  They reflect the color of the lucky paper lantern hanging above them, chaotic crimson fragments interrupting the orderly interlocking diamonds that form pale six-pointed stars against a sea of satin black.

Grabbing a wastebasket from under the scroll-top desk in the corner, he crouches to pluck silver slivers with careful hands.  But his hands are still unsteady from adrenaline and numb from cold, and it's only inevitable that blood drips onto bamboo from a cut Xiumin didn't even feel.

Cursing, he drops the pieces in his hands into the bin, then brings his bleeding finger to his mouth.  He should have just called the boy and made him do it, but he doesn't want the infuriating git in his sight.  It's bad enough the boy's song is stuck in his head.

The one thing I can't do is bring you back to me.  I wish I didn't have this useless power anymore.

That's how his snowflake's sad little song goes, but the Snow King's power is far from useless.  If he wants the boy at his side, that's where he'll be.

But the underworld he rules must still be reminded they'll be forever on their knees before him.

Rising to his feet, Xiumin turns his back on the shattered mirror, wishing it were so easy to turn his back on the boy he plans to break.  But the little fucker has stabbed into the Snow King's life like glass beneath a fingernail, and Xiumin hadn't fucking noticed until he was already bleeding for the boy.

So he picks up phone number six from his nightstand, tapping the contact he calls most frequently.

"Yixing.  Change of plans."
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Jongdae is practically naked, but he's grateful for the cold seeping up from the ice beneath his bare feet.  He can blame his shivering on that and not the fact that he's about to be obliterated beneath the Snow King's breaking bars, literally marked for death.

The dimpled doctor had grinned the whole time as he prepared the sacrificial lamb, drawing careful blueprints on his bare body with a black marker, lines of permanent ink marking out the precise place for Xiumin to land his blows to break skin and shatter bones without sending his victim into shock for as long as possible.

Jongdae tried not to pay attention to exactly how many lines now stripe his skin.  Nor does he look at the surgical stand whereon lay the implements of his doom.

Instead he keeps his spine straight and his eyes locked on the shining steel of the infernal asterisk set in the middle of the ice, looking as bright and innocent as the amusement park surrounding the indoor skating rink in which he'll spend his final moments.  The park was closed to the public for the day, bought out for the purpose of preparing bloody murder. Now, as the sun goes down on the last day of winter, the spectator stands fill with dour-faced adults instead of laughing children.

Soon Jongdae's life will stain the frozen surface of the rink, and the next day, children will happily skate on a fresh layer of frost, unaware of the blood beneath the supporting ice just as Seoul is ignorant of the shadows structuring the lives of ordinary citizens.

And as ignorant as the assembled crowd is of the secret Jongdae wears beneath his skimpy thong.

Jongdae had been absolutely stunned when the doctor had clipped away a swathe of his pubic hair and applied a pair of pain patches to the exposed skin.  The dimpled man had said nothing, but he'd given Jongdae a conspiratorial wink as he'd handed him the scrap of white spandex.

So Jongdae isn't feeling any pain as he walks to his doom, despite the vague crunching sensation in his broken foot.  However, he still has to concentrate to walk steadily, because he's well on the way to being high out of his fucking mind.

He should probably be more grateful.  But pain or no, he'll still be dead in a few hours.  And Jongdae is sure this ostensible act of mercy is more for Xiumin's sake than his.

After months of trying to make Jongdae scream, the Snow King suddenly seems averse to the sound.

Jongdae can hear his mother's hysterical sobs as the doctor straps him spread-eagled to the six-armed structure, arms and legs following the central X while the Snow King lays out instruments from the surgical cart along the flattened horizontal branches.  As always, the doctor hooks up a heart monitor and starts an IV to keep the snowflake's blood pressure up enough to avoid shock and loss of consciousness for as long as possible. It's evidently not as intimidating to watch someone break down a comatose corpse.

But instead of setting the IV into his neck, the grinning doctor places it in the crook of his elbow above the forearm from which he'd just removed the cast.  This forearm also has no linear markings, making him idly wonder through the painkiller fog why the Snow King seems uninterested in re-breaking the just-healed bone.

He doesn't seem to be planning to spare Jongdae's still-broken foot.  The lines on the bruised one match the ones on the other. But while he's staring at his feet, his eyes land on the shallow silver bowl that traditionally displays the pile of cash the victim's family has paid in return for mercy.  He expects it to be empty, or to maybe hold the tangle of jewelry Xiumin had tried to give him to buy an early end to his own life with. And indeed, the jewelry is there—along with the baubles Jongdae had offered the Snow King as a gift, much to Jongdae's offense—but it's supported by a towering pile of neatly-bundled banknotes.

Jongdae blinks at it for what feels like a long time while the two men bustle around preparing for his murder.  Perhaps the pain patches are making him hallucinate? They hadn't done that before, but these had bigger numbers on them than the ones he'd been given in the past, and he'd never before worn two at once.

It's a really big pile, and the rubber bands keeping the stacks of cash together are all different colors, like they didn't all come from the same bank.  That doesn't seem right, because his father only uses the bank run by the Parks, and while he does see bright orange bands on a good deal of the cash, there are at least three other banks represented.

He stares at it for several more heartbeats until he realizes that his old jewelry draped over the cash isn't what he gifted to the Snow King, after all.  It's the rest of it; the stuff he'd bequeathed to his stylists and Xiumin's. And the bracelet he'd given Kyungsoo. And a bunch of thick gold chains like the ones his brother likes to wear.

Sure now he's hallucinating, he darts his eyes away, catching his father's stony face in the crowd between his mother's stifled sobs and his brother's perplexed expression.  Then he snaps them quickly back to the bowl of cash to see if it's still there.

It is, but he keeps his gaze fixed on it, anyway.  He really doesn't want to watch his family watch him die.  Plus the jewelry reminds him of his friends, because they'd given him several of the older, tackier pieces when they were young and had no style.  Except he's pretty sure that sunburst pin is one Baek used to wear all the time, and that firey opal pendant is one of Chanyeol's favorites.

These pain patches must be full of the good shit.  He almost wants to laugh.

Instead, he presses his lips together, because the Snow King is stepping forward to give his traditional little speech about sacrifice and subjugation.

"I'm told that the proudest day of a man's life is when his son is born," Xiumin begins.  "It should therefore be the most devastating day of a man's life when that son dies. But I think that today, the man who sired Kim Jongdae should feel ashamed.  The woman who gave him birth and raised him is obviously devastated, but I propose that she also be proud of the man she raised. No one has ever volunteered in place of another before.  And the mercy bowl has never held more wealth."

The Snow King pauses, a sneer distorting his full lips.  "However, none of this wealth was provided by the man who sired my snowflake, though a great deal of it was provided by his eldest son against his father's wishes."

Jongdae looks up in surprise as the beginnings of a murmur ripple through the crowd.  His father is scowling at Junmyeon, hissing at him in a way Jongdae knows is usually accompanied by a slap to the back of the head, likely only omitted since all eyes are on them.  Jongdae's mother is staring at her husband with mouth agape, betrayal written all over her face.

"The rest of it," the Snow King says, lifting his voice slightly to recapture the attention of the crowd.  "Was provided by my snowflake's extensive network of friends and acquaintances, in compassion or gratitude or tribute.  Thirty-seven different people thought this boy's self-sacrifice was worth honoring, including members of my own staff who hadn't known him before the winter solstice."

The Snow King's eyes burn as he projects his voice over the ever-increasing noise of the assembled families.  "Let it be known that Kim Jongdae bought his brother's life with his own, yet his sire repaid him with dust. At least Kim Junmyeon considers his brother's sacrifice worthy of repayment, liquidating all assets not frozen by his father.  Let it be known that his friends added enough to convince me to consider his already-broken bones sufficient suffering, and end him before I even begin."

Xiumin selects a gleaming knife from the array of implements laid out on the Iceterisk's crossbeam, tossing it end-over-end to let it glitter before the crowd before catching it by the handle once again.  "And let it be known that Kim Jongdae refuses this offer of mercy, or any other that does not include his survival. Therefore, the accumulated wealth will be donated to provide scholarships to the music university he earned his vocal performance degree from, to spite his sire who believed the effort wasted and the expense frivolous."

Jongdae's not sure if he's relieved or disappointed that the shining blade is set back onto the crossbar without being drawn across his throat.  He's not sure about anything that's happening anymore. He half-believes he's hallucinating the whole fucking thing, his brain escaped to this delusion while his body is already being broken.

But then the Snow King picks up a crowbar, and Jongdae is

very

aware of reality after that.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
For the first time in the ten years the Snow King has been claiming snowflakes, he doesn't enjoy breaking one down.  He doesn't enjoy snapping carefully-selected bones in specifically-designated places, doesn't enjoy listening to his snowflake's pants and whimpers and eventual screams, doesn't enjoy the look of helpless betrayal drenched in snot and tears.

He certainly doesn't enjoy severing the boy's feet along Yixing's precisely-drawn lines, fretting instead of delighting in the gouts of hot blood that splash down to melt the ice before slowly freezing to become part of it.

But Yixing is a brilliant torturer because he's also a brilliant doctor, and no one in his care ever comes to more harm than he means them to.  He's right there beside Xiumin as his bonesaw harvests his snowflake's freshly-shattered feet, tying off the vessels that will bleed enough to kill the boy while leaving enough viable blood supply to allow the planned surgical follow-up to be successful.

As anticipated, the shock of the amputations makes the boy pass out, slumping against the bonds holding him spread against the Iceterisk.  Then it's easy enough to dislodge the heart monitor, letting the device emit the continuous tone of a flatline while the mother shrieks in her eldest son's arms.

It's nerve-wracking rather than satisfying to cut the boy's unconscious form down and let Yixing flop him onto the waiting stretcher, hauling a living body out of the ice rink for the first time.  But the Snow King stands firm, imperiously gazing at the crowd as his snowflake's blood drips off the bonesaw onto the ice instead of watching after Yixing and the boy.

"A man without feet can only kneel," Xiumin declares.  "The wise man kneels before the same is done to him."

The assembled families drop almost as one to bow formally to the Snow King from their knees, the mother's wail providing a suitably-jarring soundtrack.

Then Xiumin runs his fingers carefully along the flat of the bonesaw, crouching beside his snowflake's sire to swipe the boy's blood and bone fragments over the prostrate man's face from ear to chin.  He lays the still-gory saw where the kneeling man can easily see it, then saunters out of the rink.

His pace picks up as soon as he's outside the amusement park, practically jogging through the gloom to the waiting ambulance.  His racing heart is comforted by the sight of the prepared bags containing the Snow King's own blood that are dripping the life-sustaining fluid into his snowflake's IV.  He's further reassured by Yixing's grin as he raps on the windowed partition separating them from the cab, signaling the driver to take them back to the villa's medical suite where Yixing can stabilize the boy, close his wounds, and set his bones.

The heart monitor's beeping gets steadier as Xiumin's blood flows into his snowflake's battered body.  The Snow King brushes the boy's hair off his forehead, then presses a claiming kiss against the too-pale skin.

Tonight, Kim Jongdae was broken.

Tomorrow, a new dawn breaks.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
It seems reasonable that heaven would be so bright, but the constant beeping isn't exactly tranquil.

Jongdae groans his disapproval, squinting against the celestial light as the beeping speeds up.

"Ah.  Good morning, Chen."

The voice is smooth and low and familiar, as is the beautiful face that's suddenly interposed between his blinking eyes and the brilliant light.  The strong illumination from behind creates the impression of a halo, giving an angelic look to a man Jongdae knows to be the devil.

"Fuck," Jongdae croaks.

He's becoming more aware of his body, pain taking up residence as a dull ache that seems to pervade his entire being.  But he's more concerned by the fact that he can't move any of his limbs, can't even wiggle his toes. A flash of memory splits his skull wide with horror, mouth falling open as he stares at the thin green blanket draped over a body that tapers gracefully toward the end of the bed, fabric undisturbed by any protrusions below Jongdae's ankles.

He doesn't seem to have any toes to wiggle.

"Fuck," he rasps again, and the annoying beeping jumps up to a frantic pace.  His mind is sluggish, drug-muddled, yet one thought freezes, solid and crystalline in the slush of his brain. "Holy fuck, my fucking

feet

."

The cat-eyed devil looming over him presses full lips into a thin line.  "A snowflake falls to keep Seoul forever kneeling. A life has been ransomed, but the object lesson must remain."

Jongdae blinks at his absent feet.  The devil gives him a wicked little smile.  Is this hell, then?

No,

he decides immediately.  He's alive, fucking

alive

, and devil or no, he's grateful enough for the unexpected gift of his life to spend it kneeling at the Snow King's feet.

Unless Xiumin doesn't want him there anymore.

The beeping ramps up again.  "I'm staying?" he asks, twisting his neck to better see the man who broke him, then seems to have mostly put him back together.

"You can't really run away, now, can you?" the Snow King smirks.

The beeping slows.  "Okay," Jongdae says.

He breathes a deep sigh, and the beeping settles even more as his bleary gaze roams his body in an effort to take stock of himself.  His torso seems mostly fine except for sore ribs, but his arms are encased in rigid plaster from the armpit down, and while his legs are covered, they look thicker than usual beneath the blanket and attempts to move them are futile.  He's guessing they've been mummified, too.

It's going to be hard to get any work done like this.

He looks back up at the Snow King, blinking the back-lit man back into focus.  "I'm sorry, but... can I have a day off?"

The Snow King throws his head back and laughs, Adam's apple bouncing merrily.  "My industrious little Chen, you won't be scrubbing floors for two months."

Jongdae gapes.  "Oh," he says, dropping his head back against the disposable pillow.  Then he frowns as the Snow King's sentence circles back around his misty thoughts.  "You forgot my name." He tries not to pout. He's not sure he's successful.

"I did not," the Snow King states.  "Kim Jongdae died for his family. Kim

Chen

lives for his master."

It takes a moment for the sentences, short as they are, to be processed by the chilly mire of the injured man's brain.  All snowflakes are stripped of their name when they're claimed by the Snow King. But Xiumin had given his name back to him, in bed and then in the ice rink, acknowledging his identity and his family in front of the assembled crowd right before breaking him.

But now he's mending, alive, and he's been called far worse things by those soft, cruel lips.  He'd demanded to live, to be used by the beautiful, terrible man that reigns over Seoul with an unshakable icy grip invisible to most of the city's population.  If the Snow King wants his servant to answer to

Chen

, then Chen he shall be.

"Okay," Chen says, nodding his head once his sluggish thoughts are sorted.  "I'm Chen. Jongdae is dead."

A moment later, Chen tilts his head.  "Does everyone know I'm Chen now?" He doesn't want anyone to call him the wrong thing and get in trouble.

"Everyone knows Kim Jongdae is dead," Xiumin informs him.  "They all watched him die. My Chen will be introduced at the Sun Soirée just as the solstice dawns."

Chen smiles.  He enjoys the Sun Soirée.  It's when promotions are given, marriages and other alliances are officially announced, and heirs are formally introduced, the aurora of the longest day symbolizing the hoped-for length of these prosperous conditions.  It's a big barbecue party on a private beach starting at the break of day, and by noon everyone has shed suit jackets and shoes and rolled up sleeves and unbuttoned shirts, sharing food and booze and passing chubby babies around to be exclaimed over.  Those promoted spend one last day being treated as their former rank, hazed by their soon-to-be peers with a tolerant smile, newlyweds are hassled about sex and children, and new allies do their best to drink each other under the picnic tables.

Jongdae had always gotten hammered as soon as possible, then had made it his mission to get laid as many times as he was physically capable of.  His record was seven and a half times over the course of the fifteen-hour day—an irate father had interrupted one session before they could finish.

But then his brow furrows.  He's not Jongdae anymore and he won't be running around half-naked trying to catch his next partner's eye.  He'll be kneeling mostly-naked at the Snow King's feet, probably made to crawl through hot sand and over jagged seashells for his master's sadistic amusement, and he's sure to be sunburned to a crisp, which will give the Snow King many new options for painful punishments in the following weeks.

But he'll be alive to see that sunrise, so Chen can deal.  And perhaps he'll still be allowed to drink a little. Possibly he can use his blatantly-displayed body to convince Xiumin to fuck him once or twice.  And surely he'll be able to catch a glimpse of Junmyeon's new heir.

His smile makes a subdued return.  "Okay," he says again. "I will work hard to please you."

The Snow King favors him with a wide, gummy smile.  "My determined little Chen. You already do."
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King couldn't be more pleased with his rebuilt slave.  His little Chen has continued to prove himself worthy of life, doing everything he can to be a cooperative patient even though his broken limbs necessitate caring for the boy like an infant.  Xiumin himself hasn't visited the boy since the first day. He's not

soft

on the boy just because he spared his life.  But sometimes, he'll check on him when he's asleep, just to make sure he's resting well.  The Snow King wants his slave in working condition as soon as possible, so he has Yixing's nurse report directly to him morning and evening, keeping him apprised of Chen's progress.

The nurse, a dark, quiet youth tall and strong enough to easily shift the weight of slave and immobilizing plaster, has obviously grown quite attached to the patient he spends almost twenty-four hours a day with.  He wears a proud little smile as he dutifully goes over his meticulous notes, informing the Snow King exactly what goes into (and comes out of) Chen's broken body, how they're slowly weaning him off the pain meds, how they've started him back on oral nutrition.  His blood cell count is replenishing and his chemistries are normalizing as his body processes the byproducts of bone and muscle damage, and Chen is diligent about making sure he expands his lungs as much as he can to avoid pneumonia, making Xiumin pleased at Yixing's foresight to merely bruise the boy's ribs rather than break them.

He and Yixing had collaborated to give Seoul's elite the best possible show while allowing the boy to maintain as much dignity as possible, wanting him to be remembered as strong and fearless for the three months the organization believes him to be dead.  Now, Yixing is collaborating with the Snow King's chef to give Chen's broken body all that it needs to repair itself. Chen's fractures are clean, uncomplicated breaks in locations carefully chosen for rapid healing, easily accessible for Yixing to pin or plate or wire back together.  A measurable percentage of Xiumin's slave is now made of titanium, but thanks to meticulous planning and flawless execution, he should heal without loss of function.

Of course, the Snow King hadn't been nearly as careful with the boy's feet.  He'd shattered every bone he feasibly could, until they were nothing more than dangling lumps of pulverized flesh.  And then he'd done a beautiful job of cutting off the useless extremities, leaving enough dangling skin and muscle for Yixing to shape into tidy, smoothly-rounded stumps.  It would be perfectly comfortable for the boy to walk with prosthetic feet if the Snow King so deigned, but whether he replaces Chen's feet or not, Xiumin doesn't plan to leave his slave crawling on the ground for anyone but him.

On the contrary, Seoul's elite will kneel before his durable little Chen.

He's already commissioned several imperial-style gama, planning to have his new arbiter carried around in elegance and style by two sturdy young men he's subjecting to rigorous training, building their strength and stamina so they'll bear Chen's palanquins with grace and dignity.  And for the Sun Soirée, Seoul's elite will kneel in the sand as the Snow King's little surprise rides up the beach, handsome on a white horse.

He'll make a point of Chen's missing feet at the beginning, wanting to stick the bloody memory of the day Kim Jongdae died firmly in their minds.  But that will be the last time he'll allow the boy to be a spectacle for anyone else. At home, his slave will continue to serve him in the nude except for a collar and whatever accessories Xiumin feels the need to apply.  But in public, Chen will wear elegant, modernized hanbok, cut to emphasize the breadth of his shoulders and long enough to obscure his absent feet.

And the Snow King will seat the boy beside him, let him settle disputes and resolve conflicts, sorting out all of the tedious, complicated social situations that Xiumin abhors having to deal with.  He will support Chen's decisions, let him wield his master's power, make Seoul's elite fear and respect him.

And then he'll have two handsome boys carry him away within ornately-carved wood, reminding the organization over and over that no matter how much power someone has,

everyone

kneels before the Snow King.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
For the second time in his life, Chen is thrilled to death to be able to crawl.

Well, okay, the first time was technically in

Jongdae's

life, and he doesn't even remember it, having been a baby at the time.  But he imagines it must feel roughly the same; to be frustrated at your own immobility, your total dependence on others, and then to be able to roll over, sit up, and finally

move

.

He might have felt a little pathetic, to be so happy about a basic achievement he'd already mastered once upon a time.  But he's only excited and joyful as he places palm after palm, knee after knee, shifting his weight carefully from one mostly-healed limb to another.  It's fucking

exhilarating

after being trapped in a bed or a chair for so long, depending on his personal nurse (okay, more like his new best friend) to help him out with everything, including embarrassingly-personal tasks.

And then there's the look on the Snow King's face as Chen painstakingly travels down the runner of plush carpet custom-fit to form a cushioned track from the king-sized bed to the en-suite.  Xiumin is standing where the carpet makes a ninety-degree turn to head toward the bed, well-muscled arms crossed over his chest. But Chen doesn't make a sharp left to stay on the soft cobalt rug.  Instead, he slowly draws himself up into the formal inspection position, feeling the Snow King's contemplative gaze rake over his body.

Chen watches Xiumin's eyes bounce around, scanning his scarred body with a slightly-furrowed brow.  Evidently satisfied with what he sees, the Snow King gives a curt little nod.

"You're doing well, Chenny," he informs his slave.  "I'm pleased with your progress."

Chen smiles up at the Snow King.  "The medical staff say my bones are back to eighty percent of their strength, and that the more I use them, the faster they'll regain the rest."

"Without putting too much strain on them," Xiumin corrects.  "You'll resume your floorcare duties, but you'll stay away from stairs or reaching or climbing until Yixing clears you.  You'll keep three limbs on the ground at a time while you're working, and you'll carry a timer with you and take regular breaks to sit on that pretty ass and give your bones a rest."

Chen suppresses a frown.  "Yes, boss," he agrees.

Xiumin squats directly in front of his slave.  "You'll have physical therapy morning and evening, you'll continue to eat three meals a day, and you'll tell the medical team if you have any pain.  At this point, pain is a sign of a problem, so you will not ignore it. I need my new arbiter in top shape for the Sun Soirée."

"Yes, boss," Chen says again.  When Xiumin pats his own shoulders, Chen leans in for what could look like a hug, with his arms around Xiumin's neck and Xiumin's arms around his waist.  But then the Snow King stands up, and Chen flexes his abs as he draws his thighs up to clamp on either side of Xiumin's hips.

With Chen clasped to his torso like a koala against a eucalyptus tree, Xiumin makes his way to the bed, gently depositing the nude slave onto the soft gray comforter.  "You've worked hard today. You've earned yourself a little treat." The Snow King reaches to pull a bottle of lube from the side table.

Chen spreads his thighs in response, suppressing a smile.  He's "earned himself a little treat" (i.e. lube and prep instead of rough, careless penetration) every day since Yixing had told the Snow King four weeks ago that he could fuck his slave if he were gentle, the slave were laid out on a bed, and Xiumin supported any limbs that weren't resting flat against the mattress.

It had been awkward at first, with Chen's legs cast perfectly straight from thigh to calf and his arms cast into rigid right angles, but Xiumin had spread Chen face-down on his bed, arms flat to either side of his torso.  He'd shoved pillows under Chen's hips and beneath his parted thighs, then carefully fucked him from behind, supporting most of his weight on palms and knees.

Chen had hated it, because at that angle pretty much every thrust drilled right into his sweet spot, and he'd had to fight so fucking hard not to come all over the Snow King's pillows.  But he'd loved the aftermath, because after wiping his spend off of Chen's back and tugging the pillows from beneath his body, Xiumin had let him sleep in the comfortable, oversized bed, stating that he was too languid to carry him back down to the hospital suite.

Nurse Tao had carried him back down in the morning, since the adjustable bed and specialized supportive wheeled chair made it easier to meet Chen's needs.  But every night since then, he'd slept at the Snow King's side.

Practically beneath Xiumin, actually.  Chen doesn't think he'll ever get over how fucking

cuddly

his Snow King secretly is.

Oh, they start off on opposite sides of the enormous bed of course, but at some point in the night, Xiumin always wraps himself around his injured slave.  Of course, in the morning, he grumbles at Chen for invading his personal space, even though the broken man could barely roll himself over when he'd first been taken to the Snow King's bed.

Chen is much more mobile now, and he does his best to cooperate with the Snow King's gentle fingers as the hard man preps him, if not precisely

gently

then at least thoroughly.  When the fingers are withdrawn, Chen rolls onto his side, arching his spine to jut his ass out as Xiumin undoes his pants and lies down behind him.  Knowing how much the Snow King loves drawing noises from his throat, Chen moans as Xiumin pushes into him.

"Your ass is getting the bunny flogger next week," Xiumin pants into Chen's ear.  "I can't fucking wait to make my little whore's skin all rosy for me."

Chen will also never get over how

complicated

his Snow King insists their relationship is.

Chen is Xiumin's slave, and slaves are meaningless objects to the cold man.  But Chen is also Xiumin's favorite, his arbiter-in-training, a position that commands nearly as much respect as the overlord himself.  So he dotes on and degrades Chen, abuses and applauds him, delivers praise and punishment in equal measure, often at the same time. And Chen endures it well, suffers with a smile, even though he knows he should probably hate the man who tortured and maimed him.  Instead, Chen is grateful. Perhaps he's even a little bit

fond

.

Because for Chen, it's simple.  He'd liked being Jongdae, but he'd never felt a sense of true purpose until he'd woken up the morning of the Snow Soirée and decided that if his brother's name were called, he'd be the one to take his place.

Now that he's Chen, he wakes up every morning secure in who he is and what he's doing.  He knows who he belongs to and what's expected of him. He feels useful and appreciated.

He understands that he's a slave, but he feels more free than he ever has in his life.

So his moans are genuine as Xiumin fucks him, even as the Snow King murmurs insults and abuse.  He curves his body to meet the Snow King's thrusts, letting the skilled man angle his hips to barely brush against Chen's most sensitive spot, tormenting without a hint of relief.  And he grins when Xiumin pulls out, rolling onto his back so the Snow King can stripe his belly and chest with come, even though Chen's own cock is still aching, hard and untouched.

"My personal whore is always so eager to wear his master's spend," Xiumin observes.

"I like making you feel good," Chen pants through curved lips.

"I'll feel better when I can beat your ass before fucking it," the Snow King pronounces.

"I'm ready," Chen declares.  "I can take it." He can't wait to take it, can't wait to absorb all of Xiumin's tension and leave the overlord calm and collected in a way he hasn't been in months.

Xiumin tosses a rag onto Chen's belly, gesturing for him to clean himself.  "Your checkup is tomorrow. We'll see what Yixing has to say about that."

Chen opens his mouth to whine, but one quirk of the Snow King's brow has him swallowing his complaints instead.  "Yes, boss," he says instead, slithering toward the edge of the bed to dispose of the soiled rag.

But Xiumin stops him, tugging the rag from unresisting fingers.  "Rest, ChenChen," the overlord commands, carrying the rag to the laundry chute himself.  "Let's have you in top condition for your exam tomorrow."

Suppressing a knowing grin, Chen wriggles himself under the covers.  Even when the slave had offered to call Tao to transport him back to the medical wing, Xiumin has refused to let Chen spend the night anywhere besides his own bed, claiming that the orthopedic foam would support his healing bones far better than the basic mattress on the hospital cot.  But when Chen had asked Yixing about it, sure that the hospital suite must be appointed as luxuriously as possible, the doctor had only smirked, flashing a dimple as he'd changed the dressings over the healing stumps.

"If that's what the Snow King says, I'm certainly not going to argue," Yixing had declared.

Chen isn't going to argue either, even though it means he ends each day lying stock-still as his balls twinge and his erection fades, refusing to so much as whimper in discomfort so as not to disturb the Snow King's slumber as the man drifts off, perfectly composed on his back on the other side of the king-sized bed.

Because it also means waking each morning with that same man tangled around his torso, arms and legs folding Chen's body into the curve of a secure embrace, Xiumin's morning arousal hot against the cleft of his ass.

The Snow King might be taciturn while awake, favoring cleverly-worded speeches and terse decrees, cutting remarks and verbal abuse.  But in his sleep, Xiumin sometimes mumbles things Chen's sure his ears are never meant to hear.

Things like "my Chenny" and "pretty little pet" and "stubborn fucking brat."

And especially things like "I'm sorry, ChenChen.  So fucking sorry."
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King knows he's breaking all the rules, but since he made all the rules in the first place, it's hard to force himself to care.

He's sure he had excellent reasons for making such rules.  And he acknowledges that he's setting himself up for a terrible tumble if his trust proves to be misplaced.  But then the stupid fucking boy fucking

smiles

at him, and he can't remember why keeping him around is a bad idea anymore.

It comes back to him, of course, as soon as the stupidly-seductive creature is out of his sight.  How forming attachments is like painting a target onto his own chest. How the boy is too close to his own age to be justifiable as an heir or a protege and too male to actually give him one.  How Chen's continuing survival will look like weakness, could even look like favoritism to the Siheung Kims, definitely looks like foolish sentiment even to himself.

And any heightened harshness toward the members of the organization will only look like the overcompensation it is.

No, the Snow King has to play it cool, has to groom the boy for his new role without emotion, has to use his body without losing his own mind.  There are a few weeks left until the Sun Soiree, and Xiumin needs his up-and-coming arbiter to be just as invulnerable, just as lethal as his master.

"You are the Lightning Lord," the Snow King informs the nude slave kneeling at his feet.  "Your judgment will strike quick and clean, without visible preamble. You will be incorruptible, unavoidable, unquestionable.  You will lance through opposition and drown out objections in silent thunder. You will be my right hand, but I will cut you off as easily as I severed your useless feet if you even think about betraying me."

"I would never," Chen answers, looking entirely offended at the suggestion.  "You know I am wholly yours and no one else's. How could I betray the one who spared my life, who gave me a name and a purpose?"

Xiumin's lip twitches, amused at how his slave attempts to mirror his master's formal speech.  "What about your former family?" he asks.

"They're happy to be rid of me," Chen dismisses.  "I only plagued them."

"That woman certainly cried a lot for someone that plagued her," Xiumin observes.

But Chen only shrugs.  "She cried for my suffering, not my death.  I loved her, but I was far from the sort of son a mother would brag about."

"And Kim Junmyeon?  He paid so much to buy you mercy."

Another shrug from the kneeling slave.  "He is loyal to his blood, even when it's undeserved.  He honors my sacrifice more than my life."

Xiumin tilts his head.  "So, if in twenty years I harvest Junmyeon's heir, you'd help me break the child in front of the man who was your brother?"

Chen sets his lips.  "I would not enjoy breaking anyone," he states.  "If death is necessary, I prefer it to be quick and clean.  And I can hardly stand beside you to help, especially on ice."

Xiumin's lips quirk into the hint of a smile.  "Such a clever thing you are," he observes. "Ambiguous placation is so easy for you."

"Isn't that why I'm still alive?"  Chen meets Xiumin's gaze with dark eyes holding the undying spark that is the real reason for his continued existence.

The Snow King swallows a smirk.  "You will make an excellent arbiter," he agrees.  "I can't wait to show you off."

Then the overlord steps to the rack of abusive implements on the wall of his favorite playroom, choosing the cane that makes a lot of noise in proportion to the relatively-minor injuries it inflicts.  His blood is singing with the need to mark the hell out of his pet, but that lean body is still mottled with dull olive and dim puce, fading paint from the brush of his most-precise breaking bar.

Until the canvas of the boy's body has been renewed in both surface and structure, the Snow King will hold himself back.  Half a dozen welts across the globes of that perky little ass will be pleasing enough to the eye, and the boy's hissing moans as Xiumin hammers his hips into the abused flesh when he fucks him will be incredibly pleasing to the ear.

He swats Chen's gorgeous ass even harder when he remembers how close he came to never being able to hear those moans again.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Chen is reaching for his missing feet before he's even awake, pawing at the soft gray coverlet and sucking in a gasping, desperate breath.

"Chen?"

Xiumin's arm slid off his chest when Chen folded himself forward as if launched by a spring, but the Snow King's thigh is still slung across his hips, heavy and solid, anchoring him to reality.  Well,

mostly

to reality—he can still feel the reverberations in his shin from when the bonesaw rasped through his ankle, and he clenches his fingers around the ends of his stumps in an effort to squeeze the vibrations away.

"Sorry," Chen murmurs.  "I didn't mean to disturb you."

"Well, you did," Xiumin grumbles.  "So at least tell me why."

"It's nothing," Chen mumbles, forcing himself to let go of his still-tingling legs and lay back down.  "I'm sorry." He holds as still as his racing heart and prickling ankles will allow, focusing on drawing slow, even breaths through his slightly-parted lips.

"I'm too tired right now to beat you for lying to me," Xiumin chides.  "So you can anticipate that in the morning. Are you in pain?"

"Not really," Chen answers.  "I just had a dream or something."

"Hmm."  Xiumin slings his arm back over Chen's torso, shifting until his slave is pinned more firmly beneath his muscular body.  "Your heart is racing. You grabbed your legs. Should I call Zitao to give you a massage?"

"I'm fine," Chen insists, not wanting to disrupt the overlord's sleep more than he already has but also desperate not to be sent away.  After the dream—memory?—Chen finds himself embarrassingly in need of reassurance, which he certainly won't get alone in the hospital bed.

"Liar," Xiumin says again.  "Do I need to call Kyungsoo to sing you to sleep?"

"No."  The chef has a lovely voice, which Chen's constant singing had eventually coaxed out, much to master and slave's surprise.  But Chen knows if anyone is called in, the Snow King is going to retreat to the far side of the bed where he can be icy and aloof while his broken little slave is fussed over, and said slave finds more comfort beneath Xiumin's sturdy arm.

Even if that arm had held the bonesaw that haunts his sleep.

Swallowing his insufficient saliva and his pride, Chen dares prevent his master's sleep for a moment longer.  "You... won't do it again?"

"Do what?"  Xiumin's voice is a little slurred.

"Cut..."  Chen swallows again, but still can't finish the sentence.

"Mmm."  Xiumin shifts again, settling more heavily against Chen's mostly-healed body.  "Can't cut off your feet again, can I? And I need all the rest of you reasonably intact.  I'm going to beat the shit out of you tomorrow for being such a pain in my ass, but your bones are safe, ChenChen.  No more breaking unless you betray me—then you'll wish you'd died on the Iceterisk."

The Snow King's words are distorted around a yawn.  "Now shut up and sleep."

Mollified, Chen matches his breathing to the measured rise and fall of the body against him, letting the steady beat of Xiumin's heart lull him to sleep.

The rest of his dreams are about flying over a white-capped mountain, then running through a sunny meadow while huge snowflakes drift slowly around him.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
The Snow King isn't supposed to grin like a maniac, so he keeps his lips schooled into an enigmatic little smile.  Only his long years of practice at regarding Seoul's underworld elite through an impassive visage enables him to tamp down the burgeoning excitement threatening to bubble up through his throat.

But he's far too disciplined to let it escape as anything but steady, projected speech as his stallion shifts beneath him and the sky lightens behind him.

“Dawn is a symbolic time, and this is a symbolic day,” the Snow King begins, no less frosty on the first day of summer.  “Today we celebrate the Byun-Park marriage, the Kim-Byun marriage, the Park-Kim adoption, and the subsequent merger of our financial sanitation branch.”

Xiumin pauses for the cheers and applause, then lists off the other business and dynastic mergers of the last  twelve months. He moves on to the list of heirs and adoptions, pausing for a moment to cast a lingering gaze on two-month-old Kim Jonghyun, newly-named heir of the Siheung Kims.  At least the brother has loyalty as well as sentiment, naming the kid after the man who died so he could live.

He works his way through the promotions, and when everyone has been congratulated, welcomed, and applauded, the Snow King pauses, lifting his chin and allowing his smug satisfaction to leak onto his lips.

“In a perfect, peaceful world, all the alliances would last for eons, and all heirs would outlive their progenitors,” Xiumin states.  “But we live in a cold, unforgiving world, and heirs are routinely plucked and crushed to make that point.”

The celebratory mood of the crowd instantly sours, but the Snow King’s smile only broadens as the first glimmer of daylight breaks over the water at his back.

“Yet some sparks are too bright to be snuffed in winter’s fist.  Instead, they rise like the sun to ignite a brand new dawn.”

A murmur ripples through the crowd.  Xiumin can hear hoofbeats in the sand, but he doesn't take his eyes off the crowd.  In particular, he watches the Siheung Kims, waiting for the moment they recognize the Snow King’s prince on a white horse.

It’s an extremely gratifying sight.

The first one to notice is the mother, but that’s only to be expected.  What’s less expected is that she faints, face-planting in the sand before her husband or son realize what’s happening.  They both stare stupidly at the woman at their feet, but the other woman with them—presumably Junmyeon’s wife—shoves the infant heir at his sire and kneels to aid the fallen woman.

The next to hit the sand is Junmyeon, cradling his child to his chest as his mouth gapes stupidly.  The senior Kim stares down at his stricken family, but his attention is stolen by a snort from the white horse as it comes to a stop beside the Snow King’s own pale steed.

A third set of knees hits the beach.

Entirely satisfied, Xiumin turns his grin toward the man at his side.  His Chen is always a lovely sight, but now, in pale gold robes that glimmer in the morning glow, with those molten eyes lined in luminous jet, his chiseled cheekbones kissed by shimmering gold, and his jet black hair upswept and haloed by dawn’s early rays?

Handsome doesn't even begin to cover it.

And when the boy’s always-intense eyes lock with his master’s, Chen’s smile eclipses the sunrise.
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Chen is grinning so hard his cheeks are aching, but he can’t make himself stop.  Even as he hears his mother’s sob, even as the assembled crowd murmurs, he can’t tear his eyes from Xiumin’s beautiful face.

His Snow King is smiling.

He’s smiling right at Chen, wide enough to expose his gums and curve his eyes into tapered crescents.  He flicks those crescents over Chen’s outfit and back up to his face, even though he was there when the stylists worked their magic.

And then he turns to the stunned crowd, face pivoting away from Chen well before his eyes manage to follow suit.

“Let it be known that the Snow King has appointed an arbiter to his right hand,” Xiumin announces, grin dissolving in favor of his usual expression of deadly sincerity.  “Kim Chen is Xiumin’s Lightning Lord, and any judgment from his lips stands as final as if it had come from my own. Any insult to body or character is a slur cast into my own face and will be dealt with as such.”

The crowd has fallen silent except for residual smothered sobs, and Chen fights to mold his face into an imperious neutrality.  The Snow King has gestured, and in response, two tall, graceful young men step forward to lift Chen off the horse as Xiumin dismounts.

He sends the matched steeds back down the beach with matched smacks to the rump, then stands before the assembled elite of Seoul’s underworld, stunning in his silver suit.  He looks on as Chen’s porters set him in the sand beneath a waiting umbrella. Chen settles on his knees, kicking his lower legs out to the side so that his porters can spread his robes out elegantly, leaving the tapered ends on display.

There’s a collective gasp from the assembled, and the buzzing of whispers starts up again.  Chen keeps his face impassive but lifts his chin in silent challenge. Xiumin spreads his arms wide and ritualistically invites the underworld to enjoy the day, then takes his seat in the lounge chair that looks so much like a throne.  He’s shaded beneath his own umbrella, close enough to keep an eye on Chen but far enough away that a quiet conversation won’t be overheard.

And as soon as Xiumin is engaged in such a conversation, a teary Junmyeon is kneeling before Chen.

“Jongdae,” he cries.

Chen shakes his head.  “Jongdae is dead. I’m Chen now.”

Junmyeon swallows, brow furrowing in confusion.  “How are you still alive? I watched you die.”

Chen shrugs.  “Jongdae did die.  Chen was reborn. How have you been?  Your son looks healthy.”

Another exaggerated gulp.  “Uh. He is. He’s great. We’re very blessed,” he mumbles as if on autopilot.  Then he shakes himself. “Wait. So, you’re Chen? But you’re coming home, right?”

Chen shakes his head again.  “My place is at the Snow King’s side.  I belong only to him. My home is at his feet.”

Junmyeon’s face twists.  “Are you like, brainwashed or something?”  His voice threatens to rise but is quickly reduced to a near-whisper.  “Jong— Uh, Chen, the Snow King

tortured

you and

cut off your fucking feet.

How are you so okay with it?  You should hate him.”

Chen’s not sure how to answer his former brother.  He

had

hated Xiumin.  Part of him still does.  But he had been willing to do anything to avoid death.  He had to make Xiumin want him, which meant he had to learn to understand him to some degree.  And it’s hard to hate someone once you realize their life is ruled by fear.

The Snow King is afraid he’ll lose his grip on all he’s conquered.  It’s not enough just to be a competent overboss, he must also command respect and obedience from people who, by birth or choice, are unapologetic lawbreakers.  So he must be brutal, ruthless, without mercy, an unopposable force. The Snow King is a crushing avalanche in order to survive. And for Chen to survive too, he must glide along with it.

So he only shrugs again.  “I’m content,” he says truthfully.

Chen is safe.  He’ll bleed and bruise but he’ll never again break.  He belongs to Xiumin and Xiumin takes care of him. And he’ll take care of Xiumin, too.  He’ll sort the squabbles and settle any unrest so Xiumin can focus on business and power.  Perhaps the Snow King will feel more secure. Perhaps he won’t need to be so brutal.

Chen will absorb the Snow King’s crushing cruelty and mete out white-hot justice.  Not mercy, not clemency, but sharp, decisive order. Cold, but clean. Like the air after a storm.

He answers Junmyeon’s quizzical expression with a genuine smile.  “Really. I’m not your worrisome baby brother any more. Raise your heir.  Take care of your parents. I’ll be fine.”

There’s a long silence in which Junmyeon’s skeptical gaze rakes over his form from face to non-existent feet.

“Well,” he finally says.  “It’s your life, and I guess I’m glad you have it.  It’s good to see you, Chen.”

Chen grins.  “It’s good to see you too, Junmyeon.”
 
❆❅❆❅❆
 
Humans have worshipped the sun since the dawn of time itself.  As the days shorten and winter advances, there’s still a whisper of primitive fear that the sun will continue to hide, leaving the earth cold and frozen forever.  Thus the winter solstice is traditionally a time of great rejoicing, that the worst is over, that life will yet resume.

Conversely, the summer solstice should be met with a hint of mourning, since the sun’s time in the sky will be ever-decreasing afterward.  But in Seoul, those that know the dark celebrate the light, absorbing summer’s warmth to bolster them against the cold to come.

Even the Snow King is basking in the morning light despite shielding pale skin from the touch of the sun.  He’s even smiling, a gentle curve playing about his lips as he watches his former snowflake shimmer.

His Chen is incandescent.  Electric. Glowing brighter than the midsummer sun.  And as he watches Seoul’s elite flock to him, bringing him food and drink, conversation and entertainment, in a blatant effort to earn his favor, Xiumin is pleased.

He’s pleased to have proved his power yet again.  Pleased to have set a shield between himself and the whining masses.  Pleased to have filled his bed with a durable and enthusiastic toy, always ready for pain or pleasure.

Six months from now, he’ll harvest a new snowflake.  He’ll have no need to fuck this new one, not when his Chen is so good at satisfying sex drive and sadism.  He might enjoy smacking it around a bit, but he doubts he’ll ever again break a body on his bloodstained Iceterisk.  Somehow, he just knows Chen will make sure the mercy price is always paid in full so that no one else will ever suffer as he had.

And the Snow King is okay with that.  It does not diminish his chill grip on Seoul’s underworld elite if a throat is slit before bones are broken, not when it’s the intercession of his arbiter that’s the cause of a collective outpouring of mercy funds.  Mercy has always been available for the right price, so it’s no fang out of his bite if it’s perennially bought.

Especially when the funds are officially presented by a man who must be carried over the ice.

The Snow King’s icy fingers are still clamped around Seoul’s gasping throat even if his Lightning Lord’s electric tendrils are wrapped around his frozen core.  Sated is not soft. A lion is still dangerous when well fed, after all.

So Xiumin smiles as his Chen socializes with old friends and new, laughing on a blanket spread over sand.  He can see the glances shot in his own direction every time Chen shifts his weight or moves his legs. The wounds have healed well and the scars are rapidly fading.  Soon it will be as if Chen’s feet were never there, as if the Lightning Lord had never been anything besides an extension of his masters grip on the city.

And Seoul will never forget to kneel before the Snow King.
 
❆❅❆❅❆