ddaeng.biased⁷

“At least you live here. I’m only visiting.”

“You live there too,” Yoongi reminds him. “You live somewhere even when you’re visiting. That’s how living works.”

He doesn’t mention that Hoseok has been visiting for three months now, bag unpacked and broomstick gathering dust in the corner of the workshop. He doesn’t mention that Hoseok was here for the winter solstice, that he’d dance the year’s end in the yard out back of Yoongi’s shop, just the two of them. Hoseok appreciates that. It’s one of those questions that churns away at the back of his mind, turning over and over and over again, but he hasn’t decided what he wants it to mean yet. It’s not like it changes things between them if he’s here or gone. Yoongi had been the one to untether him in the first place, when he was so caught up in his own head that he couldn’t get off the ground. He knows where they stand, no matter the distance.

It’s just a little weird to be the one welcoming a new witch to town when he’s not entirely sure if this is his town, or what it means for him if he wants it to be. He’s all in-between, the dark of the moon, not sure if he's waxing or waning. It bothers him more than it should.

“Yah, so wise, hyung,” he says instead of any of that, and Yoongi makes a chuffing sound that means he's laughing. It warms Hoseok, despite the chill in the air. “Is there anything you want me to do? Or say? Is there anything official I need to know?”

“Nah,” says Yoongi, who’s always been unconcerned about the sorts of formalities that would tie Hoseok’s family's coven up in knots. Hoseok likes that about him—how easy he makes things, how straightforward. “You remember how it was.”

“Well, yeah.” Of course he remembers. But that had been different, had been accidental. More job than anything, until it was something far more than a job could ever be.

This isn’t that. This witch—one Kim Namjoon, no coven affiliation—had sent a letter to Yoongi’s workshop letting him know that he’d be in residence to perform some research over the coming months, and he hoped to work well with the local coven. The trouble being, of course, that there is no local coven. It’s just Hoseok and Yoongi and the unspoken tether of them here at the edge of the world, unbothered by the proper way of doing things or the rules that the city covens cared about. They're not like that out here. Out here, the sky is wide and the world is green and growing, and everything knows how to breathe.

But that means that right now Hoseok is here, alone, trudging out to the edge of town with all the right gifts and greetings to let Kim Namjoon, no affiliation, know that he (and Yoongi, whenever he gets home) will be more than happy to assist him, but if he’s looking for a coven, he’s come to the wrong place for it.

“You’ll do fine,” Yoongi promises. “Better you than me.”

“That’s not true,” Hoseok protests. “You were very welcoming to me.”

“You don’t have to stroke my ego, Seok-ah.”

“Maybe I want to.” Aish, he misses him. It’s ridiculous. He snorts and tries not to drop the phone. “I’ll tell you how it goes, hyung.”

“It’ll be fine,” Yoongi insists. “Namjoon is nice. And you like people.”

He does, is the thing. Yoongi’s good with them, solid and steady and good for leaning on, but Hoseok just likes them. Likes new people, new stories, new experiences. He shakes his head, laughing at himself a little as he struggles to put his phone away without dropping anything. He’s so caught up in his own head he’d almost forgotten that this is his favorite part of traveling.

The hanok eventually comes into view at the end of the road. It’s set on a sprawling property, though the place has clearly seen better days—the low wooden fence lists in the earth, paint peeling and gate hanging open, split from its hinges. The yard is well past overgrown, everything brown and bare and dead, or at least sleeping for the winter. There’s no color anywhere; even the house itself is weathered and stripped bare. 

Behind it, the world rises steep and swift, and the ancient camphor tree at the mountain’s summit shivers in the winter wind.

Hoseok lets his magic stretch as he reaches the edge of the property, which is almost as dull and dead as the plants in winter. A faint hum stirs somewhere deep within—Namjoon’s magic, maybe, or the quiet, steady heartbeat of the valley itself. It feels far away, though. Faint. Hoseok reaches out, part knock and part warning, as he wends his way through the overgrown garden along what's left of the path. By the time he reaches the door, he can hear scuffling on the other side, a clatter of something knocked over. A moment later, it slides open, hinges sticky and creaking, and he finally gets a look at Kim Namjoon.

He’s handsome, and young. All witches tend to hold onto youth longer than their mundane counterparts, but he can’t be any older than Hoseok, with a broad, lovely face and dark eyes and a shock of pale pink hair. He’s wearing his sweater inside out and his socks have tiny orange dinosaurs printed on them, and he looks nothing so much as startled to find someone standing on his doorstep. Neither the surprise nor the sweater situation make him any less handsome.

Shit. Yoongi should have warned him.

“Hi,” Hoseok says, only choking on his tongue a little bit. “Kim Namjoon-ssi?”

“Uh,” says the witch. “Yes?”

“I’m Jung Hoseok. I’m a friend of Yoongi’s? I came to welcome you to town.”

“Oh. That’s very kind of you, Um, do you need a hand?”

“Yes, actually, if you don’t mind. Thanks.”

Namjoon takes the muffins and the potted peony, holding them a little awkwardly. For a moment they stand there, and then Namjoon shakes himself. “Sorry, sorry. Come in. It’s kind of a mess, but. Yeah.”

Inside, the hanok is about as weathered as the outside. It could use a good dusting, and a good sweeping, and fresh paint. A stack of books lies fallen across the entrance hall—that must have been the clattering—and the kitchen appears to be barely used, a rice cooker plugged into a wall socket and a single bowl in the sink. It has a wide sliding door that must open to the back gardens, though right now it’s closed, cloudy sunlight sifting through the hanji. Hoseok’s surprised by how warm it is, despite the chill outside. He hadn’t noticed any smoke from the hearth—though maybe the place has one of those modern ondols and doesn’t need a working fireplace.

Namjoon sets the muffins and the plant on the kitchen counter, and Hoseok only hesitates for a moment before placing the rest of his gifts down next to them. He clears his throat.

“Kim Namjoon-ssi,” he says, giving a proper bow now that he’s not in danger of dropping anything. “Welcome. I bring you gifts of clarity, sweetness, and wealth. May your beginning here be fruitful.”

“Oh,” Namjoon says, “thanks. I’m sorry, I didn’t think—I don’t really have anything to offer in return. Sorry.”

“That’s alright.”

“But your coven—”

“We don’t have one.”

Namjoon blinks. “Pardon?”

“There’s no coven out here. It’s just me and Yoongi-hyung, but he’s gone for the month, so actually it’s just me. You don’t have to worry about any formalities. I mean, I suppose you can if you want to, but your letter seemed…” He hesitates, then decides against putting words in Namjoon’s mouth. “I just wanted to let you know that you’re welcome here as long as you like, but we don’t have any coven this far out. We’re pretty, um, informal.”

“Oh. Right.”

“Sorry. If that’s a problem—”

“No! No, it isn’t. Actually.” He runs a hand through his pink hair and huffs. “Sorry, this sounds bad, but that’s kind of a relief.”

Hoseok blinks at him. “Oh?”

“Yeah, I just. I’m a little tired of politics.” He laughs, self-depreciating. “I mean, obviously if there had been a coven here I’d be respectful, but, um. Yoongi-hyung tends to be kind of…”

“A loner?”

“I was going to say independent,” Namjoon says diplomatically, though his mouth pinches up at the corner like he’s trying not to smile. Then, “So you know Yoongi-hyung? Do you work with him, or…?”

“I do a bit, sometimes. We’re roommates.”

Namjoon nods slowly. “Roommates. Right.”

“He’d be here too, but he’s out of town until February.”

“Right, yeah. Sorry, I didn’t think. I knew he was out here. Or he had been out here?" He says it half like a statement and half like a question, a little tentaive. "I just thought— Actually, I don’t really know what I thought. This was kind of a last-minute decision, honestly.”

“You thought it would be nice to have another witch around?” Hoseok hazards, and Namjoon nods, looking almost grateful.

“Something like that, yeah.”

“I get it. Well, he's gone for the month, but I’m around if you need someone. I mean, if you want to talk. Or need help. Or anything.”

“Sure.” Namjoon rubs the back of his neck and smiles, and oh. Wow. Dimples. “Thank you for the gifts, Hoseok-ssi.”

“Ah, that’s— You don’t need to be so formal. I’m ‘94.”

“Oh! Me too!” The smile gets wider, the dimples deeper. “What are the chances?”

“Well, if Yoongi is your hyung too…”

“Right, right, yeah. Math.”

“Math,” Hoseok agrees. He can feel himself grinning to match, brightening a bit with it despite the waning moon. He likes Namjoon, he decides. He likes his smile, and his inside-out sweater, and the low, steady thrum of his magic, like a bass note rolling on endlessly, deep and slow and steady. He’s glad that, of all the places Namjoon could go to do his research, he picked this green corner of the world. “Hey, I don’t know if you’re busy with work already, but if you've got some time, do you want to get dinner?”

“Dinner?”

“Yeah. You eat it in the evening?”

“I know what dinner is,” Namjoon huffs, but he seems to realize Hoseok is joking, and his shoulders ease. “You know somewhere good?”

“How do you feel about fried chicken?”

“Uh, yeah. Big fan, personally.”

“Then, yes,” Hoseok says, thinking about the first meal he had with Yoongi, the narrow restaurant and the hot food and the cold beer. It had been summer then, sweltering and humid. Now it’s winter, crisp and cold, the world dying around them. But there’s still warm food and cold beer and the easy company of someone exciting and new. “I know somewhere good.”

"In that case," says Namjoon, grinning and lovely and interesting, the start of a new story, "yeah. I'd love to get dinner."

"Great," says Hoseok, holding out his elbow in invitation.