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With the autumnal chill came a catastrophic problem for Seungho’s village. An intense illness spread rapidly among the townfolk, with many of the less sturdy citizens succumbing to the illnesses in their homes. Older people, young children, women left frail after birthing their children - all were dying at rates that would leave his village even weaker and less relevant than it already was for at least a generation. Even some of the men that he had previously thought durable were not able to withstand the illness.
The illness would take its victims faster than expected, but slow enough to know what it was that killed them. It would start with an intense fever and spontaneous defecation. It would be near impossible to provide enough potable water quickly enough for how much was wicked from the patient. Already weakened, they would be left with almost no appetite. If tended to rigorously, some could survive with a mix of extremely intentional porridge and warm water around the clock. Largely, most that reached this level of sick would waste away, eventually officially dying of starvation, as their body unceremoniously leeched its liquids and nutrients back into the bedroll they lie in.
It was also contagious. It wasn’t immediately obvious what exactly would pass on the illness, but being around someone so sick inevitably led to others around them also developing gastrointestinal distress. This risk made many families make the difficult decision of whether they should try to nurse their loved ones through the wretchedness, or allow them to wither in order to not leave their children orphans. There were so many orphans in Seungho’s village now. So many small homes covered in human waste and bowls of water and crying children.
And Nakyum – that lovable
idiot
. Over the last few years Seungho had taught him how to read in the common tongue. And Nakyum had been teaching the children in Seungho’s village. And even when the illness creeped into town and began ravaging anybody it could ensnare, he kept heading into the densely inhabited areas to keep providing his lessons for his kids. He was proud of Seungho’s village having such smart children. He was certain it would lead to the village breaking generational curses and usurp the traditional Lordships across the region. Not that Nakyum was trying to start a revolution - he just loves everything he’s been afforded and wanted to share the gracious love Seungho had provided him. Their governor was so kind, they deserved to have their lives enriched by him as well. It seemed harmless, and gave him a purpose.
A purpose? Seungho smashed a porcelain import into the ground, the delicate material pulverized into a fine dust that’ll certainly impale their hands and feet. What a crock of shit.
Nakyum, my boy. My love. My wife. My best friend. My painter. My love. My love. My love. My love.
He’s dead.
Years of fattening him up. Making the delicate boy a pudgy beauty with big cheeks and a supple bottom - wasted. He was as skinny as the day he was picked up as a drunkard in a bar. Perhaps skinnier. His face was so gaunt. It was as pale as when he had been kidnapped with a knife to his throat. His luxury linens were destroyed. An acrid damp surrounding him. Seungho and a team of all of the best doctors he could summon tended to him the second he began showing symptoms. They locked themselves in the manor for weeks with around the clock care. Seungho was urged not to enter the room, but Seungho was never one to listen to reason.
Besides, it was the weak in town that were dying. Nakyum wasn’t a soldier but he was a healthy man. Seungho was a fighter and raised with all of the finest care - he knew he wouldn’t die. They wouldn’t die. It was impossible.
Seungho was wrong, however. It’s impossible to predict these things, the physicians would say. It was dependent on each person’s constitution, the physicians would say. They did everything they could, the physicians would say. They’re so sorry for his loss, the physicians would say.
The physicians didn’t know shit.
The physicians didn’t try hard enough.
My Nakyum is gone.
The town, struggling to keep up with the pace of death, was instituting mass graves. Nakyum couldn’t be part of that. The gravediggers would dig and they would shit and they would end up in the pit with their constituents. A cry for help was sent to the major strongholds awhile back, and it went either unanswered or the answer wasn’t satisfactory because Nakyum was fucking dead already anyway, so what the fuck were they going to do?
Nakyum needed to be honored. His death was a tragedy that should bring anybody to these distant parts of the country. He was Lord Yoon’s wife. Of course the other lords would come to help him into the afterlife. I hope he’s fat in the afterlife. He deserved it.
Seungho sent a message to all lords he had a relationship with - good, mediocre, even those with whom he had a poor relationship but Nakyum had wanted him to repair. He was certain some would come entirely to watch Seungho the Sodomite come undone as his concubine with a prick is stuck in the ground. He was equally sure that many would come as part of their civic duty and to uphold the relationships across families. A favor from a strong family is useful to have on hand. Attending a funeral for a lousy nobody was a small price to pay to keep that option available.
Seungho’s advisors had urged him to delay. They urged him to find a painter for Nakyum’s portrait. What a joke! They had urged him to bury Nakyum safely and allow the lords to visit his shrine when the town was less plague-stricken. It was unwise and unsafe to have so many powerful people endangered by such a grave illness, his advisors said. But Seungho wasn’t going to have any other painter ever attempt Nakyum’s likeness. Nakyum had painted himself plenty, and had become quite good at it. They can use Nakyum’s own paintings. Many may be salacious but there were plenty that would be appropriate for a public shrine. Only Nakyum could ever capture the love and safety they shared together. Nobody else would ever get his little cheeks right, and his perfectly plump little lips that required no rouge. His cute little eyelashes. His slim frame and his beautiful smile. Nobody else could have ever captured him correctly. What could Seungho do if he hired someone and they drew some tepid cretin and called it Nakyum? He’d have to kill them. And Nakyum wouldn’t like that.
Seungho knew throwing money at craftsmen was a good way to get things done quickly and get them done well. He spared no expense having a well treated casket built for his Nakyum. It was lined in the softest weaves with the boldest dyes. Colors that would emphasize his beauty rather than wash him out. These details assured everyone of his love for his painter boy, the casketmaker assured him. It wasn’t the right season, but there were gardeners with buildings made of glass that were able to grow the finest flowers. They also sent many many bouquets.
Seungho had his advisors also send notice to the Kaesang house that cared for Nakyum in his childhood. He had seen Heena in the past year, at least. A notice was posted in town as well - although Seungho didn’t particularly care for them, the mongrels that caused Nakyum’s illness did also adore him. And Nakyum clearly enjoyed their company as well, given his petulant behavior brought this situation upon himself. So, they can come, too.
The grief left no room within Seungho for hunger, thirst, lust, happiness, or desire to work. It left only a notch in his throat that always threatened to make his voice croak. It felt like a tea kettle where the openings had all been sealed up. The ear bursting screaming of the pressure that built within him with nowhere for it to go.
The screams weren’t entirely metaphorical. His manor needed desperate repair. After every meeting to arrange Nakyum’s funeral another room’s furniture would be tossed, shredded. His throat worn so raw as to feel blood falling from it to his digestive tract. Fine glass shattered, walls ruptured with the force of his emotions. Seungho’s hands were scabbed and swollen, with at least one broken finger. The staff never saw a tear drip down his cheek, but they were keen to stay far away, regardless. The only times they would approach was with soothing teas when he would finally settle in the studio.
The studio was Nakyum’s private space. Seungho had hired him as his own lecherous painter boy, and always ensured he has the best tools and anything he needed to encourage his work. After taking care of his father, he ensured his new manor also had space for what Nakyum held dear. The subjects he worked on varied day to day, week to week. There was no more requirement it be only of Seungho’s sexual appetite. The room even now was littered in partially finished paintings. Some were of himself and Seungho holding each other and smiling, also of kittens and puppies frolicking. Some scribblings in a corner that had been crossed out and redone a few times - it looks like a lesson plan for a particularly sharp “student” of his in town, paired with a simple but vibrant portrait of the reeds that grow near the riverside.
This studio was the only place off limits to Seungho’s violence. The medical room where Nakyum died also hadn’t been touched, but the studio was the one that was most important to the grieving lord. When his voice could no longer muster its deep timbre, his hands no longer had sensation or could even grip a spoon, and his legs no longer functioned, he’d retreat into Nakyum’s studio. In here, he would lay on the floor, gripping tightly the pale fabrics of Nakyum’s painting clothes, portraits resting against the walls in places Seungho could see if he could bear to open his eyes. It was in here where the tears would actually fall. Silently, yet vigorously. His entire body heaved, his head pounded, his mouth filled with saliva and his stomach constantly attempting to heave its empty contents - he cried.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Nakyum’s processional went as well as one could hope. Not as many people from out of town arrived as Seungho would have demanded - the illness struck a deeper fear into those cowards further than the “tamed” Lord Yoon does, it would appear. It was a bitter passing thought that none of Seungho’s “friends” had come either. Heena and the other women arrived, hair carefully styled in subdued patterns, wearing their grieving garments. Since Heena had last come by, it appears one of her eyes had been injured. Probably an episode of violence from a drunken man with more power than her.
A shrine was erected within the manor near the entrance to his studio. The medical room was finally emptied after a protest from the staff - the odor was seeping beyond the doors, bodily waste absorbing into the floorboards. The room was still acrid with the scent of death and decay. For weeks, although Seungho couldn’t bring himself to enter the room any further, he was acutely aware of the bedroll where Nakyum had perished, and the small nest of linens he had laid in next to his love as his body became feeble. He liked to pretend the two of them were laying together in repose, although it became clear as the fever refused to ease and the food refused to stay down and his skin became pallid and his clothes became loose that there was not going to be rest for either of them for a long time.
Seungho didn’t feel particularly attached to his lordship or the family Yoon, but it was where he will be required to be buried when he does inevitably perish. Nakyum’s myojimyeong - his epitaph - was something that Seungho struggled to find the words for. He knew Nakyum deserved the finest porcelain and slip. He knew his body would be transported from this small village town to the Yoon family tombs. He would be closer to Seungho’s father than he would ever find acceptable.
It wasn’t hard to write about the facts - when he was born. Where. Who his family was. Seungho made a point to connect themselves as wedded soulmates. He included Heena as a courtesy. Nakyum’s death made Seungho a much more gracious man, he thought bitterly as he filled out the information for the craftsman. What was hard was actually writing down that he died. Seungho knew the date clearly. It was actually a beautiful autumn day. The morning had started chilly and it turned into a warming afternoon sun. If Nakyum hadn’t been sick, they surely would have spent the day in the woods, finding crunchy leaves and enjoying the last breaths of a season that didn’t require thick outerwear. Instead it was the most suffocating, desolate, hot day of Seungho’s life. He could not cool himself off, despite feeling his blood run cold as he watched his love take his last breath. Nakyum hadn’t even been awake for it. There weren’t any last words to soothe him and take his grief away. Just a sick boy, a meager smile across his face and resting his wet hand on Seungho’s, too weak to grip it, as he slipped into what Seungho had hoped would be just another nap wrought with fever induced delirium.
Even the day he died wasn’t a hard thing to answer - except for all of the feelings attached to acknowledging it had actually happened. It was summarizing his life and finding the right words for such a wonderful man. Their meeting weighed heavily on him. How could he possibly memorialize his childhood, wrought with poverty and abuse. Or his life as a young adult, sexually harassed and violated by many nobles’ whims? How could he possibly summarize just the past few years as if that was enough to describe how incredible Nakyum was?
Trying to find these answers dialled Seungho’s already impalpable grief into a territory only seen by men about to remove their own heads. The fortune of a village ravaged by sickness and grief was that medicine was being traded cheaply and without much regulation. Sticking the painkillers in the end of his pipe, the dulling effects of opium didn’t take his edges off, but it did leave him incapable of acting on them. It did leave him able to close his eyes without seeing the sunken and pale face that Nakyum left him with. Not long enough to sleep, but at least long enough to exhale without his throat hitching on all the pain that threatened to boil over at any moment.
Every time Seungho sat down to figure out how he would summarize Nakyum’s life, he found himself sitting within his studio. His head at rest atop a work table, opening the little music box he had picked up on a whim from that merchant. Nakyum kept it with him all this time, even when he could have used the money more than a trinket. One day, perhaps it had been a month after his death, this minor solace came to an end. The familiar trilling of the music within the box came to a halt, the machinery within the box no longer operational.
This was when Seungho returned to work, epitaph unfinished, his pipe permanently affixed to his mouth, the most effective (not necessarily expensive) liquors being shipped to his manor at his demand. His town and his government affairs all came to dread needing to meet with Governor Yoon - The Tear Streaked Governor. He sat, body language near catatonic, eyes bulging from his head and bloodshot from his drugs, insomnia, and tears. His cheeks with permanently affixed lines where the salty tears had followed the curves of his gaunt cheekbones and rolled down his jaw. He did not seem to blink often enough or think deeply about any issues that were taken to him. Given Seungho’s reputation and what he had just been through, nobody dared push him further than what he was already giving them.
At one point, a constituent was brought before him on charges of neglect for his son. The case was severe, the physical abuse evident on the boy - he was scrawny and bruised. He was shorter than he should be for his age and even then his clothes were still too small, worn so thin in certain places that his armpits and groin were nearly visible. He had large eyes and round cheeks and little pink lips - Seungho thought the boy could look a lot like when Nakyum was a child. That thought angered him even more toward the boy’s father. How dare he treat Nakyum like this?
As it happens, people were generally right to not urge the grieving lord out of his catatonic stupor - because this man had, and he immediately found himself on the other end of a very sharp sword, held by a very unstable man. Seungho was ready to remove every limb this man has, starting his cock, and make him beg for mercy before finally removing his head. The fog in his head from the drugs tried to bury the whispers that this would not quell the explosions within him. As the boy sobbed in the corner, an electric jolt shot through Seungho, icing his core.
The names were very familiar. This was… the boy with the lesson plan? In the studio? As the boy sobbed and called his father’s name, blood dripping from his father’s chin where the sword was perched, Seungho thought of those scribbled out papers he had spent so many hours staring at recently.
“You, you learned from the painter?” Seungho said suddenly, eyes darting to the sobbing child. “He was teaching you Hangul?”
“Y-yes sir,” The boy stammered, tears flowing freely from his cheeks. He was on his knees, and couldn’t make eye contact with Seungho. Snot pored from his nose and into his mouth, the boy used his too-short sleeve to wipe it away. “He helped me a lot. He said he even asked for help to learn more to teach me.”
This was certainly an interesting dilemma for Seungho. Nakyum was never fond of capital punishment as it were - but especially if it would harm someone close to him. It was evident the things Seungho saw in this boy were also noticed by Nakyum, although Nakyum had kept his existence private from Seungho. It was interesting to think he could have possibly had a life Seungho hadn’t known about, but he supposes he did become less possessive as they ruled their little village together.
“And you,” Seungho finally says, returning his focus to the father and lowering his sword. The father peered up, fear evident in his face. “You were aware of these lessons?”
“Yes my lord!” The father yelped almost immediately. “I always thought it would bring us misfortune! I always told my son to knock that off before it got us in trouble for disturbing the peace and terroristic thoughts!”
Seungho’s face contorted with a rage he had not felt since poisoning his father. Lips curled, teeth exposed in a snarl. Brows furrowed deep into the bridge of his nose. The tears streamed from his bloodshot eyes. A guttural yell escaped him before he had any chance to pretend he was composed. He cut off the man’s left hand with his sword. Blood spewed from the open wound, the man screaming in agony. The son crying in fear, soiling himself. The smell of blood and urine paired with the cacophonous racket was enough to whip Seungho back into the present.
“Advisor Kim,” Seungho says through the chaos he just created in his seating room. One of his advisors nodded, indicating he was listening. “Have a medic tend to this father. Have an academic sent from the city to care for his son. He may keep custody of his son if his quality materially improves, otherwise I demand a suitable caretaker also be acquired for the boy. He is clearly quite intelligent, and he should not be squandered in a poor town covered in piss and rags.”
“That is a very unusual punishment,” The advisor responded. “I will send my requests at once. I will have one of our medics take care of the emergent issue with the man.”
“Understand,” Seungho says, returning his stare to the handless man. He had stopped screaming and was extremely pale, staring where his limb had once been. “This is mercy because my wife loved your son and would hate to see him distressed. I will not be so kind if we cross again.”
When the liquor arrived later that evening, it did not take Seungho long to drink enough of it to vomit and fall asleep. This was a recurring theme after each day of work. He wouldn’t know this, but his advisors took turns through the night ensuring he would not choke on his own bile or overdose on his drugs. Regardless of his grief, they still needed him. And Nakyum needed his epitaph.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Lord Lee Jihwa was receiving a lot of mail these days. There was an illness spreading across the country with an unknown origin. Some of the best scientists had proposed it may be mass contamination of drinking wells with agricultural and livestock waste. Others proposed a “super flu” of sorts. Nothing was quite determined, other than many people were dying unceremoniously and it was straining the economy and political strength of the nobles.Since there was a lot of mail, there were also by default a lot of meetings. Especially since Jihwa had taken a post in Hanyang and was in close proximity to most of the major conference buildings.Jihwa always felt like these meetings accomplished very little, but he understood a little better as he had grown older the degree of opportunistic power-grabs that sewed their roots behind these closed doors.A specific letter caught his attention. He had received a few requests to attend processionals recently, given the state of the world. But this one arrived from a perimeter village from Yoon Seungho. For Nakyum, of all people. Jihwa felt his lips twitch and his chest tighten as he read the notice. Of course after everything Nakyum was going to find a way to fuck things up again.But Jihwa was not going to attend due to his prior engagements in the main city. He wasn’t blind to the cries for help from governors across the region, but he was part of the team trying to find the best ways to treat, minimize, and ultimately dispose of the infected. And it’s not like Seungho was very happy to see him at their last encounter. He was granted mercy and told in no uncertain terms that they were never to see each other again. It took years for Jihwa to come to peace with losing his dear friend. To see him reach out like this, in this circumstance, was really twisting a knife that Jihwa had thought was long removed from his sternum.The pain in his chest grew as he began receiving flurries of letters from advisors and other staff from Seungho’s estate. He wasn’t sure how many of the folks there remembered him, although some of the names seemed vaguely familiar from their past. At minimum, someone there had deemed him someone capable of handling the capricious man in his state of grief. The letters were vague in their nature - no doubt to prevent rumors should they be intercepted before reaching their intended audience. But Jihwa recognized the desperate pleas and felt his heart twinge and hurt for his former friend and love.Jihwa took great pains to redirect his workload to the outskirt village Seungho had taken a post in - of course Seungho would even make going to see him be an ordeal. The man never did care about how he inconvenienced others. He finished his most urgent business and alerted the rest that he will correspond via letter or resume when he returns - and should something important happen while away, to take the word of his senior advisor as the word of Lord Lee.The journey would take nearly three weeks, given the general instability and danger that had begun to present itself along the countryside in the wake of mass sickness and hysteria. Watching your wife and children be dumped into the ground while the nobles accused them of getting sick from eating pig shit would do that to you. In a normal world, the trip would only be ten days. Jihwa did not pack lightly. He was unsure what Seungho would be needing, but also knew he was going to need something to apologize for missing Nakyum’s funeral. That lewd little painter was important to Jihwa’s lord, after all.Jihwa’s most senior advisor was most senior for a reason. That reason wasn’t his emotional intelligence, but he was an extremely perceptive man who was more capable of leading a country than most. With his advisor by his side, Lord Lee Jihwa had truly become a powerful man in Hanyang, making progress his father never would have imagined possible as he swung him violently by his hair as a horny teenager. This advisor urged Jihwa to consider what it was he truly hoped to gain by rekindling a relationship with Lord Yoon - a family Jihwa had rightly predicted as being in decline, but wrongly predicted the speed of their downfall. Seungho’s civil examination and taking a government post in a small area while Seungwon also moved to Hanyang had stabilized the family’s reputation. Seungho taking a “wife” had also done wonders to quell the incessant rumors of how much of a lazy sodomite he was.That made Jihwa smile some, in retrospect. So few people knew his wife - Nakyum, was the painter boy. He had heard whispers a few times from merchants who had traveled far and wide that they met a painter who called himself wife to make his lover’s life easier. These merchants usually carried his wares - no longer salacious paintings of naked men and now lively illustrations of flowers in bloom and buildings bustling with happy activity. The paintings were always signed “Yoon Naemin”. It was obvious to Jihwa who this was, the lowborn boy clearly still wasn’t terribly clever. Far less an intellectual equal than Seungho deserved.What did he hope to gain by visiting Seungho now? He could have stopped by to try to rekindle their friendship at any time. It may not have worked, but he probably wouldn’t have actually been slain - Seungho wasn’t like that anymore. It was one good thing about the painter’s presence in his life. Especially as the city became less lenient on slaying each other, even as a lord. And it’s not like everyone has forgotten the sodomite young lord and the rumors that he was responsible for murdering so many of their friends and setting a temple ablaze.As Jihwa traveled the countryside he was left to ponder his advisor’s question. There was a fear in him that so deeply remembers the belly rumbling, snot running, head bursting agony that came from losing his first love to some lowborn. Was he being an opportunist trying to retake what he felt was rightly his? He hadn’t thought of Seungho in that way in many years. He hadn’t really thought of Seungho much at all recently, other than to think about how few male escorts had the skills he had. Or his proud lack of discretion. Generally, Jihwa was really not fond of his ambivalence toward customs and norms, as he had wanted to uphold his family’s honor and enjoy their play sessions. But having a man that was proud of their time together was something he found himself missing as his age passed thirty and the few children he bore had no resemblance to anyone he loved.It’s not possible he was traveling halfway across the country just to take a prick in his ass. He really was a respectable adult who understood the difference between passing whims and something he could actually pursue. Jihwa was certain he was working his way toward Seungho’s estate entirely to keep the village from a revolt that would inevitably come as Seungho takes up his Mad Lord behaviors yet again. Jihwa was also certain the letters he received didn’t even begin to scratch the surface. They said he was having “a difficult time”, that he was feeling “overburdened”, that they were instructed to change some of their shipments last minute. These types of concerns could easily be brushed away as a governor distracted with personal matters who can’t take care of his citizens as well as he should be, and needs some assistance.It could also be interpreted as Seungho was falling apart at the seams and attempting to rip his soul out of his body and leave this mortal coil. And as Seungho’s longest, and perhaps only, friend, he had a duty to make sure that wasn’t the case, either. That’s all this was - a welfare check for someone finding themselves vulnerably alone at an age younger than most would expect.It couldn’t possibly be Jihwa’s own greed at the situation. There was no way the way his heart stopped in his chest and then stammered back in an arrhythmic pattern as he read the letter was just excitement at taking advantage of a man he loves. Jihwa found himself wondering a lot about what Seungho might even look like these days. He didn’t feel like he himself hadn’t changed much - older, sturdier, a few whisps of gray streaking his auburn hair, but largely still the same. His hair still lolled down with loose rings that never quite smoothed perfectly for his top knot. His eyelashes were still bold and long. His cheekbones were still high. His weight was still average, with enough muscle to not seem slovenly. He hoped to find Seungho in similar condition. He really loved his long, lounging body and strength that settled quietly just under his skin. He loved the little veins in his arms and his sharp jaw and his intense eyes. He really hoped he wasn’t looking like his father. That would probably be too much for Seungho to withstand these days.Jihwa caught himself thinking like this more often than he was comfortable with. He blamed it on the boring trek and not having had much time to himself lately. He was just pent up and on his way to see someone who used to suck him off regularly. Of course his mind fluttered into adulterous places when left unattended. But he wasn’t going for that. He really wasn’t. And he didn’t “love” Seungho today. He hasn’t loved Seungho in years. He made a very strict point to absolutely not think about it like that. He was an old friend and paramour that he had to outgrow faster than he was ready to thanks to finding the directions their lives needed to go. And now he’s traveling to check in on his friend.It isn’t greed. He isn’t happy Nakyum is dead. He isn’t excited to see Seungho to kiss him and sleep with him and play chess and read books and dress up in fancy clothes. He’s visiting to make sure an old friend is okay and the village is functioning without a functional governor. That’s all. It isn’t greed. It isn’t. It can’t be. It really, really, can't be.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Seungho received notice that he had a visitor today. He wasn’t sure how long it had been. He didn’t smell very good. His hair was loose, his lips were cracked, his vision was bleary. Stains on his robe smelled a little bit like bile and a little bit like urine. He tried to turn away his visitor.
“It’s Lord Lee Jihwa, sir,” Advisor Kim notified him, staring at the distressing state of his lord. It was evident his advisor wasn’t going to let him turn the man away. “Would you like me to receive him elsewhere so you may freshen up? I’ll call for the maids.”
“That would be best, thank you,” Seungho responds, pressing palms harshly into his eyes until he sees stars. His vision began to clear, as light filtered in, sharp pins pressed against his brain through his skull. “Drinking water too.”
His attendants drew him a warm bath and found unsullied clothing for him. He wiped himself slowly, generally unpleasant feelings of unease in his gut and throat and pain coursing up and down his brainstem tarnishing what had used to be a peaceful time for him. His brain fogged in the aftermath of his drugs and booze and left him without much ability to mull over why Jihwa would be coming now but hadn’t come when he was actually invited.
Seungho emerged from his bath with his hair wet, but tied, clothes clean, holding himself straight and upright. His face firmly impassive, eyes staring straight ahead. He felt absolutely bedraggled, a sodden shell of his usual self, but Jihwa wasn’t allowed to see that. He lost that privilege a long time ago. He had been told Jihwa was being offered tea and a small accompaniment of snacks in the main sitting room that shared a hallway down to Nakyum’s studio. Jihwa wasn’t where Seungho had expected. He was at Nakyum’s shrine. Seungho felt his jaw clench and his nerves wind around themselves in a flaring, hissing, possessive shriek that he contained within himself.
“What are you doing here,” Seungho demanded. It wasn’t a question. And he didn’t feel particularly like giving him pleasantries.
Jihwa was on his knees in front of the altar, not in a position of prayer, but a position of deference at least. Seungho noticed he had developed a few gray hairs but was largely the same boy he used to play with. His clothing was extremely nice for having just traveled so far. He noticed a well wrapped box at the shrine that wasn’t there before. Had Jihwa brought something for a tribute?
“I came to give condolences and check in on you,” Jihwa responded from his place on his knees, his eyes darting to look up at Seungho, but not turning his head away from his task at hand. “I told your help I brought those honey cookies the painter liked so much and they brought me here.”
“You know I told you I was never to see you again or you’d be risking your life.”
“And yet, you invited me out here,” Jihwa still hadn’t moved from his spot, but he was maintaining eye contact with the grieving lord at this point. “Did you want me to see what it would’ve been like if I had succeeded all those years ago with the assassin? You just wanted to rub in that this godforsaken illness was a stronger man than me when we were young?”
Jihwa wasn’t entirely sure why he chose to say that to Seungho. It really wasn’t something he was actually feeling. But it was enough for Seungho’s impenetrable face to contort with the kind of rage fueled psychosis Jihwa had seen many times in their childhood. He felt his hair grabbed and his skin pulled taut across his skull as Seungho grabbed him by his head and threw him to the side of the altar.
“Leave if this is the nonsense you’re going to spew,” Seungho responded shortly. His body was stiff and his eyes pierced Jihwa as if he were imagining skewering him with thirty swords at once. “Nakyum can’t even eat those anymore. They’re going to rot and attract bugs. We have enough rotting in the village, not that the capital has ever acknowledged it.”
Jihwa stood and patted himself off, swiping a hand across his hair, not that it would fix the tie that Seungho just ruined or make his curls behave. Checking for blood, he told himself. “What I said was out of line. That’s part of why I’m here. My work in the capital has me managing this plague. Your village is hardly the only place looking at mass graves and economic collapse. I know communication has been poor. We haven’t sent anything to the villages this far out, yet. It didn’t feel worth the parchment when we didn’t actually have answers or advice for you all.”
“You’re telling me you’re responsible?” Seungho responded, uninterested in the excuses coming from the other man.
“You have selective listening these days. Becoming like your father,” Jihwa quipped back. “I’m only responsible for making sure they have the time, money, and resources to get to the bottom of this. It’s entirely bad luck that it has affected you so poorly.”
“I still don’t understand how you could come now and not when I actually called for you,” Seungho responded, his voice losing a lot of its edge. His fists had unfurled. It was obvious to Jihwa that Seungho hadn’t realized he was so close to losing his composure all over again. This was a man about to bawl like a newborn babe. The words gripped Jihwa’s chest tightly and sent cold into his veins. “Did you wait entirely to taunt me? See how low I’d go? See if maybe I’d just forget about Nakyum?”
Jihwa grabbed Seungho’s arm tightly. It was clear he had lost some weight recently, but otherwise had been in very good condition. Jihwa pushed away the thoughts that what he had been quietly hoping - not hoping - for during his journey were largely accurate. He was still a strikingly handsome man, even stricken with grief. “You refuse to listen to me. I am here to help you. I am here to stabilize anything you need for your villagers, and I am here to assess what this illness is doing outside the major cities. I am here to honor the painter’s passing. I am here to make sure you aren’t trying to leave Seungwon the last Yoon so soon.”
“He’s not the last Yoon. He has children now,” Seungho muttered back, removing Jihwa’s arm and crossing his own in defense. “Those cookies really will rot. Give them to the help.”
Seungho’s tacit acceptance of his presence felt like a huge victory to Jihwa. He honestly wasn’t sure he was even going to be allowed in the manor. And after allowed in the manor, he didn’t expect to get to talk to Lord Yoon so peacefully. The letters really undersold everything about Seungho. He was falling apart in his own body. Even as children as he was forced to repeatedly lie with women while surrounded by their fathers, Seungho never looked so broken. Even when he thought Nakyum was going to die after being imprisoned he wasn’t so broken. It was frightening to see someone so strong turned into this.
Jihwa spent most the afternoon looking over paperwork and getting information from Advisor Kim over how the village has been operating. Not just since Nakyum’s death, but since the first signs of the illness spread. He asked for a record of when Seungho had reached out to the main city for help. His heart twinged again when he checked these, seeing the repeated letters seeking any kind of answer. And the flurry of them, one sent every day the first week Nakyum was sick, three to four sent every day up to his death. Then he didn’t reach out anymore. It was clear Seungho no longer trusted the city to care. Jihwa wondered how many other places in the country had reached similar conclusions. He wasn’t really in charge of correspondence. He wasn’t sure how much was coming in or how frenetic the energy in the pleas for help were. They really could be facing a revolution if enough of the country is feeling this ignored.
He checked the supply orders for the manor. He submitted a few extras for timber, linens, and dishware as he was filled in on some of the damage Seungho had done to his own property. He canceled a few of the liquor requests. The manor certainly didn’t need to be ordering more than the tavern was. He wrote a letter to his wife, letting her know he was going to be gone for quite awhile longer, yet. He requested a toy maker to build and paint a wood variant of the yakgwa he had brought. Then it won’t rot.
He checked in with when villagers had come to the manor what plights Seungho was handling, and how. He was surprised with how relatively stable things seem to be. A small boon to it being a sleepy town. There was one man who somehow received compensation for beating his kid - he got a tutor and a caretaker? That was something to look into some other time. There was a note that he did also lose a hand in retribution.
As evening came, Jihwa excused himself from Seungho’s advisors and knocked on the door to his chambers. There was no answer. Jihwa let himself in anyway, with only a brief pause to note how he would have never thought twice about this when they were young. Seungho wasn’t in his room. His room smelled of vomit and there were broken goods along the walls - no doubt fragile items thrown in rage against the walls. There was blood in another area by some broken boards, that must be why he was asked to order timber. He should check Seungho’s hands later and see if they need any medical attention. The state of his room gave Jihwa a whole new list of things to take care of tomorrow. He went to find a maid to figure out where the hell Seungho is.
“He’s usually in Nakyum’s studio these days, sir,” the help responded to Jihwa, avoiding his gaze. “Please, be nice to him. He might not be as lucid as you’re wanting. These days we largely leave him alone from sundown to sun up unless he starts yelling.”
Jihwa passed by the altar, grabbing his cookies back. “Sorry lowborn, I’m gonna need these to take care of you. You’ll be fine, these weren’t as good as the ones I gave you before, anyway.”
He knocked lightly at the door at the end of the hall past the shrine. Jihwa could hear some movement behind the door, but ultimately he was ignored. Unlike his bedroom, this didn’t feel like a room he should enter without permission. “Lord Seungho. It’s Jihwa. Can we talk?”
“No.”
That was that.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
The next morning, Jihwa set about ordering a general clean up and “air out” of the manor. He specified Seungho’s room needed to be taken care of if any of them ever expected him to stop using the studio like some lowborn himself. It was evident whenever he mentioned the painter was a lowborn that none of his staff ever considered him that way. He took a mental note to not say that so often.
Another day of taking care of affairs here, seeing that things largely weren’t on fire except for Seungho, and making quiet notes to himself about how to help had passed. He caught Seungho at dinnertime.
“Let’s talk,” Jihwa tried again.
“About what?” Seungho responded, sipping only a thin broth. His eyes didn’t seem entirely focused. He smelled vaguely of smoke and opium.
“About you,” Jihwa responded back, demanding Seungho hold his eye contact. “Your government affairs are in better order than I expected for how much of a pile of shit you are.”
“You keep claiming that you’re here because you care about Nakyum and all you do is walk around and degrade him to my staff and ridicule me for caring that he’s gone, Jihwa,” Seungho responded back. His impassive demeanor once again showing its cracks so quickly to his old friend. Jihwa wondered if Seungho had spent any time last night in the studio thinking about how desperately he needs a shoulder to cry on.
“Okay, fine,” Jihwa responded back, placing his dishware down with a small clack. He folded his hands in his lap. “I really don’t care about the painter. Nakyum. I never did. You know that. He took you from me. He changed you. He caused many of my friends to die because they became stupid thinking about him. He basically ruined the first half of my life and left me scrambling to figure out what I’m supposed to be as an adult. Maybe it’s a little selfish of me to be here after he’s dead and say that to you, but it’s the truth. I really don’t care about him at all. But I care about you so much, Seungho. I have to care he died because of what he meant to you. I’m here because of you.”
Seungho threw his head back in a loud laugh, hollow and echoing wickedly in the room. “Is this the love confession you couldn’t handle when we were kids? You think I could possibly reciprocate now?”
“I’m not an idiot these days, Seungho. I wouldn’t guarantee at least two months of my life to some guy crying over some dead lowborn expecting to get love out of it,” Jihwa shot back, defensive. “I don’t care if you love me. I care that you’re going to survive and not make a fool of yourself.”
Seungho left after this, half his broth remaining and rice untouched. Of course he was losing weight if all he was doing was drugs. Jihwa didn’t have the patience to deal with a man who won’t deal with himself at all. This couldn’t possibly be true, of course, or he wouldn’t have come all this way to take care of him. But it didn’t make the situation any less frustrating.
Jihwa stopped back into the guest quarters. He had noticed the night before some signs that there were things missing from this room as well. Seungho must have been on a real rampage at some point. There was a painting in this room that must have been from Nakyum. It was clearly made with some of the most expensive paint Jihwa had seen. It was of a Kaesang that looked like it could’ve been Heena - no doubt the painter would’ve made it exactly like her if he hadn’t been worried what Seungho would think. That was untouched, as was anything in its immediate vicinity. Jihwa didn’t want to spend much time here. It was clearly not meant for someone like him, it was for Nakyum’s visitors.
That night, Jihwa once again went to Seungho’s chambers. It occurred to him that these were also Nakyum’s chambers, but he pushed the thought aside. The room had been cleaned. There was still a slight odor but it was too cold with winter looming to keep windows open very long. Jihwa sat in his old friend’s bedroll, looking around in more detail this time. There were piles of scribbled out papers in one corner. He thought the help would have cleared out trash like this as part of his orders. Perhaps they were some leftover paintings? Wouldn’t those be in the studio?
Jihwa uncrumpled a few of the papers and paused. They were all beginnings of an epitaph for the painter boy. Jihwa didn’t realize he was as close in age to them as he was - he was so small. Only a few years. He also didn’t realize Seungho wouldn’t be able to figure out how to describe the painter boy’s life after spending nearly one third of it with him and the rest of it being entirely unremarkable. The entire pile was Seungho trying to figure out what words should get carved and slipped in blue on white ceramic and presented in his final resting place. Jihwa felt like he was violating his friend’s privacy with these.
“What are you doing in here?” On cue, Seungho’s deep voice cut through the thick atmosphere of Jihwa’s digging. “I believe we gave you space in the guest quarters.”
“Well, you didn’t seem to be using it and I didn’t want to stare at a Kaesang all night,” Jihwa responded, putting the papers back down. He returned to Seungho’s bedroll and sat down. “I had your staff try to make this room a little less distressing. It still smells. Not sure how much you can even smell, right now.”
“Not much,” Seungho admitted, sitting down next to Jihwa. He hadn’t expected that at all. Seungho leaned onto Jihwa’s shoulder, resting weight on him. For wasting away, he still wasn’t a small man. He was certainly a lot bigger than Jihwa’s wife. “Everything is wrong, Jihwa.”
Instinctively, he placed a hand on the grieving lord’s cheek. It was damp. A thoughtless motion, he wiped the tear away. Seungho’s body began to shudder violently and Jihwa’s robes were warm and wet and deep gravelly breaths were sighed into him, interspersed with sniffles. Yoon Seungho was crying.
Instinctive, Jihwa will call it in the future. He gripped his love tightly between his hands, the grief-stricken tear-stained face staring at him with such despair it made his own eyes water. He kissed him hard, the lord’s lips cracked and nowhere near as soft as he remembered them all these years later. Seungho didn’t kiss back, but didn’t push him away. Didn’t lean in, but didn’t pull away. Didn’t close his eyes, but didn’t widen them in terror. It did slow the sobbing.
Jihwa reminds himself he really wasn’t trying to come here to be some greedy harlot desperate to hop on his old love’s prick. But he was so at a loss of what Seungho could possibly need right now. He found himself with his mouth around his friend, providing him a wet hole to find at least one kind of release these days.
Seungho’s own drugged stupor left him unsure how to process what was happening. He didn’t really want this. He didn’t really not want this. He understood where Jihwa was coming from, innately. It was one of those things they had always done for each other. They hadn’t ever had a relationship where they couldn’t do this to each other. The feelings were so familiar.
So familiar. That sucks so much. It wasn’t familiar like his last few years of happiness and calm. It was familiar like when his father was alive and everyone called him lazy and he had no reason to live other than to read books and cum in whatever he wanted. He couldn’t possibly call it nostalgia. It was just an artifact of a different lifetime. Jihwa was right, the first half of their lives were ruined. Were they ruined?
Jihwa swallowed Seungho’s orgasm, the grieving lord having no inclination to continue what they were doing beyond what had transpired. Tears weren’t falling from his eyes anymore. His breath shuddered as he ejaculated but he wasn’t holding back sobs. In some ways Seungho felt disgusted that this was really all it took for Nakyum to go away for a little bit. He hadn’t intended to have anybody else ever again. At least it wasn’t someone new? Maybe Nakyum could forgive him.
The nobles sat in silence together, Jihwa once again allowing Seungho to rest himself on his body. He stroked Seungho’s shoulder and sides lightly, squeezing in comfort when it felt he was on the brink of another breakdown. He didn’t make any further moves on him. Seungho felt his eyelids become so heavy and his body feel so warm. Sensations he hadn’t really been able to feel in so long. He wasn’t sure when he last truly fell asleep versus passing out in exhaustion, despair, or a drug induced fugue state.
“Jihwa,” Seungho finally breaks the silence, his voice barely above a whisper. “You mentioned you had a wife, now?”
“I do.”
“How could you do this? I feel like I’m going crazy.”
“I don’t love her at all, Seungho,” Jihwa responded, looking up at the ceiling instead of into his gaze. “When our friends died and you cut me off, I figured the best thing I can do is become exactly what my father wanted. I have a wife and three kids. Two girls and a boy. They all look a little like me, but I don’t feel so attached. My wife is very understanding, she has her own separate love we choose not to disclose.”
This didn’t really comfort Seungho at all. Seungho had changed so much for Nakyum. He was always hedonistic and interested in doing things for himself. Him and Jihwa got along so well because they were so similar. But that answer about his wife couldn’t be different from how Seungho felt these days. Even though it was so similar to how he had once felt, and how he had also figured he’d deal with the issue if his neck was ever on the line. There was another uncomfortable quiet in the room.
“Seungho,” Jihwa says, looking down at the other man, holding his face up to ensure eye contact. “I want to be extremely clear. I don’t ever expect anything like what Nakyum had. I didn’t come here with any plans to do that, or even to do this. As I said, I’m a smart man. I don’t have expectations for things that are impossible.”
“Jihwa,” Seungho responded, feeling comforted despite the absurdity of the situation. “I’m not convinced you’re very smart.”
That night, Seungho slept in the lap of his friend, and his friend slept extremely little.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Jihwa was a very smart man. So smart he knew not to try to sleep in Seungho’s chambers any longer. He wasn’t actually planning to do that that night, either, but he had wanted to say anything to deflect from seeing Nakyum’s unfinished words. He found himself spending more time than he originally expected to spend with Seungho in his village. Some of his work correspondence had started to arrive, and he had been providing data back to them from the outskirts as well. He wrote another letter to his wife, as well as to his superiors. He had his own attendant set these ones for delivery, rather than Advisor Kim.Seungho is receiving his constituents, although he never does seem to be sober. He was very displeased when his reduced shipment of liquors had arrived and demanded to know who was responsible. Jihwa made a mental note that this was definitely the correct choice. When Seungho couldn’t fill his belly with as much booze, he ate a little bit more. Jihwa requested some of his favorite dishes from the staff. Not constantly, but periodically, to coax the man out of the studio and get nourishment in him. His clavicles were still becoming more prominent, elbows and wrists sharp. Certainly not enough.Sometimes, when Jihwa could get Seungho out of the studio, there would be repeats of that night in his chambers. Not usually with as many tears. And Seungho never specifically used his words - his proud, confident words - the way he would have when they were younger. But he was receptive to the treatment. Providing an oral release for Seungho felt like the least Jihwa could do, at least for a while.It wasn’t his own desire growing that made it feel like not enough. If anything, Jihwa was being racked with guilt and feeling extremely discouraged. Seungho would have him, then share something with him that would split his heart into two and throw his brain in disarray. It was so clear that Seungho was using Jihwa to punish himself at this point. He’d become another weapon in his arsenal of self-loathing and destruction. Jihwa had to do something more for Seungho, so he could relinquish his addiction to self sabotage and embrace any semblance of recovering from his loss.“Jihwa,” Seungho asked one of those nights, his voice small like it always is before he pierces the other lord’s heart.“Yes?” Jihwa responded, bracing himself for what could possibly come next.“How are you not sad? Stricken with anger?” Seungho asked. “How do you wake up every day and do your job and do my job and comfort me and not once do you cry or get mad?”Ah, there it is. Seungho was so wrapped in himself he had no idea how much Jihwa was going through every single day. Every single time he caught a glimpse of his bedraggled friend. Every time he let Seungho be held in his arms. Of course he was mad. He wanted to shake him and tell him to snap out of it and have some self respect. Of course he was sad, he wanted his friend’s skin to regain its radiance and his eyes become lustrous and for him to smile again. Even just once. But even though he wanted to be mad at this selfishness and lack of perception from Seungho, he can’t. Jihwa knew that Seungho had dulled his own senses to a degree that he couldn’t possibly be the same smart, mischievous man he used to play with. Not right now, at least. But he was sure he could get it back.“I’m not sad, Seungho, because it wasn’t my lover who died,” Jihwa chose to respond simply. “And do not feel guilty, but just because someone dies, the sun still comes up the next day. I’m sure you’re aware.”“All too well,” Seungho agreed, unwilling to meet Jihwa’s gaze this time.“Every time the sun comes up, someone new needs something. I told you I’m here because I care that you are able to still succeed after everything. I keep going every day because we need to keep moving every day,” Jihwa continues on. “If you can’t do it, then I’ll do it for you.”A veiny hand grips Jihwa’s robe, a display of understanding and comfort. Maybe shame. It was always hard to tell exactly which emotions were bubbling through Seungho these days. Jihwa felt it was safest to assume all emotions were in there, and he was just seeing the few he really couldn’t control. He wasn’t willing to give Seungho the benefit of the doubt that he could contain anything truly pressing right now.Jihwa puts a warm hand over Seungho’s. He couldn’t hold himself back, but he didn’t want to say it out loud. “Don’t ask me again if I’m mad at you. You aren’t a teenage girl. Have some respect for yourself.”A few days later, Seungho didn’t take a visit from a concerned villager. Jihwa took care of it. It was a reasonably simple issue, the man had crops that needed to be harvested and too many of his employees had become ill to be able to help. Jihwa offered to post a sponsored employment listing in town, providing bonus pay to any who could help the man. The man’s crops would be an important stable food source for this village, and with winter here there really wasn’t any more time to dawdle over getting them out of the ground.Seungho also didn’t come to dinner. Jihwa had specifically requested a roasted fish that Seungho had really liked, and the help assured Jihwa that he knew it was available. Jihwa ate in silence. The wooden yakgwa arrived from the toymaker. After dinner, Jihwa placed it at Nakyum’s shrine. He didn’t really stop by the shrine often. He didn’t lie to Seungho when he said he wasn’t really heartbroken over the kid dying.Jihwa was reading letters in the guest quarters when he heard stagged foot steps, the occasional banging against the walls, and finally a knock with no strength at his door. Was this really the first time he was seeing Seungho today?“Come in,” Jihwa called out, the door opening immediately. Standing outside it was Seungho dressed in only his pants, his hair down, his eyes wide and breathing haggard. He was holding the wooden cookie in his hand.“What is this?” He asked. Screamed. It was hard to tell what emotion he thought he was conveying. It was certainly forceful. “Why was this there?”“You said real treats would rot. I thought he would appreciate the gesture of something less perishable,” Jihwa responded, trying to assess what was actually going on with Seungho right now. He was clearly distraught, he’s obviously been doing drugs for weeks, and he’s been drinking extremely heavily. And, he’s a lovesick man that got ripped in half with grief. But which thing was causing this specific behavior?
Seungho staggered into the room, collapsing on top of Jihwa, the wooden toy grasped firmly in one hand. The other was pushing Jihwa down at his shoulder. Seungho was on all fours on top of him, his long hair falling from his face and tickling Jihwa’s chest framing both of their faces. It was evident now his face was tear streaked and his eyes were bloodshot. His lips were cracked and his nostrils were flaring. His eyebrows furrowed in an incalculable expression. He continued to breathe hard, the stink of his drugs and dry mouth filling the enclosed space between them. He was so very high.
“My lord,” Jihwa started, beginning to push Seungho off him. “You really nee-”The toy dug into Jihwa’s wrist as he was pinned down. Seungho crashed his mouth into Jihwa’s, his teeth banging hard into the other’s face. A bony knee pressed into his thigh, a distinctly uncomfortable and somewhat painful feeling. Seungho’s tongue came out, trying hard to push himself into Jihwa. Jihwa pursed his lips.Jihwa shoved upward, destabilizing Seungho. He wasn’t particularly strong these days and he was inebriated enough this wasn’t particularly hard. “Get off. What are you doing?”“My thanks,” Seungho responds, pushing back against Jihwa and pinning him down again. “You keep making me feel better and don’t ask for anything.”Seungho grinds himself against Jihwa. Seungho let out a gasp as if he were experiencing pleasure. He wasn’t even hard. His fingers coil around Jihwa’s wrists, nails ripping the flesh. He bites Jihwa’s neck. Hard.Jihwa kicks him off this time. One hard kick right to the gut. Seungho immediately crumpled over, groaning. Jihwa is bleeding lightly from his neck and wrists, but overall isn’t injured. Breathing heavy with the sudden adrenaline from feeling like he was attacked. He supposes he was attacked. Seungho had gone quiet. And still. Far too still for how uncomfortable that crumpled position must be.Jihwa reaches out and turns him over. His face is pale, his breath is shallow. He flips open an eyelid and sees an eye with no consciousness or focus. Jihwa feels fear envelope his entire body. He begins to shake. He didn’t just kill his friend, did he? He can’t. He can’t have ruined their lives this badly. He was supposed to help. He needed his love to make it.“H-help,” Jihwa musters out, barely above a whisper. He pulls Seungho in tighter, pulling the biggest breath he could muster from his chest. Jihwa bellows, a sound louder than he’s certain he’s ever made before. “HELP! WE NEED A PHYSICIAN. IMMEDIATELY!”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
It felt fortunate that Seungho had been such a wreck that his staff had been staying near his side in the evenings - in secret, of course. They heard Jihwa’s desperate screams and were ready to awake the physician that had been staying in the manor since Nakyum’s passing. Jihwa’s face was tear streaked and the maid kept a continuous cup of hot tea available to him. Sometimes the cup gone quickly, other times left to go cold. It did not matter, she refilled whether it was empty or lukewarm. He sat steadfast by Seungho’s side as he was treated, mute.
Seungho’s eyes fluttered open a few hours later, glassy without recognition of his environment. The physician at the manor was extremely competent. He kept Seungho hydrated and had even nearly resolved his lips that had seemed permanently chapped lately. He was frustrated at how malnourished he had become. He was more frustrated that Seungho had done this to himself and didn’t even have an illness to blame. It took a little longer for Seungho to be awake in any meaningful capacity.
“Jihwa,” It was that damn small voice again.
“Yes, Seungho?” Jihwa responded. This back and forth was really becoming entirely too much.
“Why did you save me?” Jihwa looked at Seungho in silence. Seungho looked back. Tears had pooled at the edges of his eyes, threatening to fall down his temples and into his ears. Jihwa wiped them away. He’d call it impulsively. Not lovingly. That wasn’t allowed and they both knew that.
Ultimately, Jihwa didn’t answer the question. He just stroked Seungho’s hair, wiped his tears, and helped the physician when requested. The physician was much stricter than anybody else had been, and demanded full bed rest and large meals for the lord. It took almost a week for the physician to be happy with Seungho’s progress, and Seungho was about ready to murder the physician he was feeling so cooped up in the room.
The physician’s orders had a few extra benefits that Jihwa wondered if the physician had done on purpose. The strict bed rest prohibited him from laying alone in Nakyum’s studio for hours at a time. It didn’t allow him to drink and smoke himself into stupors, although he certainly vomited and had the shakes for a few days to compensate for it. Really, it broke a lot of the habits Seungho had developed over the past two months since Nakyum’s death. The new year was approaching.
Finally, he was allowed to leave, and the first thing he requested was to have an extremely hot bath drawn. He said his muscles were stiff from spending so much time in a bedroll, and his groin stinks. Jihwa offered to help him bathe, which takes Seungho by surprise, but ultimately the offer is accepted.
Using soft cloths, Jihwa wiped down all of Seungho’s limbs. He went over each one a number of times, gently, like a newborn babe. Seungho thought to himself that Jihwa had probably done exactly this to his children. He wasn’t sure what that thought made him feel. It wasn’t quite jealousy, but he was certainly saddened by it. And he was saddened that thinking of Jihwa made him feel such confusing things. That wasn’t supposed to be his place in this world.
Jihwa scrubbed the dirt out of Seungho’s fingernails, massaged his scalp when washing his hair, passed over the cloth to Seungho to take care of his genitals and neck - places Jihwa wasn’t really certain he wanted to touch right now. He assisted Seungho with shaving himself, as an unsightly shadow had begun to cross his face. When they were done bathing, Jihwa also helped to dry Seungho’s long, thick hair. He noted that unlike himself, Seungho did not have any grays poking through yet. Largely, they bathed in silence.
“Lord Seungho, would you like me to fasten your top knot?” Jihwa says, as he feels confident in how dry his friend’s hair is. Seungho tensed at this, then ultimately agrees to this help as well.
Jihwa took an extraordinary amount of time and care to comb out all of the tangles that had formed in Seungho’s hair. He wasn’t sure how much of it came from his time bedridden, and how much came from refusing to care for himself before. He was gentle, when he reached a snag he would start again, working slowly and deliberately to remove them without causing discomfort. His hands felt deft and used to this kind of chore. Seungho thought of Jihwa’s children again.
“Why are you helping me?” Seungho asks again. Jihwa felt like Seungho was never going to be happy with his answer. Seungho felt like he was never going to be happy with Jihwa’s answer. In that regard, they were on the same page.
“I’ve told you,” Jihwa replies, pulling a little harder on his hair, a teasing play. “I’m here to help you.”
“I think you’re just being an opportunistic leech and a pervert,” Seungho responds. Somewhat truthfully, but immediately regretting saying it out loud. It became clear as soon as he said it that he not only didn’t mean it, but had struck a nerve with the other lord. Jihwa pulls his hair again, this time not so playfully.
“I’ve told you,” Jihwa repeats again, through gritted teeth. He is tying the final loops of the top knot at this point. “I’m not idiot expectings things I can’t have. I am your friend, and I can’t let you die like this. I care about you too much.”
“That’s just selfish,” Seungho snaps back, turning his head to face Jihwa the second he was finished with his hair. “I don’t get why you can’t just let me die! There is nobody else as concerned as you!”
“That’s why it’s my job,” Jihwa responds back, staring down Seungho. The intense amber stare of the grieving lord was weak to someone so set in his ways. Unlike Seungho, who had to wade through all of his grief with Nakyum, and blinded his senses in any way he could, Jihwa has spent months figuring out why he is doing anything at all. His life isn’t nearly as purposeless as Seungho’s at this point.
“It’s a selfish job.”
“You’ve always known I’m selfish,” Jihwa laughs. “I am an extremely selfish man. I’m possessive, I’m jealous, and I am entitled. I choose what I want and I get it. You have been the only exception in my entire life, and the entire reason you are an exception is because of the dead painter boy you worship in the other room every night.”
“So you are here just to try to replace him,” Seungho whispers. “What of your wife and kids?”
“You’ve changed so much, Seungho,” Jihwa replies bitterly. “Nakyum changed you so much. You changed for the better. There was a time this wasn’t true, but you changed and are better than me and are better than I can ever hope to be. That’s why it’s so important you survive.”
Jihwa had evaded the demanding question. He knew logically that still wasn’t what he was trying to do. But he understood his constant confessions of adoration could confuse someone as emotionally fragile as Seungho. He helps Seungho tie his robes, not that he really needed the help. He just wanted to make sure the grieving lord understood he was not mad.
“Jihwa.”
“Yes, Lord Seungho?”
“What of your wife and kids?” Seungho wasn’t going to let it go. Was this his way of trying to cling to Jihwa, even as they keep repeating to each other they can never be?
“I was waiting for you to be better for this,” Jihwa responded. “I sent some letters awhile back. Called in a favor. There’s a governor two towns over - not even half a days ride, really - who has been wanting to get into the main city for a long time. He’s not very good, but I offered to swap posts with him.”
“That has nothing to do with your kids.”
“No, it has to do with you,” Jihwa stares at him, a piercing gaze to penetrate the confused tone spreading across Seungho’s entire body. “My wife has been given an option. We have a lot of money, with the post I work in Hanyang. I won’t make her leave her lover. It’s warmer here in the winter than it is in the main city. I will work here, we will own two homes. Her and the kids will visit sometimes so the other lords do not raise suspicion. It will be like a vacation for them. It’s obvious my post in the city wasn’t so useful, seeing how I never even saw your desperate pleas for help with the illness. Having eyes out here will be more beneficial.”
“And what does this have to do with me?” The question sounded so scared.
Seungho, what are you so afraid of?
“This sounds to me like you fucked up your career and are moving out to the middle of nowhere to hide.”
“Sure, I sort of did. I’m a beautiful man moving in proximity to a known sodomite I used to hang out with. Some people are going to figure out I’m out here to get my rocks off and take advantage of a sad and lonely pervert.” Jihwa smiled sadly at Seungho at this. Seungho realized he was also telling a stupid, stupid joke. He returned a wan smile. “I don’t ever mean to lie to you. You are my closest friend and my special person. I’m never going to expect you to love me the way you loved Nakyum. I won’t ever expect you to love me at all. But I want to stay here near you, help you, and provide for you as much as I possibly can until my heart stops beating.”
“You’re my friend,” Seungho replies, unsure what else to add. Jihwa was relieved he wasn’t mad this time. “I can’t promise you anything else.”
“Then we’re on the same page,” Jihwa smiled again, this time with sincerity. He extended his arms, offering a place for Seungho to fall. Seungho instead takes one of his hands in his and shakes it confidently.
“To being on the same page.”
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Jihwa and the other governor swapped roles amicably, and he moved his belongings into this home. The village wasn’t much different than Seungho’s, so his daily work really was insignificant. The town was given two days each week to visit in person, and otherwise was told to come to Seungho’s town. That’s where Jihwa spent most of his days.
Sometimes Seungho and Jihwa would take out their carnal desires on one another, but Jihwa was unwilling to push further with anything more intimate. If their relationship were to ever become one of “lovers”, it was going to be by Seungho’s terms. It was the least he could offer his best friend.
Seungho flourished with the company. It didn’t make losing Nakyum easier, but it did make grieving his loss more bearable. When he wanted to cry, he had someone who would let him cry. When he wanted to talk about happy memories and stupid stories, Jihwa would listen to them.
“Seungho,” Jihwa said one day while they cuddled close in the sitting room, reminiscing on old stories. “Did you ever finish Nakyum’s myojimyeong?”
“I’ve gotten much closer,” Seungho admitted. “I can’t decide some of the end.”
“What are you struggling with?”
“It’s customary to include a quote, but I can’t decide. I’ve wanted to choose something from the books Nakyum has read, but nothing fits quite right.,” Seungho rattles on, explaining how Nakyum had learned to read but largely read Seungho’s political letters and children’s books to teach the town kids. Jihwa was impressed at Nakyum’s initiative - he would certainly have to present some of this to Hanyang to keep their country competitive in the wake of the plague.
“Don’t pick something he’s read. Pick something you’ve read,” Jihwa simply stated. “He adored you. He thought you were so smart and cool and special. He was so smitten when he learned you read every book in that godforsaken library from your father. He’d love to be remembered by words only you knew.”
“Would he care that it wasn’t originally Korean?”
“Does he care that he’s Korean?”
Seungho reached up and pulled Jihwa’s face closer to his, a soft warm kiss shared between them. Seungho’s amber eyes swam in love and admiration and a glint of pain. Jihwa smiled warmly back at him, comforting him and encouraging his decisions every step of the way.
Yoon Baek Nakyum
Born - 20 April, 1802
Death - 11 October 1831
Family - Yoon Seungho (Spouse). Baek Heena (Sister)
Painter. Lover. Friend. A man whose eyes saw beauty in every crevice of the world and poured light where darkness seemed rampant. A man born to poverty with no shame for his status, in no small part due to the unconditional love and support of his sisters. A man whose disposition found himself an adoring Lord and husband after much hardship, who was able to spend his later days with want of nothing and encouragement to pursue all of his goals and dreams. A lowborn who became literate and taught children, created masterful paintings sold across the country, and loved his husband with every fibrous strand in his being. Yoon Baek Nakyum, you are loved so dearly. Forever and always.
“Come back. Even as a shadow, even as a dream.” - Euripedes