Work Text
“Don’t move,” Jongin mumbles.
Sehun tries not to shift, hands up to his side as he poses, huffing.
“Look, I love how you draw, but are you sure we can’t just use an incantation?”
“What, like a speed up spell? Wouldn’t work, not on fine art like this. It’s a luxury. Magic will want to draw it out even longer.”
“Zitao’s lucky I love him so much,” Sehun says, grumbling a little.
Jongin looks up from the parchment Sehun’s kept hidden away for months, refreshing his ink as he does.
“He didn’t even ask for this. You’re the one who wanted to make this gift so special.”
Sehun rolls his eyes, discontent with the fact that Jongin is correct, and they fall into silence.
“Before I get started on the rest of you,” Jongin hums suddenly. “Wanna try turning to your hands? I think your profile would suit the look more.”
Sehun does as directed, facing his hands, still delicately perched on the step-stool, trying desperately to get the Semblance right.
“Where is he, by the way?”, Jongin asks. “Surely you wouldn’t risk him walking in and ruining the surprise.”
“Sent him pearl hunting,” Sehun says. “I need some powdered pearl for my stores anyway, so I might as well make use of kicking him out.”
Jongin hums in agreement.
“What are you making?”
“Growth potion,” Sehun sighs. “Crocuses aren’t growing fast enough, and I need them to start crafting the spell to turn winter.”
“You got the silver extract for that?”, Jongin says, eyebrows raised. “I had to buy mine from the Fae.”
“No, I need to distill it still. Have to buy some silver first, though. Would’ve sent Zitao down to town to do that, but you know. It’d be rude to make him buy silver, since he’s allergic and all.”
“Ooh,” Jongin winces in sympathy. “Chanyeol’s been more willing to run errands since he found out about the whole witch thing. I know the coven didn’t sign off on telling him, but it’s made my life so much easier.”
“He’s taking it well?”
“As well as anyone could,” Jongin tells him. “I just wanted him to know what he’s getting into. I know the Coven doesn’t agree, and I’m not saying the way their relationships work is wrong-“
“No, I get it. I would’ve told Zitao if he didn’t already know.”
He catches Jongin nodding in his peripheral vision. His gaze focuses back on his hands, surprised by how steady he’s able to keep them; he’s still unsure of his posing– Semblances are not his magic, never have been.
“I’m done,” Jongin calls out after a bit.
Sehun sighs, lets his body go, hands dropping and shoulders slumping for just a second. When he stands, his joints pop.
“How many more of these are there?”, he asks, bleary, once again choosing to ignore the fact that this is completely optional and also his idea. He leans over the desk to get a look at Jongin’s parchment, but Jongin covers it up quick.
“No looking till it’s all done.”
“It’s not meant to be a surprise for
me-“
“Who’s the artist?”
“You’re so terrible and mean to me.”
“You know, I think you had the Semblance wrong the whole time, I think I need to sit you down for another hour or so-“
“
Jongin!”
---
“The pearls are perfect,” Sehun smiles at him, in that slightly shy way of his: Zitao smiles back, bright and wide; it’s almost involuntary.
“Found a little pool of oysters,” Zitao tells him, watching as Sehun examines his day of hard work. “They were very polite.”
“Come here,” Sehun says, a soft thing, as he sets the little bag of pearls down on their table. His hands are cool and clean and open, beckoning.
Zitao, ever obedient, does as told. Sehun’s arms wrap around him, hand on his face, thumb tracing his cheekbone. He has to tilt his head ever so slightly to stare into Zitao’s eyes, and it’s very becoming on him.
“You’re wonderful,” Sehun tells him softly, and then kisses the corner of his lip.
Zitao just about melts right there.
“I love you,” he manages somehow. Sehun grins, and it’s blinding.
“Come downstairs with me,” Sehun says. Downstairs is Sehun’s sanctum, where he writes his spells and brews his potions. “We can make the dust together.”
“Can I keep the pretty ones?”
“Hmm,” Sehun hums, pretending to think. “Are you planning on gifting them to me over the next week?”
Caught, Zitao laughs.
“Yes,” and it’s a little musical as he sways Sehun around.
“And how many do you already have in that pocket of yours?”
Zitao’s mouth opens, and then closes. Sehun knows him too well.
“Six,” he says, voice small.
It’s a habit he has whenever he gets sent on pearl duty. He finds a perfect one, that he just can’t justify sending to a mortar and pestle, and he slips it in his pocket. It’ll make its way to Sehun eventually, as all things do. He keeps them in a little jar on his bedside. It’s starting to get full.
Sehun affords him a laugh, anchored on him. Arms still around his neck, he shuffles them around.
“Of course you can,” he says, eyes darting ever so slightly across Zitao’s face. “You can have whatever you want.”
“I just want you,” Zitao mumbles.
“I knew you’d say that,” Sehun says. And he kisses him.
And kisses him. And kisses him.
---
“So what exactly
is
going on here?”, Chanyeol asks, granola bar in hand as he appraises their little model/artist set-up in the middle of his living room.
Sehun stretches, needing his muscles to relax before he can start posing. They’re in Chanyeol’s house today; Zitao has been tasked with working the gardens and the farm, which removes Sehun’s home from the running, and Jongin’s house is undergoing repairs, so he lives at Chanyeol’s these days anyways.
“Gift,” Sehun sighs, popping his back, short and simple. The old, weathered set of loosely bound parchment in front of him sits intimidatingly. He delicately turns to where they last left off: a Semblance to call upon the breeze. It’s proven troublesome; Sehun’s (for once) a little too good at it, causing gusts that sweep their parchment away and knock things over.
He’s running low on magic today, though, just one of those days, and instead of trying his herbs to help out, he’s decided to use this opportunity to finally get the Semblance done with. It helps that it’s Chanyeol’s house, though.
“Zitao’s family has had this book of Semblances for a long time,” Jongin elaborates, probably in response to a confused look from his boyfriend. “It’s been falling apart for a while now, and he’s been upset about it. He can’t use magic, so this is the only record he’ll ever have of them. I’ve been drawing Sehun posing for them so that he’ll still get to keep them.”
Chanyeol’s eyes widen and he nods, humming in understanding. Then:
“What’s a semblance?”
“It’s like, soft magic. Little gestures that
could
do something small, but you’d need to focus, and get the pose right, and all that. It’s older magic. Nowadays you’d just keep a bunch of incantations pre-written. Or learn wordwork,” Jongin says.
“Wordwork is… the thing Sehun does? Where he’ll just say things and they’ll happen?”
Sehun preens a little. He’s proud of his wordwork; the only person in the coven who can do it other than him is Kibum, who’s been in charge for as long as he can remember.
“Yeah,” he says, and his hands come up in the pose they need to be; index of the left hand hooking onto thin air, right hand bent into an ornate gesture. A light breeze fills the room, but nothing enough to disturb their setup. “And this is a Semblance.”
“Woah.”
Sehun laughs, catching Jongin’s eye. It’s always fun to see a human be introduced to magic for the first time. He thinks it might be part of why Jongin finds Chanyeol charming.
“Thanks for letting us use your living room, honey,” Jongin says, reaching for the ink, putting down a stroke and then another. “This might take a while.”
“That’s okay,” Chanyeol says, and he seems to be entranced by how fast Jongin’s working. Sehun understands; there’s a reason he bribes Jongin into doing all his parchment drafting. “I don’t-“
He’s interrupted by steady, quick knocks, three in a row. Sehun would recognize that knock anywhere. Which is why he’s up on his feet, already picking up the bound parchment when Chanyeol, nervous, asks, “Who is it?”
“Dude, it’s me.”
Zitao. Just their luck.
“
Fuck,”
Jongin whispers, hurriedly, capping the ink, putting his tools away as quick as he can, staining his hands. “The parchment’s wet,” he realizes.
“Do something!” Sehun hisses at Chanyeol.
“Like what?”
“Tell him he can’t come in!”, Jongin says, taking everything except the drawing parchment and placing it behind the couch where Sehun hid the bound work.
“You can’t come in!”, Chanyeol says, loud, and unconvincing.
Sehun braces himself for the drain, puts his hand on the edge of the paper.
“Dry,” he whispers, and the ink suddenly looks a day old. He’s a little dizzy, but Jongin grabs the parchment from him and deposits it in their hiding spot.
“Why not?”, Zitao asks, from the other side of the door.
Chanyeol turns around, eyes wide, and Jongin shrugs frantically.
“Just say anything!”, Sehun directs him, looking for a place to hide himself. Maybe behind the curtains? They’re long and flowy enough.
“Jongin isn’t wearing any clothes!”
“Not
that-”
“
What is wrong with you?”,
Jongin says, whisper only barely concealing his anger.
“I’m sorry!” Chanyeol mouths, panicked. “I couldn’t think of anything else!”
“Oh,” awkward, subdued, muffled through the door. A pause. “Hi Jongin.”
Sehun buries his face in his hands.
Jongin’s eye twitches, once, twice.
“Hi,” he finally sighs, resigned. “Sorry for the inconvenience.”
“Oh, um, no, it’s fine. Go nuts. Or, I mean- well- uh-“
Sehun melts into the curtain, unable to handle this anymore. Jongin glares at him.
“How about I put on pants and then we can talk?”, Jongin offers, lying. Sehun fears for Chanyeol’s life.
“Good idea! I’ll just, um, stand here. Till then.”
“You do that, buddy,” Chanyeol winces.
Jongin turns to Sehun’s curtain, checking to make sure it hides him well, and then gives him a somber thumbs up.
Chanyeol reaches to open the door, taking the cue.
Zitao walks in, awkward, and Sehun realizes there’s a hole in the curtain. He’ll offer to mend it later. For now, he uses it as a peephole.
He prays to the seasons that Zitao won’t do anything else that’s stupid, like try to shake Chanyeol and Jongin’s hands, or salute them.
“Congratulations,” Zitao says, and immediately cringes. Oh well. “Or hello. Whichever one of those is good.”
“I think it’s usually hello,” Jongin says, and Chanyeol nods vigorously in agreement. “Did you need something?”
Be nice to him,
Sehun feels flashing through him, despite fully understanding Jongin’s motivations. Still. His curtness can be harrowing.
“Um, so, Sehun left me this list for groceries,” he says, patting down his jeans, and finally locating an unrecognizably crumpled piece of paper. “And his handwriting is really small? So I can’t really… read it.”
Jongin takes one look at the list and snorts.
“Just like him to write a grocery list on charmed paper,” and Sehun winces, realizing that he’s right. “This stuff hates non-magic ink. Crinkles it up.”
“Can we fix it?”, and Zitao sounds so concerned it’s endearing.
“He could,” Jongin mutters, still staring at the list. “I can’t wordwork.”
Sehun takes the chance.
“
Release,”
he says, the smallest of whispers. Jongin’s eyes widen as the paper presumably starts to shift under his fingers.
“I could try though,” he rushes. “Get…
legible
,” which is absolute nonsense, but Sehun appreciates the improv.
“It’s working,” Chanyeol mumbles, and Zitao perks up, looking over.
“Try now,” Jongin says, handing Zitao the list. He takes a second, eyes lingering on each word, before nodding.
“Thank you!”, he says, beaming. “For the magic, and for your time, and I’m sorry for-“
“That’s okay”, Jongin cuts in. “You should hurry to get your stuff, some of the shops close soon.”
“I’ll see you both around,” Zitao says, in agreement. “Thanks again.”
And then he’s out the door, just like that. A moment passes, and then another.
Sehun allows himself to slump out from behind the curtain and into the nearest chair, exhausted from the magic use on one of his worst low supply days this year. He didn’t
have
to cast that last one, but he didn’t want them to be sans dinner tonight. The other two look at him in concern, but he throws a tired hand up to placate them.
“Well,” Chanyeol tries, breaking their little lull, and he sounds so sheepish it’s funny. “That-“
Jongin turns to him, eyes narrowing.
“You’re never seeing me naked again.”
---
Zitao lights the candle on their dining table right in time for Sehun to walk in, which is incredibly satisfying. One look at the door to greet his lover though, and he forgets everything else.
“Are you okay?”, he asks. Sehun’s eyes are cloudy, posture slumped. He looks exhausted.
Sehun doesn’t respond, kicking his shoes off instead, and then trudging over to Zitao.
“Just hold me,” he whispers. “I’m tired.”
Zitao’s arms are moving before he even registers anything, wrapping around Sehun, pulling him close. Sehun melts into it, hands pressed into his back, which feels really fucking great, if Zitao is being honest.
“What do you need?”, he whispers, and he hopes his hold is steady and warm enough.
“Stay like this for a while,” Sehun mumbles. “It’s been a low magic day and I used a little too much, and now my bones are fuzzy. You feel nice, though.”
“You should’ve told me this morning,” Zitao says, fretting a little. “I’d have kept your little tea ready for you.”
“I wasn’t feeling it so rough before now.”
“Well, I got dinner ready for us. So we can eat after this and head straight to bed. Let you charge up,” and he kisses Sehun’s forehead.
“Sorry you had to do it all alone today,” Sehun says. “I wish I’d made it easier on you.”
“You did make it easy on me,” Zitao rushes. Pulls Sehun a little closer. “The gardens are pretty much self-sufficient thanks to your incantations. So is the farm. All I had to do was get groceries, and you did all the list-making.”
The last part is a lie, since the list was such a debacle, but it’s a small lie, and it’s worth it to get the tension out of Sehun’s shoulders.
Sehun pulls away when he says it though, just enough for them to make eye contact, still propped up mostly by him. Zitao gulps a little under his sharp gaze; he’s really good at telling when he’s lying.
Then his features soften, beautiful even in their exhaustion.
“You’re too good to me,” he says. “You can’t be so good to me all the time.”
“I love you,” Zitao tells him. “I love being good to you. It’s like being good to myself.”
Sehun stares at him for a second, and then leans up to kiss him, so gentle. Zitao falls into it, little zaps of electricity in his blood.
They pull away after a while, resting their foreheads together. Zitao’s the first to open his eyes, sneaking a peak at Sehun’s face.
“Let’s get some food in you,” he says. “We’ll cuddle in bed after.”
Sehun breathes deep, and nods. Then, quiet, muted:
“I love you too.”
---
“Pancakes and full plate breakfast!”
Zitao’s up to collect the food before Sehun can even move a muscle. The pancakes go down in front of him, while Zitao claims the three egg/hashbrown/toast/sausage/bacon/coffee spread.
“Just once, you could let me grab the food, you know,” Sehun says, soft, gentle.
Zitao settles into his seat; they’re nestled away in their favorite booth. He looks up from his food, tilting his head a little.
“Nah, where’s the fun in that? It’s Blue Diner! You get to sit pretty, and I get to feed you as many pancakes and milkshakes as you want.”
“More like I get to watch you shovel down an ungodly amount of food before I even make a dent in mine.”
Zitao’s unfazed, picking up his fork, pointing it at Sehun.
“Hey, look, I’m a very large man. I need a very large amount of food to keep me going. All this muscle has to get something.”
“Showoff,” Sehun mumbles, reaching for the syrup to drown his pancakes with.
“Oh, you
love
it.”
Sehun rolls his eyes, but doesn’t deny it.
“Look at you, you’re grinning,” Zitao teases. “It’s like you have a crush or something.”
“A crush? Me? What are you talking about?”, Sehun says, unable to keep his smile hidden. The pancakes are fucking delicious, which doesn’t help.
“Hm… I have my theories.”
“Plural, huh? Who’re your top suspects?”
“Well,” and he’s putting on this awful noir film detective voice. “You seem pretty chummy with that Jongin. But I don’t know if that makes any sense. That Kibum hyung of yours seems like a pretty hot commodity around here too, so maybe it’s him.”
Sehun laughs, loud, inviting stares, but he doesn’t care. He kicks Zitao under the table, shaking his head.
And then if he casts a soft glamor on himself, what does it matter? Can’t a man want sparkly eyelashes during breakfast with his boyfriend?
He tilts his head, looks over at Zitao, blinking softly. Takes his kicking leg and schools it into the footsie pro it truly is. A little stroke of Zitao’s leg, and the tables are turning.
“What about you, Detective?”, he asks, soft, sultry. Two can play at a noir film. “I think you’re covering something up,” and his foot pushes higher, a gentle stroke. Zitao looks like he’s fighting for his life. Good. “I think…
you’re
suspect number one.”
Zitao’s arm, well muscled and tattooed, reaches out over the table, and Sehun’s too busy ogling to really pick up on his intentions.
Until his hand clasps around Sehun’s wrist, that is. It’s a quick, sharp tug; enough to pull Sehun forward, to get him to drop his fork with a clatter, but not enough to draw any attention to them.
It’s a slow moment, Zitao’s eyes searching Sehun’s face, with that look in them. Sehun shivers pleasantly.
“Do you have glamor on?”, Zitao finally asks, soft.
“Yes,” Sehun breathes. Zitao can always tell. It’s so sweet. “You know I like teasing.”
“Take it off,” Zitao says, undemanding but firm.
Sehun keeps steady eye contact, mouth hanging slightly open as he waves his finger, wrist still in Zitao’s hand. The glamor melts, and the slight sparkle to his face should fade.
Zitao’s smile is so bright that Sehun almost cries. He’s so beautiful like this.
“Thank you,” Zitao mumbles, and then he’s leaning in and standing up, just enough for their lips to meet comfortably. The kiss is steady, and Sehun can’t help but deepen it in the middle of the diner, hand going up to curl into Zitao’s hair. They’re both breathless when they pull away.
Zitao glances around real quick, checking to see if anyone noticed them. It’s just a kiss, but it’s still cute to sneak around like this. Excites Sehun a little.
“Aw,” Zitao pouts, and he makes no move to sit back down or lean back, inches from Sehun. “I was hoping someone had seen us. I had the best excuse.”
“Yeah?”, Sehun asks, only just barely brushing over Zitao’s cheekbone with his fingertips. It’s funny how ticklish he is.
“Was gonna say that you’d okayed getting dessert. Couldn’t help but kiss you for the possibility of their pie.”
Sehun laughs.
“You know you don’t need my permission, right?”
“Oh, I know that. They don’t. Plus, I like asking you things.”
Sehun hums, smiles, resists the urge to kiss the mole by his eye.
“You can put the glamor back on if you want,” Zitao whispers, conspiratorial, as Sehun gently nudges his shoulder to get him to sit back down. “I like it when you tease, too, with or without it. I just really wanted to kiss you like this.”
“It’s always so cute, seeing your brain trying to process the first five seconds of a glamor. It’s like you freeze up.”
“It’s
distracting
that you have glitter falling out your eyelashes!”
“That’s the point,” Sehun tells him, batting the eyelashes in question (sans glitter this time).
“How romantic.”
“Pot, kettle.”
Zitao grins.
Sehun loves him for it.
---
“Can I take you out?”, Zitao asks, only barely leaning into their bedroom. Sehun’s lying in bed, reading what looks like one of Kibum’s spellbooks, hands curling in the air as if they’re ready to pluck the words out of it.
Sehun starts, hands falling as he sits up. He snaps, and the book goes flying to the shelves.
“What do you mean?”, he asks, but he’s already standing, like he intends to say yes no matter what.
“Just a walk around the island,” Zitao says, and he absently rubs at his neck. Doesn’t miss how Sehun’s eyes follow his line of action. It makes him smile, a little smug. “I like it better when I have you.”
Sehun’s come all the way over to the doorway, leaning against the frame, slightly lowering himself, so Zitao has to tilt his head down ever so slightly.
“You’re like a puppy,” Sehun jokes. “I have to walk you twice a day lest you rip up our couch.”
“I think I’m a quarter werewolf,” Zitao says, completely serious. His grandfather, if he remembers correctly. “That’s where the silver allergy comes from.”
“I know, honey,” Sehun smiles. “It’s cute.”
Then:
“Come on,” he says, sticking out his hand. “I love walking with you.”
A few moments later they’re ambling down the path to the mountain pass, past their garden and the distant shadow of the farm that Sehun’s magic runs, hands waffled.
“Tell me if you see any thistles. Or pinecones. I’m working on a new incantation.”
Zitao nods, eyes immediately scanning what they can make out in the moonlight. He squeezes Sehun’s hand softly.
“What’s it for?”, he asks.
“I figured out how to do that growth boost spell,” Sehun muses, and Zitao knows what he’s talking about, an old project left on the back burner for a while. “Look.”
He lets go of Zitao’s hand to crouch by the petunias at the side of the path. Zitao watches, rapt.
He mumbles something Zitao can’t hear, and swipes a finger behind the stem. There’s a slight sheen as the plant absorbs the magic, and then suddenly, every flower bud on it has a twin.
“Holy
shit,
Hun-ah, that’s
crazy!”
Creation is the most difficult branch of magic, and here Sehun is, wordworking it like it’s
nothing.
Zitao steps forward, sweeps him up in his arms— it’s easy, since he’s light and pliant. Sehun laughs, and it’s everything.
“I love how easy you are to impress,” he smiles, when Zitao puts him down.
“I know easy. That ain’t easy,” and Zitao can see just the faintest sheen of sweat on the back of Sehun’s neck, proving his point.
“A proper incantation on parchment would make it easy though,” Sehun says, glittering in the moonlight. “Kibum thinks it could get standardized.”
“Of course it could,” and Zitao feels this expanding sense of pride. “You’re incredible.”
They’re walking again, leaving the twinned petunia behind to shine its own reflection. Sehun’s arms wrap around Zitao’s right bicep as he laughs.
“You’re a sweetheart.”
Zitao can’t help but grin. Approval from Sehun will forever mean the world.
“I keep telling you. I just love you,” he says, softly, like he always does. “The rest follows.”
The way Sehun looks at him is enough to make him dissolve into thin air.
---
“Hyung,” Sehun tries, a little unsure. It’s midnight on a Thursday, which is typically when his magic is strongest; this automatically makes it his turn to be on coven duty with Kibum. “Do y-“
“One second, Sehunnie,” Kibum says, and he’s making his offerings to the cauldron that connects to the island’s ley lines.
When he’s done, he turns to face Sehun, regal as always, wearing the circlet signifying his position as head of the coven.
His face flashes in recognition, as if remembering something.
“I’ve been working on getting your incantation standardized. We’ve made some progress; do you have a sample ready?”
Sehun starts; this won’t be his first standardized spell if it goes through, but it would be what he’s most proud of. A creation spell in standardized spellbooks is almost unheard of.
“The ink is brewing,” he says. Zitao had helped him complete his ingredient requirements just the previous afternoon. “I’m doing the actual spell work today, since it’s Thursday.”
“Smart,” Kibum nods. “I swear, most witches wouldn’t know their day of spirits if it came tattooed on them.”
“What’s yours?”, Sehun asks, realizing he doesn’t know, since Kibum is on coven duty most days.
“Monday,” Kibum says. “Had a low magic day on Monday recently. It was terrible.”
Sehun winces. That’s the worst.
“Anyways, if you get the incantation to me right after you’re done, I can-”
“Hyung, can I ask you something?”
It’s sudden; a rush he didn’t know he was swept up in. Kibum blinks, and then nods, soft, an “of course” instead of a “yes”.
“Do you know how to work Semblances?”
“Semblances? You mean like,” and then he’s putting his hands up in the pose Sehun first learnt; both to one side. “this?’
“Yeah,” Sehun says. “I- um, so you know how Zitao has magic lineage? Most of that was Semblance work back in the day, but their master book has been falling apart, and I know it sort of upsets him, since he can’t work any magic, and I’ve never been good at Semblances. And I just don’t want him to lose that, so I’ve been getting Jongin to help me work on a new copy, with me modeling. Because it’s me now, right? His link to it all. He likes where he is, and I just-”
Sehun breathes, Kibum’s face unparsable.
“I just want to make it nice for him. And I’ve been thinking of… coming up with my own. Adding it to the end, keeping a couple of blank pages in there. Just to let him know- I don’t even know what, actually. I just need him to know this thing that lives inside me, and this is all I can think of to tell him.”
“You need my help?”, Kibum asks, gentle. Sehun realizes how emotional he’s been about this with a start; he had no idea it was weighing on him like this.
“Yes,” he nods. “Please. I just… I’m not good with them. Not good enough, at least.”
Kibum hums.
“That’s expected, though. They’re older magic, and you’re so skilled at wordwork… one usually takes easier than the other.”
Sehun nods; the easy freedom and control of wordwork comes much more naturally than the care that goes into a Semblance.
“But you’re a powerful witch, and even better crafter. I think if you spend a little time on it, you’ll find that Semblances are a lot more like your preferred magic than you think.”
“What do you mean?”
Kibum smiles, then turns towards the Stone Circle.
“Come,” he says, already walking. “Sit with me. Let’s talk about what you want to do.”
---
“Hun-ah,” Zitao says, playful, hands on Sehun’s thighs, looking up at him from where he’s pressed into the bed. “Come on. Look at me.”
Sehun is currently straddling him (which is awesome) but also preoccupied typing very fast on his phone (not awesome).
“Hun-ah,” he whines again, gripping the skin a little harder. He can feel Sehun jump a little, which is satisfying enough.
“I’ll put that silence spell on you,” Sehun warns. “Behave.”
“Don’t wear shorts and sit on me then!”, Zitao grumbles, miffed.
“Oh, boohoo. You should be able to accommodate your husband.”
“We aren’t… married?”
“And whose fault is that?”, Sehun shoots, narrowed gaze lifting from his phone to finally make eye contact. Zitao gulps, having walked straight into that, hoping to god Sehun hasn’t been rifling through the sock drawers recently. He’s waiting for the seasons to turn.
“Sehun-”
“Don’t Sehun me,” he sighs, running a hand through his hair, and setting his phone on the bedside table. He shifts a little when he stretches over, which is really killing Zitao. “See, was that so bad?”
He’s leaning down, arms going to either side of Zitao to hold him up, till their faces are only inches away from each other.
“Yes,” Zitao tells him. “It was terrible. Please only give me attention always and forever.”
“You’re such a baby,” Sehun smiles, hand coming up to rest on Zitao’s face, thumb stroking along the line of his jaw. “Meanwhile, I could feel you under me the whole time, and I was being so brave about it.”
“Don’t make me pay for your courage,” Zitao tells him. Sehun’s fingers spark at that, a little static shock; completely deliberate, no doubt, since he can do that. He shifts in Zitao’s lap a little too, which is honestly excessive.
“Alright, that’s enough,” he decides, and he’s gripping Sehun and flipping them over. Sehun goes easily, like this was his plan all along.
“Yeah? You gonna fuck me till I say I’m sorry?”
Sehun’s beautiful and tugging, and Zitao almost can’t bear it.
Almost.
“Should’ve started earlier,” he mumbles. “Fucked you through writing that text. Seen where your bravery got you.”
“Oh, fuck off,” but then Sehun’s pulling him down, kissing him deep and slow and wanting.
It’s always worth it.
---
“Sorry I’m late,” Sehun says, as they walk into Jongin’s garden. “Got caught up.”
In the shower. But Jongin doesn’t need to know that.
“That’s alright,” Jongin tells him, looking toward the sun. “We have enough natural light left for me to sketch. Your text said we’d missed a page?”
“Something like that,” Sehun says, taking his place at the seat Jongin has set up. The parchment is already there; Sehun isn’t carrying the original book today, though. “There’s a reason I asked for us to be outside. I… remember how I was playing with the idea of crafting a Semblance?”
Jongin’s eyes widen.
“No
way,”
he says. “You got it?”
“Kibum hyung helped,” Sehun says. “He taught me how to lean into the Semblances. I’m much better at them now.”
“What does it do?”
“You’ll see,” Sehun tells him. “Down the line… we might ask you to sketch again for us. I’m thinking of slipping in some blank pages when I inscribe and bind.”
“Of course,” Jongin smiles, looking genuinely pleased. “I’d be honored.”
Sehun takes his seat, shoulders squared, posture perfect; his breathing is measured and slow. Kibum told him to treat his Semblances more like wordwork, live in the flow of them instead of the perfection. Like dancing.
So he does.
His left arm goes up, fingers delicately arranged, and his right lies perpendicular to it, hand inching just by his left elbow. He hopes that it works, and then falls into it, making direct eye contact with Jongin, because that’s what feels most natural.
He feels the grass start to grow almost instantly, and all he can manage is a relieved half-smile at Jongin’s gasp.
“Sehun, that’s
insane,”
Jongin says, frozen, staring at the ring forming around Sehun’s chair, made of longer grass and wildflowers.
“Thank you. But you might want to get started on the sketch. I don’t know how long I can hold this.”
“Oh, shit, yeah,” Jongin starts, and then he’s moving, pen on parchment, the quickest Sehun’s ever seen him.
It must take at least half an hour (Jongin only does fast outlines when Sehun is posing, and does the detail work later), but it feels somehow like both a few seconds and forever to Sehun. When Jongin steps back from the canvas and gives him a thumbs up, Sehun doesn’t hesitate to sigh, arms dropping, with his entire body following, as he allows himself to slip off the chair into the cool grass he’s grown.
“Woah, are you o-”
“I’m fine,” Sehun manages, just wanting to lie in the soft grass for a second. “Just- I’m fine.”
Jongin seems to understand, backing away.
Sehun breathes, deep, gentle. His hand curls into a wildflower.
He smiles.
---
“Are you babysitting me?”
“What?”, Chanyeol asks. “Dude, we’re just hanging out. Just being- we’re being cool with it.”
Zitao’s forehead scrunches up as he tries to make sense of that.
“Well, obviously I know that,” he says. “It just feels like recently you’ve known when Sehun’s out. Feels like you’re one of those therapy dogs they give to cheetahs.”
They’re lying on their backs in Zitao’s living room. Chanyeol had grabbed a beer earlier, and Zitao had passed.
“Do you feel like you need a therapy dog when he’s out?”, Chanyeol asks, serious and ridiculous, turning to him. They’re on the same wavelength most of the time though.
“Dude, no,” Zitao tells him. “Just that you feel like one. Like you’re keeping me busy.”
“I- I think that’s just called like, um. Being bros, ya know? Being busy is great when you’re having fun. Or whatever.”
“You’re really bad at expressing yourself, I think.”
Chanyeol nods in response and acceptance. Zitao gives up.
“Anyways,” he says. “When do you think they’ll turn the seasons?”
“Soon,” Chanyeol says. “I think they all have their own projects right now though. Why?”
Zitao hums.
“I think I’m going to ask Sehun to marry me in the spring.”
Chanyeol sits up so fast he almost hits his head on the couch.
“Zitao!”, he splutters. “That’s so- how long have you been thinking about it?”
He’s smiling in a way that’s making it hard for Zitao to not beam. So he doesn’t hold back, sitting up too, lit up.
“Since I met him,” which is so corny and stupid but it feels true.
“For real?”
“For real.”
---
Sehun spends at least a week copying everything from the master book into the fresh parchment that Jongin has finally finished completely. And then he spends another three days sewing and binding it together.
The finished weight of it in his hands almost makes him cry, for some reason.
---
“I have something for you,” Sehun tells him, when they’re drinking their morning coffee and cuddled up on the couch together. “I’ve been trying to give it to you for a while, but I can never figure out the right way. I know this isn’t grand, but-”
“I like not grand,” Zitao interrupts, smiling at him, leaning in for a quick kiss. “I want to see.”
“Okay.”
Sehun emerges from Zitao’s hold, gets up and walks to the door that leads to his sanctum. Zitao’s eyes follow him till he starts going down the stairs, and then he’s looking up at the ceiling, still smiling. A gift. Sehun has him weak.
When Sehun comes back up, he’s holding a book; medium sized, leather bound. Hand-bound, even, as Zitao can see when he gets closer. It looks surprisingly like Sehun’s spell records.
Sehun settles, looks down at the book, back up at Zitao, shifts in his seat.
“So, I, um… I got Jongin to- Well, actually I just-”
He stutters to a stop. Clenches his hands around the gift. Zitao knows how he gets, so he reaches to touch his forearm.
Sehun relaxes.
“Why don’t you, uh, take a look yourself?”, he asks, and he hands Zitao the book.
Zitao takes it eagerly, and it’s beautiful on closer inspection. The stitching is neat, and the leather is well stained. He opens it to the first page.
It hits him straight in the chest.
It’s Sehun, beautiful, sketched with a meticulous hand. Fingers bent into a Semblance. And then in the lower right corner, his careful, sharp handwriting, explaining what it does.
He flips the page. It’s Sehun doing the Semblance to summon small things. Sehun, calling upon the wind. Inscribed in the exact words Zitao has committed to memory.
It’s the family book. Zitao might dissolve.
He can feel Sehun watching him, rapt, nervous. Every Semblance is perfectly drawn, and the fact that it’s Sehun posing is making his hands shake.
Zitao’s flipping pages fast enough to get to the end in a couple of minutes. Or at least, what he remembers as the end, because he gets to what he knows is the last Semblance in the book, but there’s still pages left. He can see the ink of the next page through this one, so he flips the page, and-
Oh.
The most detailed sketch in the book is Sehun holding his hands up in a new Semblance, looking directly at the viewer, but softly. Jongin (presumably) has drawn the slight sheen of gossamer on him, and has draped him in pearls. Around his wrists, his head, his waist.
There’s wildflowers at the bottom of the page, and the crafter is listed as Sehun himself. A creation Semblance, newly made.
“He stylised this one a bit when he sketched it,” Sehun says, and his voice sounds heavy, but he laughs anyway. “The blank pages are there in case… in case you want to help me record any new Semblances we craft.”
“You crafted… a Semblance? For me?”
“I know how important it is to you.”
Zitao flips to the first blank page, runs his hand across it. Makes a note to thank Jongin later. Thinks of Sehun. Thinks of all the possibilities in the world. Of the sock drawer, of spring. He doesn’t realize he’s crying until a teardrop falls on the page.
“Oh, baby,” Sehun says, soft. The book goes on the coffee table, and Zitao goes to Sehun, holding him close, unwilling to let him spill away. “Did you like it? Because I just love you so much, and I just- I wanted you to have this. You know I love being your family.”
Zitao curls into him, hand in his hair, the other arm wrapping around Sehun’s back. Face buried in Sehun’s neck.
“I’m so glad it’s you,” he says, quietly. In the sketches, in his life. “I’m just always so glad it’s you.”
“I was so nervous,” Sehun confesses. “I knew I didn’t have to be, but I just- I want you happy.”
“All that takes for me is you.”
Sehun’s hands shake for a second, and then he kisses him.
Zitao could fall in love everyday, and it still wouldn’t be enough to hold all this in it.