Archive of Our Own

Yoongi knew something was wrong the second Jin walked in.

He didn’t say anything at first. Just shut the door too carefully behind him, smoothed his palms down the front of his apron like he was trying to erase something, and scanned the room for Yoongi.

“I need to talk to you.”

Yoongi sat up straighter from where he’d been half-reading a report. “What happened?”

“There was-” Jin hesitated. “-an altercation earlier. At the clinic.”

Yoongi was on his feet before Jin could finish the word. “What kind of altercation?”

Jin’s mouth pulled tight. “One of the hunters got into it with one of my healers.”

The words landed with a cold, clean weight. Yoongi’s jaw tightened.

He specifically was in charge of the hunters, and they don’t have altercations in this pack, not with their own pack mates. 

And Yoongi knows a certain witch that’s been working in the clinic since his arrival in their pack. If there was an altercation, it likely involves said witch.

Yoongi’s voice went sharp. “Who?”

“It doesn’t matter-”

“It does.”

Jin sighed, clearly choosing his next words. “He’s been bringing his mother in. After Taehyung healed Jungkook’s mom, word got out. You know how it is. He heard about it, and started showing up to the clinic, thinking maybe-”

Yoongi didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. He already knew where this was going.

Hei was already moving. He’d taken two steps before Jin caught his arm.

“Wait, Yoon.”

Yoongi stopped, jaw clenched.

“He’s been asking Taehyung to treat her,” Jin lowered his voice. “And Taehyung’s been doing what he can. But she’s dying, Yoongi. From an actual illness. It’s cancer. There’s no spell for that. He can ease the pain. Slow things. But he can’t fix it.”

Yoongi’s hands curled into fists. Not because he didn’t believe it, but because he did. And because he knew some of his hunters wouldn’t. Especially the younger ones. Especially one with dying parents and a grudge already blooming in their chests.

Jin lowered his voice. “Taehyung told him no. More than once. But today.. I stepped out for ten minutes, and when I came back, he had him cornered. Demanding he try again. That he stop holding back.”

Yoongi's eyes darkened. “And let me guess, he wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

“No.” Jin looked away for a second, then back. 

Yoongi didn’t speak. His pulse was thudding, loud in his ears.

He could picture it already, Taehyung, exhausted but standing his ground with that unbearable smirk stretched too tight across his face. Words sharp like knives. And one of Yoongi’s hunter, spiraling. Lashing out just like young, emotional pups do when they don’t get their way.

Jin added, quieter, “He was already drained, Yoon. He’d spent most of the morning healing the others that just got back from looking at those rogues. We had two broken ribs, a crushed ankle, and three bite wounds today, Yoongi. He was barely on his feet when he finished up with them.”

“And my hunter still demanded he treat her?” Yoongi asked for clarification, though the dread in his stomach already told him what was coming.

“He shouted at him. In front of the others.” Jin’s voice had gone flat. “He called him a fraud and a liar. Said he was just like the rest of his kind. That he was using fake magic to trick people into trusting him.”

Yoongi closed his eyes for half a breath.

He could still hear that same suspicion echoing inside himself. Hadn’t he said almost those exact words, once? Not aloud, but in his head. Where it counted most.

Yoongi exhaled sharply, like he’d been kicked. “Who stopped it?”

“I did. By then Taehyung was-” Jin shook his head. “He played it off like he always does. Laughed, even. He said he was used to it. But he hasn’t said much since. I asked if he needed help recovering and he said he was fine and it didn’t bother him, but-”

“He’s not fine,” Yoongi finished for him. 

“No,” Jin agreed with a light shake of his head. “He’s been outside his house since he got back. By the garden.”

Yoongi didn’t speak again. He just turned and left, fists still clenched at his sides.

The air around Taehyung’s temporary house smelled like rosemary and rain.

The scent of healing, Yoongi realized. A lot like Jimin’s house and its lavender softness. He hated how familiar it had become.

He stepped out into the garden, half-expecting to hear movement. But there was only silence. A hush. As if the trees themselves were trying to hold their breath.

But he still saw him.

Taehyung was perched on the mossy stone wall near the back hedge. Barefoot. Hands braced behind him, sleeves rolled high. There was a bowl of water beside him, faintly glowing, the surface humming with residual magic.

He looked still. Not peaceful, just too still. Like if he moved, something inside him would crack.

Yoongi stopped a few feet away.

He didn’t know why, but every single time he came face to face with this witch, he always felt the urge to flee. 

He should leave. He had three patrols to reorganize and a meeting with the east border scouts before dusk. 

He has so much other shit to worry about, and instead, he’s staring down at the one person he’s always actively trying to avoid.

“I can feel you glaring from here,” Taehyung said without opening his eyes.

“I wasn’t glaring.”

“I can feel the judgement from here. It has a distinct scent.”

Yoongi didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure what to say. Wasn’t sure what he felt, guilt, maybe. Or defensiveness. He wasn’t the one who’d said those things. But he could’ve been.

“You’re dripping,” he muttered instead. “The wall’s all wet and it’s freezing out. You shouldn’t be out here.”

“Good. Maybe it’ll grow.”

Yoongi exhaled through his nose and stepped closer. The sunlight slanted through the clouds, pale and weak with the brush of winter nearly here. It brushed the edge of Taehyung’s cheekbone, making him look unreal for a second, fragile, even. His usual bright blue hair was dulled to a pale blue, lacking its usual abrasiveness just like the rest of him.

“Jin said you were drained. You shouldn’t be doing anything with your magic right now. Didn’t you get a nose bleed last week from doing too much?”

Taehyung cracked one eye open. “Aww. Concern. Should I put it in a jar and keep it on my shelf?”

Yoongi rolled his eyes and walked closer. He didn’t sit, but leaned against the tree near the edge of the clearing. His voice was quieter now. “You’re still pale.”

“The water helps.” Taehyung flicked a finger through the bowl. The surface rippled tiredly. “I just need time.”

Another silence. The wind stirred the leaves. A few birds started up and fell quiet again.

Then Taehyung looked at him. Really looked at him.

“You always stand like that when you’re uncomfortable. Like you’re getting ready to lash out and bite me.”

Yoongi blinked. “What?”

“It’s fine,” Taehyung said, stretching one long leg out across the wall. “I do the same thing with words. See? We’re not so different.”

Yoongi stared. “That’s the most absurd thing you’ve ever said.”

“Give me time. I’m sure I’ll top it.”

The silence between them wasn’t tense, for once. Just odd. Light. Like a crack had opened and neither of them quite knew what to do with it.

Taehyung reached behind him, dragging his hand through the water again so that it rippled around his fingertips.

Yoongi watched the movement quietly. “He shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”

Taehyung blinked. “Oh. You heard about that.”

“Of course I heard about that. It was one of my own fucking hunters.”

“Hm.”

Yoongi waited. He wasn’t sure what he was waiting for, an outburst, maybe. A jab. But all Taehyung did was stare down at the water.

“He was angry,” he finally said. “Angry people always need someone to blame.”

“That doesn’t excuse it,” Yoongi hastily retorted.

“No. But it explains it.” His lips quirked up at the edges, but it didn’t match his usual saccharine sweet smile. “Besides. He only said out loud what most of you think anyway.”

Yoongi’s spine stiffened.

“I don’t-”

“You do.” Taehyung looked up under his long lashes, eyes guarded just like the first few times they interacted. One step forward and ten steps back. “You think I’m dangerous. Or worse, useless. You’ve never said it, but I can feel it every time you look at me.”

Yoongi looked away, the accusation landing like claws in his side. The wind stirred behind him, cold and damp. His heart stirred with it.

“I didn’t stop him fast enough,” he said finally. “I would have if someone told me he was bothering you-”

Taehyung studied him. “Did you want to?”

Yoongi didn’t answer.

The silence stretched. The bowl of water pulsed once more, a shimmer across the surface. Taehyung leaned back again, and for the first time, his sarcasm faded.

“I didn’t pretend to heal her,” he said softly. “I did what I could. I always do.”

Yoongi nodded, the knot in his throat tight and unfamiliar.

“I know.”

And Taehyung only looked at him, like he was trying to dissect whether or not he was telling the truth.

The wind picked up again, and with it, a thread of magic curled around Yoongi’s ankles. It felt calm. Not invasive. But certainly more present.

“Don’t do that,” Yoongi murmured, his voice barely more than a whisper, vulnerable for once.

“Do what?”

“Use magic on me.”

Taehyung looked at him, eyes a little darker now. “I didn’t. That wasn’t for you.”

Another silence.

Then Yoongi said, “You’re still dripping wet.”

Taehyung huffed a laugh, leaned back, and let his head tilt toward the sky. “Better than me bleeding.”

And for a while, neither of them said anything else.

Yoongi didn’t move. Not even when the wind turned colder. Not even when it would’ve been easier to leave.

It had been three days since the altercation at the clinic.

Three days since Yoongi had found Taehyung sitting soaking wet, dripping with magic and exhaustion, holding himself together with water and sarcasm. Three days since the quiet ache settled behind Yoongi’s ribs, a pulse of something restless and unspoken that refused to leave.

He hadn’t meant to find him again.

The sun had just begun to lower when Yoongi caught the scent, light and fleeting on the wind. 

A whisper of lavender that seemed to cling to both Jimin and Taehyung.

The scent that stirred a memory in his chest and set his paws moving before his mind could catch up. He was in his wolf form, patrolling the woods near the northern ridge, where frost clung stubbornly to the low brush and the river snaked quietly through the trees, glassy and half-frozen already despite it being early winter.

The scent pulled him like a thread, winding deeper into the quiet hush of early winter. And even before he reached the edge, he knew exactly where it would lead.

Just like last time.

Yoongi padded silently through the underbrush, paws pressing into damp soil and cracked frost. The forest around him held its breath, muffled and waiting, and when he finally reached the break in the trees, he saw him. Floating in the river, still and pale, like a ghost suspended in time.

Taehyung.

His arms were stretched out at his sides, fingers just breaking the surface, palms upturned to the sky. His face tilted toward the light, eyes closed, lips parted slightly. He wasn’t shivering, though the water around him had begun to crust over with thin veins of ice, fracturing at the edges where his body warmed the river just enough to keep it from closing in.

Yoongi stayed at the top of the stone embankment, chest rising and falling as his instincts screamed at him to move, to drag him out, to do something, anything, because the cold here wasn’t just bitter, it was biting. The kind of cold that hollowed things out from the inside. But Taehyung didn’t seem to notice. 

Or maybe he did. Maybe this was the point.

Yoongi’s muscles remained taut beneath his thick coat as he lowered himself to his haunches, the stone biting against his paws. 

His golden eyes tracked every shift in the water, every flicker of movement in the trees beyond. He knew Taehyung wouldn’t drown. He knew the witch’s affinity for water was something deeper than he could understand.

It healed him. It fed whatever wild magic ran through his veins. Still, the fear curled tight behind Yoongi’s ribs, low and steady, an instinct that told him this was wrong, that nothing should look so much like dying and still be called healing.

And so he watched. The cold settled deeper into his bones, breath fogging faintly in the air.

Taehyung didn’t move.

Not for minutes. 

Not for an hour. 

He just floated, silent and weightless, as though the river had claimed him and he’d let it. His lips, the same ones Yoongi had kissed barely a week before, were tinged a pale, dusky blue now. His usual flush of color had long since drained from his cheeks, and his lashes lay dark and wet against his skin. 

There was no smirk. No sarcasm. No mask.

Just stillness.

And Yoongi stayed.

He stayed even when the wind shifted and brought with it the sharp scent of snow. He stayed through the aching burn in his limbs, the quiet churn of his own mind, trying to understand something that couldn’t be explained in words. He stayed because no one else was there to see it, and the idea of Taehyung being this alone, this vulnerable, sat too heavily on his heart.

And then, finally, the surface of the river stirred.

Taehyung’s fingers twitched. His hands pressed slowly against the water, guiding his body upright, muscles working against the current like he’d done it a thousand times before. And maybe he had.

He waded forward, the river breaking around his waist, pale blue hair clinging to his jaw and throat in wet strands. He didn’t look cold, not in the way others would. There was no frantic scramble for warmth, no chattering teeth. 

Yoongi didn’t move as Taehyung’s eyes lifted.

He watched as the witch’s gaze swept the trees until it found him, sharp and sure, settling on the figure of the wolf perched above him.

Recognition passed between them, quiet and immediate. Taehyung didn’t smile. He didn’t speak. His lips trembled faintly as he stared up, water dripping from his sleeves, hair plastered to his temple.

Yoongi held his gaze.

And then Taehyung began to swim, cutting through the current with too much ease, body graceful and tireless despite the cold. He reached the rock ledge and hauled himself up with little effort, feet moving against slick stone, shoulders rising and falling with exertion. When he stood, he was trembling, not with weakness, but something deeper, more human. Still, his eyes never left Yoongi’s.

And Yoongi, next head alpha, protector of his pack, skeptic to his very core, felt his instincts rise up in revolt. The need to move. To step closer. To keep this strange, stubborn, impossible witch from slipping into the cold again.

But he didn’t move.

He just stared for a long second, heart roaring behind his ribs, and then, too fast, too quiet, he turned.

His paws kicked against the dirt, body stretching into motion, breath harsh as he fled through the trees.

He didn’t stop running until the river had vanished behind him.

And even then, he couldn’t shake the weight of those blue-tinted lips and the look in Taehyung’s eyes as he watched him go.

The cabin is warm when Yoongi arrives, smelling of deer meat and vegetables, the kind of scent that clings to thick wooden beams and makes your chest feel a little less hollow. 

Jimin greets him with a bright smile and a quick hug before ushering him inside, already rambling about dinner and snow and how Jungkook almost burned the bread again. Yoongi toes his boots off and shrugs out of his coat, not quite shaking off the chill in his spine.

Dinner is simple, just stew, thick with carrots and potatoes, and slices of coarse bread left to soak in the bowl. There’s a plate of cut vegetables to snack on, too, and a pot of that damned ginger lemon tea. How Jimin and Taehyung manage to drink that garbage, Yoongi doesn’t know.

Jimin seems to think it’s good for the soul. 

Yoongi thinks it tastes like punishment. 

He declines the cup offered to him, and Jimin rolls his eyes.

Outside, the wind howls low through the trees, steady but sharp. The kind of wind that means more than just cold, it means trouble. 

Yoongi didn’t want to come tonight. 

In fact, he said no more than once. 

But Jimin and his blasted puppy dog pout got to him. 

Well. 

It got to Jungkook. 

Yoongi just had to fall in line or risk Jimin crying. Or worse, Jungkook crying. 

Still, he hadn’t wanted to come when they could all feel a storm rolling in. 

Yoongi keeps glancing toward the window without meaning to. The snow had already started to fall when he left his own place, and it had only picked up on the walk over. The trees had groaned under the weight of it, and even his paws in wolf form had sunk nearly ankle deep by the time he shifted back and approached the cabin. It’s heavier now. He can feel it in the air pressing close, thick with warning.

A knock at the door draws Jimin’s attention. He lights up like the fireplace just flared higher, darting toward it in an instant.

“That’ll be him!” he calls, already flinging the door open. “Taehyung!”

Yoongi’s breath catches in his throat.

No! No, no, no, fuck!

He watches Jimin all but sprint across the room, feet barely touching the floorboards, joy blooming across his face as he throws the door open.

Jimin throws himself forward, arms wrapping tight around the figure just outside, snow dusting his coat and shoulders. And when the witch steps into the glow of the firelight, Yoongi forgets how to breathe.

But it’s not the hug that startles him.

It’s Taehyung himself.

He looks.. different somehow. Healed.

Not just dry and warm again, but restored. Fully. 

That haunting pale blue that had washed his hair and lips with illness is gone, gone, replaced with something vivid. His hair falls in striking neon blue waves around his face, color as sharp as the first time Yoongi saw him. His lips are pink again, flushed and soft, like the blood in him is running full and strong. His skin is no longer dull but glowing, but healthy. And when he glances up, just once, his eyes catch Yoongi’s.

And hold.

For a second too long. A beat too heavy. A silence too loud.

Yoongi’s stomach twists.

Then Taehyung looks away, casual as anything, like nothing’s ever happened between them.

Like Yoongi hadn’t kissed him. Like Yoongi hadn’t wanted to.

They spoke to each other over the past few days because they had to. Worse, they avoided each other whenever they could. 

Now Yoongi’s stuck in an enclosed space with him, where neither one of them have anywhere to run with the weather threatening outside and Jimin’s wrath looming if they try. 

The worst part is that Yoongi doesn’t know if he’s relieved or disappointed.

He drops his gaze and forces another bite of stew into his mouth.

Taehyung moves around the room with quiet footfalls, Jimin trailing after him like an excited puppy.

And Yoongi just picks up his spoon and eats mechanically, chewing each bite of stew without tasting it even though he knows that Jimin is a damn good cook. The warmth of the fire can’t reach him anymore.

No teasing. No laughter. 

Even Jimin, usually the loudest voice at any table, seems preoccupied, shooting glances toward the windows as the wind howls louder. The storm is moving faster than expected. What had been light flurries a few hours ago has become a thick whiteout, a blur of wind and sleet pressing hard against the cabin.

Yoongi knows what that means before Jungkook even says it.

“You’re not leaving tonight.”

Yoongi sets his spoon down. “I can handle a little snow.”

“You’d be dead before you reached the main trail. Not happening.”

Yoongi scowls. “I didn’t plan on staying the night.”

“Well, you’re staying.”

Yoongi’s shoulders knot up tight. He glances toward the far end of the room where Taehyung now sits with a cup of ginger tea between his hands, eyes distant, hair falling in soft waves over one brow.

No. This cannot be happening.

Yoongi opens his mouth, then shuts it again when Jimin claps his hands excitedly.

“A sleepover!” he chirps. “Yes! That’ll be fun! Oh, we can bring out extra blankets, maybe toast something? Do you think we still have marshmallows?”

Yoongi stares at him, then glares at Jungkook, who just shrugs helplessly.

Stay the night? With him? In the same house? In the same room?

He feels it again. That creeping panic. Like a thread being pulled taut somewhere low in his chest. He hasn’t spoken to Taehyung since the conversation about his hunter going after him. 

And he hadn’t planned to. 

Couldn’t bring himself to.

He watches the witch across the room, head bent low over his cup, steam curling up against his cheek. Yoongi swears the color of his hair deepens when it catches the firelight.

This is a disaster.

He grabs Jungkook by the arm and hauls him toward the back hallway.

This cannot happen.

“We need to talk.”

“What, wait, hey-ow-Yoongi!”

He slams the door shut behind them.

“This isn’t going to fucking work,” Yoongi hisses.

Jungkook frowns. “What? The weather?”

“No. Him. This. Me here. With him. Under the same fucking roof.”

Jungkook squints at him. “Wait. Is this about the weird tension thing you’ve got with Taehyung?”

“I don’t have a weird tension thing with-”

“You totally do.”

Yoongi’s pulse is pounding. His skin feels too tight. His jaw aches from clenching it. “Shut the fuck up.”

Jungkook leans back, narrowing his eyes. “Wait, are you blushing?”

“No.”

“Oh my god, you are.”

“I said shut the fuck up, Jungkook.”

Jungkook rears back a little, clearly startled. “Okay,” he mutters. “Damn. What the hell, man?”

Yoongi rubs a hand down his face. His heart is racing and he can’t stop it. He doesn’t want to be here. Doesn’t want to face this. Doesn’t want to risk one moment alone with Taehyung again, because it might happen again. That gravity. That heat. That stupid, reckless kiss he can’t stop thinking about.

Jungkook groans suddenly. “Oh my god.”

“What now?”

“We only have one bed.”

Yoongi goes still.

“What.”

“One extra bed, I mean.”

“No,” Yoongi says immediately. “No. I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“You and Taehyung will have to share.”

“I am not sharing a bed with him!” Yoongi whisper yells, his hands frantically making a no gesture.

“It’s not like he’s gonna curse you in your sleep-”

“Jungkook.” Yoongi takes a breath. “I fucking kissed him.”

Jungkook’s eyes go wide. “What?”

Yoongi groans, quietly furious with himself. “We kissed. Last week. I don’t even know how it started. We were arguing, and then, he was right there, and I just-fuck. I don’t know! And now he’s here. And we haven’t talked about it since. And I cannot -cannot- share a bed with that witch.”

Jungkook is staring. “You kissed somebody?”

“Stop saying it like that,” Yoongi basically whines.

“You kissed Taehyung?!”

“Shh! Keep your fucking voice down!” Yoongi hisses, trying to clamp a hand over his brother’s mouth.

“You kissed him?!”

“Jungkook, I swear-”

“Do you actually like him?”

Yoongi swallows.

He doesn’t answer.

Not because he doesn’t know, but because he might.

He might actually like him.

Jungkook exhales, breathless. “This whole push and pull thing, oh my God, is it because you fucking like each other?”

“Shut the fuck up.”

“Oh my god,” Jungkook whispers. “You like somebody.”

Yoongi closes his eyes, in complete hell, pleading, ready to beg. “Please shut up.”

The door creaks open.

Jimin’s head pops in, all glowing eyes and gentle sweetness. “Can we make smores?”

Yoongi and Jungkook just stare at him. And Jungkook finally remembers to nod his big ass head.

“Okay!” Jimin chirps, and disappears again.

Jungkook glances over at Yoongi, blinking slowly. “You are so fucked.”

And Yoongi, miserably, helplessly, knows he’s right.

Taehyung watches the hallway door click shut behind Jimin again and stays frozen, teacup limp in his fingers. He can still feel the weight of Yoongi’s stare from dinner. Or maybe he’s imagining it. Either way, it burns at the edge of his senses.

They hadn’t said a single word to each other. Not one. Taehyung had nodded politely, taken his seat across the table, kept his eyes low while Yoongi’s presence lingered like smoke he couldn’t scrub from his lungs. The silence was unbearable, louder than it had any right to be.

And now, muffled voices start up behind the back hallway door, low and agitated. He can hear Jungkook’s confused bark of laughter. Then Yoongi again, sharp and harsh, too distinct to ignore.

He doesn’t want to know what they’re talking about.

He knows what they’re talking about.

The sound of his own pulse grows loud. He turns away from the fire, sets his cup down too quickly, nearly sloshing it. He needs out. Out of this room, out of this cabin, out of this whole cursed storm if he could.

Instead, he marches toward the kitchen where Jimin is humming, poking around the cabinets.

“Jimin,” he says flatly.

Jimin looks up. “Huh?”

“Come with me,” Taehyung says, already gripping his arm.

He drags him down the hall before Jimin can protest, pulling them both into the spare room. He closes the door behind them, heart pounding now. Not from the walk, but from the way Yoongi had looked at him across the stew pot like he was something dangerous. Something to run from.

Jimin raises an eyebrow. “You okay?”

“No,” Taehyung snaps. “Why didn’t you tell me Yoongi would be here?”

Jimin blinks. “Because he’s always here. It’s dinner, Tae.”

“Exactly. You should’ve warned me.”

Jimin crosses his arms, confused. “Since when do you need a warning for Yoongi?”

“Since I kissed him,” Taehyung says, quiet and seething.

“Oh.” Jimin tilts his head. “Yeah, I forgot. That- that explains a lot actually.”

“I wasn’t ready to see him again. Not like this.” Taehyung rubs at his eyes, palms cold. “And he’s avoiding me like I tried to curse his entire bloodline.”

“Maybe he’s just avoiding what he feels.”

“Don’t romanticize it.”

“I’m serious.” Jimin’s voice softens. “Taehyungie, he’s probably panicking. I mean, I just heard Yoongi say he kissed you.”

Taehyung’s head snaps up. “What?”

Jimin nods. “That’s what Yoongi said. ‘I kissed Taehyung.’”

There’s a beat of silence. Taehyung’s heart stutters.

“He said that?”

“Yeah,” Jimin says slowly, watching him. “Why?”

“Because that’s not what happened.”

Jimin blinks. “It’s not?”

“I kissed him,” Taehyung mutters. “He didn’t even move at first! It was like kissing a fucking rock, and then he got all smooth all the sudden, merlin’s sake-” He cuts himself off, shoulders curling in.

A strange mixture of heat and hurt crawls into his chest.

“He didn’t even want it,” he says more quietly. “He didn’t ask for it. I just did it. And now he’s telling people it was his idea? That fucking jerk! I should have known a dog would lie!”

“Maybe it’s easier for him to admit to something he initiated it,” Jimin offers. “Than to say he stood there and let it happen. That he liked it. That it messed him up a little.” Jimin wiggles his eyebrows in a suggestive way and Taehyung’s fear builds.

Taehyung swallows.

“I can’t stay here tonight,” he mutters, pacing. “I’ll sleep outside. I’ll go back to the stream.”

Jimin rolls his eyes. “You’ll freeze to death.”

“Fine. I’ll sleep in a corner.”

“There’s no extra bedding.”

“Then I’ll sit up.”

“You’ll look miserable.”

“I am miserable,” Taehyung hisses.

“Taehyung,” Jimin says, stepping forward and placing a hand on his arm, “you’re not the only one who’s confused.”

Taehyung looks down at the floor.

“I didn’t think he’d talk about it,” he admits. “I didn’t even know if it meant anything to him. But now he’s telling Jungkook it was him. Like it’s just some stupid pride thing.”

“Maybe it is,” Jimin says. “But pride doesn’t cancel out feelings.”

Taehyung doesn’t answer. 

He only sighs and sinks down onto the edge of the bed, dragging a hand through his hair, catching on a tangle. It’s dry now, finally, and the blue is back, vibrant and strong. He feels more like himself, but also less. Like he’s in someone else’s skin.

“I can’t share a bed with him,” he says. “It’ll kill me.”

“Then don’t sleep. Just lie there and stew like a dramatic witch.”

Taehyung looks up, absolutely scandalized. “How dare you?”

Jimin grins. “I’ve known you too long, Tae. I know how this goes. You’ll make yourself suffer for it, and then you’ll still end up wanting him by morning.”

“Gross.”

“You’re gross!”

Taehyung groans and falls back dramatically onto the bed, tossing an arm over his face.

“I hate this.”

“I know.”

“And you.”

“I know.”

Jimin laughs as he leaves, and Taehyung is left alone again, the low murmur of Jungkook and Yoongi still barely audible through the walls, the storm whispering harder now against the windows.

And despite himself, Taehyung thinks of Yoongi’s mouth.

And the way he let him kiss him.

And how maybe, just maybe, he didn’t hate it as much as he wants everyone to think.

The room is quiet. Too quiet. 

Yoongi lies stiff as a corpse on one side of the bed, arms locked against his body like he's afraid they'll betray him in the night. 

Which, honestly, they might. 

They're traitorous like that, useless, weak things that remember the shape of Taehyung’s jaw, the way his hair curled damp at the nape of his neck, the exact pressure of his mouth.

Yoongi closes his eyes and tries not to think about it.

He fucking fails instantly.

Behind him, Taehyung breathes in slow, steady rhythms, probably asleep, or pretending to be, like Yoongi is.

The bed is too small. 

The room is too warm. 

Or maybe it’s cold, he doesn’t even know anymore. His temperature regulation is fucked. His spine is locking up from tension. He hasn’t moved in twenty minutes. 

He’s going to die like this.

“You’re breathing like you’re being hunted,” Taehyung murmurs behind him, voice thick with sleep but clearly amused.

Yoongi doesn’t turn. “Maybe I am.”

“Oh? Who’s the predator, then?”

“Pretty sure it’s you. You're the one who snuck your way into my bed.”

Taehyung snorts. “Your bed? This is Jungkook and Jimin’s guest room.”

“Semantics.”

“And I didn’t sneak,” Taehyung adds, not even trying to hide his grin. “You knew I was here. You were in the room the whole time.”

“Yeah, unfortunately,” Yoongi mutters. “I asked for a bed, not a trap to meet my untimely death.”

“Please. If I wanted to trap you, I’d at least use sage and candles.”

That image hits Yoongi like a sucker punch to the gut. He inhales too sharply and immediately regrets it, because Taehyung smells like lavender and petrichor and very poor decisions.

He rolls over abruptly, glaring into the dark. “Wait a minute. You’re fucking enjoying this.”

Taehyung’s eyes glint in the moonlight. “What, sleeping?”

“Making me insane.”

“Making you-” Taehyung sits up with a half-laugh. “You’re the one who told Jungkook you kissed me.”

Oh. 

Right. 

That.

Yoongi winces. “Could’ve just fucking let that go. And what, are you eavesdropping now?”

“Nope. I’ve been lying here thinking about it for an hour.”

Yoongi groans and throws an arm over his eyes. “Of course you have.”

“You kissed me?” Taehyung scowls, tilting his head. “That’s interesting. Because I distinctly remember me kissing you . You just stood there like I lit your brain on fire.”

“Did not.”

“Oh, you absolutely did.”

Yoongi peeks at him through his fingers. “Well, you’re the one that started it after nearly offing me with that fucking cinnamon death-”

“And you panicked.”

“I did not panic! I was startled!”

“You looked like you saw God.”

Yoongi groans again. “This is hell.”

Taehyung leans closer, voice low and dry. “You said it like you were bragging, too. Like, oh yeah, I kissed the witch.”

Yoongi glares. “I panicked, okay? He was talking about bed arrangements. I was trying to end the conversation before it turned into a goddamn matchmaking session.”

“Instead, you admitted to kissing someone and made it infinitely worse.”

“Yeah, well, you’re very bad for my decision-making.”

Taehyung’s eyes narrow. “So you admit it meant something.”

“Don’t twist my words.”

“I’m not twisting. I’m gently encouraging honesty.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“And you’re a coward.”

Yoongi sits up fast, his heart thudding. “Excuse me?”

Taehyung doesn’t back down. “You’re terrified of this. Of me.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

Taehyung raises a brow. “Then why are you acting like if I touch you, you’ll catch fire?”

“Because-” Yoongi snaps, and then falters. The room is too quiet again. The storm outside presses hard against the walls.

Taehyung’s voice softens. “Yoongi.”

He doesn’t want to hear his name like that. Not from Taehyung. Not when it sounds like something gentle. Something he could want.

“I don’t know what this is,” Yoongi mutters, voice cracking just enough to betray him. “And I sure as fuck don’t know what to do with it.”

Taehyung goes quiet for a beat. “Join the club.”

Their eyes meet again. Something pulls tight between them, something unspoken but loud enough to echo in the silence. Yoongi’s lips part. He doesn’t know what he’s about to say.

Something stupid, probably. 

Something honest.

But then Taehyung shifts just an inch closer. 

Not touching. 

Still not touching. 

But Yoongi feels the pull like a current in the river, and he doesn’t know if he’s drowning or about to be saved.

Their faces are close enough to blur.

Too far.

Too close.

And not close enough.

Yoongi’s breath stutters. His eyes flick to Taehyung’s mouth.

He’s going to do it.

He’s going to-

But Taehyung jerks back first, like the spell broke.

Yoongi’s stomach caves in.

Taehyung falls onto his back with a loud exhale and flops dramatically into the pillows. “This is awful .”

“Agreed.”

“We are not doing that again.”

“Nope.”

A pause.

Taehyung adds, “Your blush is very visible, by the way. Even in the dark.”

“Sleep with one eye open,” Yoongi mutters, shoving the blanket over his head.

Taehyung laughs, soft, warm, and so very dangerous.

Neither of them sleeps. 

Not really.

The house was quiet save for the creak of the floorboards and the occasional soft drip of the coffee pot in the kitchen. 

Snow still blanketed the world outside, early light filtering in pale and silver through the frosted windows. They would most certainly be snowed in for another day or two.

Jimin stood in the entryway of the guest room, clutching his cup with both hands. Jungkook was beside him, equally still, coffee forgotten halfway to his mouth. Neither of them spoke. Neither of them could.

On the bed, nestled beneath an overly fluffy quilt, was an unholy sight. Min Yoongi, next head Alpha of the Jeon pack, wolf prince of eternal crankiness and darkness, the most uptight, ridiculously cynical person in existence, cuddling an actual witch.

Taehyung’s leg was slung over Yoongi’s hip, bare foot tucked behind his knee like a lover. Yoongi’s hand was splayed over his thigh, fingers pressing in to leave indentions. Taehyung’s hand was fisted in the front of Yoongi’s shirt, knuckles pale, holding tight like he thought Yoongi might disappear if he let go. And Yoongi’s nose was buried in Taehyung’s neck, lips nearly brushing skin.

Neither of them looked like they’d been fighting for the covers or the pride. They looked like they’d melted into each other.

“I told you Taehyung clings in his sleep,” Jimin whispered, voice barely audible over the quiet hiss of his fireplace.

Jungkook turned his head just enough to look at him, wide-eyed and in awe. “I love your genius brain, baby. You are so fucking smart.”

“Alpha,” Jimin said again, more serious this time, shifting his coffee cup to whisper behind it. “How are we going to keep them from checking the other guest room?”

Jungkook froze. “Shit.”

“If they see we had the second bed set up,” Jimin looked haunted. “Taehyung’s going to make my skin turn purple again and I’ll look like a goblin. Not a cute one either, one of those lumpy, hexed, goblins that look like trolls.”

Jungkook furrowed his brows. “What do you mean again, baby?”

Jimin lifted his cup and solemnly took a sip, shuddering at the memory. “You don’t want to know, alpha.”

Jungkook reached for his elbow, still staring at the scene in the bed like it was some kind of rare endangered species sighting. “Maybe we should.. stay away from there.”

“Yes,” Jimin whispered, stepping backward carefully.

They both took another silent, nosey glance at the witch and wolf still tangled in sleep, then slowly retreated down the hall like criminals leaving the scene of a magical miracle.

Jungkook muttered as they walked, “I give them a week.”

“Three days,” Jimin countered. “But that’s only if Taehyung doesn’t vaporize him first.”

Jungkook grinned. “Still worth it.”

And somewhere behind them, in a too-small bed, Yoongi shifted in his sleep and pulled Taehyung closer. Neither of them woke. Neither of them loosened their grip.

Not even a little.

Yoongi woke up slowly, disoriented.

Warmth. 

That was the first thing. He was warm. Not just the body-heat-under-blankets kind of warm, but the someone-is-plastered-to-you-like-a-koala kind of warm.

And that someone was breathing against his neck.

His brain caught up to his body all at once. The arm around a thigh. The leg over his hip. The hand clenched in his shirt. The witch curled into him.

Yoongi nearly combusted.

He froze, every muscle locking down as if stillness might undo what his wolf had clearly decided was the best night of sleep he’d had in a decade. He could feel Taehyung’s breath on his skin, slow and steady, the witch still deeply asleep and unaware of the scandalous way his leg was hooked over Yoongi’s hip. 

Gods above, how had this happened?

“Morninggggg!” Came Jimin’s bright, way-too-innocent voice from the doorway.

Yoongi’s eyes snapped open to find Jimin and Jungkook standing just a few feet away, sipping steaming cups like they were at the zoo, staring into an exhibit.

Taehyung made a sleepy noise and nuzzled closer.

Yoongi’s soul left his body.

“They’re so cute,” Jimin whispered behind his coffee, eyes twinkling.

“No, baby, you are so cute,” Jungkook breathed back.

“I’m awake,” Yoongi croaked, sitting up too fast and dragging the blanket with him in the process, which only made Taehyung groan and blink awake, disheveled and soft and entirely too pretty for Yoongi’s sanity.

“Did I miss breakfast?" Taehyung mumbled, voice still husky from sleep.

Jimin took a loud, slurping sip of his drink and turned. “Pancakes in ten. Chop chop, sleeping beauties.”

They vanished before Yoongi could throw anything at them. Not that he would. 

Probably.

Taehyung groaned again, flopping onto his back and throwing an arm over his eyes. “Please tell me I didn’t kick you in the stomach last night.”

“No,” Yoongi muttered, rubbing his face, “you tried to merge with me like some kind of cursed rodent.”

“You didn’t kick me off,” Taehyung said, voice low, almost curious.

Yoongi didn’t answer. He just stood and fled the room like it was on fire.

Breakfast was blueberry and banana pancakes, the kitchen filled with the cozy smells of vanilla and sugar and browned butter. Jimin hummed while he flipped pancakes with a precision usually reserved for surgery. Jungkook made more coffee, his grin never once leaving his face.

When Yoongi and Taehyung finally emerged, standing a solid two feet apart like two magnets forcibly reversed, Jungkook and Jimin exchanged one glance, and promptly started coughing into their cups to cover their laughter.

Taehyung’s hair was a mess. Yoongi’s shirt was beyond saving from wrinkles.

Scandalous.

They didn’t speak through breakfast, didn’t even look at each other. Yoongi focused very intently on his plate. Taehyung cut a single pancake into exactly twenty-seven pieces.

The weather hadn’t let up. Snow pressed thick against the windows, wind howling through the trees. The roads were buried. The power flickered once before Jimin calmly lit three more candles and declared it “perfect potion weather.”

So Taehyung was dragged into the study, sleeves rolled to his elbows, surrounded by dried herbs, glass bottles, and Jimin’s messy but brilliant notes.

They worked quietly but efficiently. 

Chamomile, lemon balm, echinacea. Tinctures for coughs, for fevers, for heartbreak. Taehyung moved with methodical care, his face furrowed in concentration as he measured each ingredient precisely, labeling every vial in Jimin’s elegant script before adding tiny, hand-drawn sigils to the corks.

In the living room, Jungkook pulled Yoongi into an old game of cards, one they both pretended to hate but played with competitive fire.

“You cheated,” Yoongi muttered.

“I did not.”

“You shuffled like a suspicious bastard.”

“I shuffled fairly, bro. You’re just mad you suck.”

But Yoongi’s eyes kept drifting.

To the study door. To the flickering golden light beyond it. To the figure standing at the desk, focused and beautiful and everything Yoongi didn’t know how to look at.

Taehyung was leaning forward to pour something into a narrow vial, the line of his throat exposed, his lips parted in concentration. His fingers were long and slender, careful as they turned the cork, then traced a rune over the top with one finger. He glanced up and smiled at something Jimin said, his eyes crinkling.

Yoongi’s stomach dropped.

“Dude,” Jungkook said suddenly, still staring at the cards, “can you like, control your scent?”

Yoongi blinked. “What?”

“Coffee,” Jungkook said. “Your scent’s all over the place. It smells like a whole café in here.”

Yoongi froze. “Oh. Shit. Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, just, do you not know you’re doing it?”

Yoongi scowled at him. “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

“It means,” Jungkook said, leaning closer with a smirk, “you might want to figure out what’s going on since you’re struck here with the guy you’re obviously in love with.”

“I’m not -”

“You are. It's okay. It’s cute. Just maybe don’t keep smelling like a double espresso.”

Yoongi groaned and flopped back against the couch, arm over his eyes.

Jungkook patted his knee. “You’re so fucked, hyung.”

Yoongi didn’t answer.

He already knew.

The snow hadn’t stopped. It fell in slow, heavy flakes, blanketing the world in white and smothering all sound beneath its weight. The storm had pressed the four of them into a kind of hushed, shared domesticity, every voice quieter, every movement softer, like the walls themselves were listening.

By mid-afternoon, Jimin and Jungkook had retreated to the bedroom with a promise to “nap,” which everyone pretended to believe. That left Taehyung and Yoongi alone in the living room, the fire cracking softly in the fireplace, and the snow piling thick beyond the glass.

Yoongi stood by the window, nursing a cup of bitter black coffee, eyes fixed on the falling world outside. He hadn’t said much, hadn’t looked over, hadn’t moved for a long time.

Taehyung tried not to look at him.

Tried.

He sat cross-legged on the couch with a book open in his lap, something old and beloved, its corners worn soft from rereads. But his gaze kept drifting up, over the edge of the page, past the steam of his too-sweet coffee, to the man standing with his back half-turned, haloed in cold winter light.

Yoongi always looked like he belonged to the woods. All sharp lines and muted colors, like the forest itself had carved him into something solid and unforgiving. But like this, barefoot on the wooden floor, his hair slightly mussed from sleep, a gray knit sweater hanging soft over his frame, he looked.. gentle.

His profile was so composed. The strong line of his jaw softened by the warm light, the slope of his nose delicate in contrast to everything else. He raised the cup to his lips and sipped, slow and quiet, like even that was something he didn’t want to disturb the peace.

Taehyung didn’t breathe for a second.

He blinked down at his own drink, a sugar-drenched mess of cream and syrup and sweetness. Yoongi’s had no sweetness in it at all. Just bitter and heat. A sharp kind of comfort. Not the same. Not like his.

They were different. So different. Taehyung, in his soft cardigans and worn pages, his bright magic and brighter opinions. Yoongi, all rough edges and silences, tense shoulders and earthy steadiness. A wolf in every sense, grounded and stormy and a little too serious.

Yoongi shifted slightly, his hand adjusting on the glass. Taehyung’s gaze caught on the veins along his forearm, the way his wrist bent with delicate strength. His fingers were long, rougher than Taehyung’s, callused from years of labor.

He turned the page in his book just to give himself something to do. But the words blurred.

He wondered what it would feel like to press his palm against Yoongi’s. Not for magic. Just to see how they fit.

Yoongi’s gaze flicked toward him then, slow and deliberate. His eyes found Taehyung watching.

Taehyung held his breath.

Yoongi didn’t speak. Just blinked once, unreadable, and turned back to the window.

The moment passed, but it left something behind. The kind of quiet that tingled under the skin.

Taehyung sipped his coffee again. Too sweet. He didn’t care.

He watched the way Yoongi’s shoulders rose and fell with his breath, and quietly, to himself, he admitted that even if they were different, even if Yoongi never tasted his coffee sweet, he still wanted to know what he’d taste like.

Taehyung couldn’t stop staring.

Maybe it was the quiet. Maybe it was the intimacy of being snowed in with nowhere else to go. Maybe it was the echo of last night’s fight, not really a fight, more of a whispered mess of things neither of them were ready to say out loud. The memory of tension in a bed too small. Heat too close. A kiss neither of them had acknowledged yet.

Yoongi turned slightly again, and Taehyung looked away too fast, cheeks warm.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Yoongi glance over. His brows lifted, just slightly. 

Suspicious. Or amused.

“Something wrong with your book?” Yoongi asked, his voice low and gravel-soft.

“No,” Taehyung said, too fast. “Just riveting.”

Yoongi hummed. Took another sip of his disgusting coffee. Taehyung could hear it, could feel it. The quiet awareness between them had returned, lingering like the snow, soft, heavy, and impossible to ignore.

“Maybe you should actually turn the page if it’s so riveting,” Yoongi muttered without looking.

Taehyung narrowed his eyes. “Maybe I like to reread.”

“Or maybe,” Yoongi said, now turning toward him fully, “you’re too busy staring at me to keep track.”

Taehyung’s mouth opened. Closed. Heat flared all the way to his ears.

“I wasn’t-”

“Weren’t you?”

Smug bastard.

“You’re imagining things,” Taehyung said coolly, though his heart thundered. “Must be the altitude. Or the caffeine. Your brain’s probably short-circuiting from all that bitterness you keep drinking.”

Yoongi stepped forward. Not far, just enough to lean against the couch’s back, his cup dangling loosely from his hand. He didn’t smile, but something in his eyes glittered.

“I like my coffee black.”

Taehyung rolled his eyes. “You like it miserable.”

“Same thing.”

And then, silence again. Except not empty. Not cold. Taehyung flipped the page, just to have something to do with his hands.

Yoongi turned back to the window, his gaze lingering for just a second too long before returning to the snow.

Taehyung didn’t watch him this time.

He felt him.

Felt the gravity of Yoongi’s presence. The quiet, inexplicable pull of something half-formed and dangerous. Something slow and warm and impossibly, impossibly close.

The fire had burned low by the time they were forced to call it a night. The snow outside had only worsened, blanketing the world in a suffocating stillness that even magic didn’t dare interrupt. The cabin creaked with the cold, but inside it was warm, warmer than Yoongi liked, if he were being honest.

Or maybe that was just Taehyung.

He was already in bed when Yoongi walked in, covers pulled up to his chest, hair damp from a too-long bath, face still faintly pink from the steam. He was curled slightly toward the empty side of the mattress, nose buried in the edge of the blanket like he wasn’t sure whether to sleep or suffocate himself.

Yoongi hesitated in the doorway a moment too long.

Taehyung cracked one eye open and muttered, “What, afraid I’ll try to kiss you again?”

Yoongi scoffed, but it caught in his throat. “I’m afraid you’ll hog the covers again.”

“Please, you sleep like a corpse. A possessive corpse. You latched onto my leg last night like it owed you money.”

“I did not.”

“You did. Ask your hand.”

Yoongi refused to dignify that with an answer and instead climbed into bed, back rigid, muscles tight. The mattress dipped under his weight. The silence pressed close.

Unlike last time, they didn’t face opposite walls.

Taehyung’s eyes were open again, blinking slowly in the low light. Yoongi hadn’t looked directly at him all evening, not since the reading chair and the coffee and the sarcasm traded like currency between them.

Now he couldn’t look away.

They lay like that for minutes. Quiet. Still. The barest brush of their pinkies meeting in the stretch of space between them. The touch was accidental at first, but neither of them pulled back. Taehyung’s eyes fluttered once, long lashes sweeping down. His lips parted on a slow breath.

Yoongi could taste the tension on his tongue.

“Stop staring,” Taehyung whispered eventually, voice so low it barely stirred the air.

“Stop being so-” Yoongi paused, trying to find the right word, but he gave up and went for one he knew was fitting at any time for this witch. “-annoying.”

Taehyung snorted softly. “Says the wolf who’s breathing like he’s going into cardiac arrest.”

“I’m calm,” Yoongi said, very calmly.

Taehyung smiled, one of those small, crooked ones that made Yoongi’s stomach twist in entirely unhelpful ways. He closed his eyes a few seconds later, long lashes dusting across his cheeks, breath slowing as if sleep were already pulling at him.

Yoongi watched him.

He let himself. Just this once.

Let his eyes trace the line of Taehyung’s brow, the shape of his nose, the small scar that curved at the corner of his jaw. That stupid, beautiful mouth that had kissed him once before and hadn’t left his thoughts since. Yoongi breathed in his lavender, petrichor, and something that ached, and tried to convince himself it didn’t mean anything.

That he could want it and still walk away.

That he wouldn’t burn for it later.

But the sheets were warm. Taehyung’s pinky curled just barely around his own. And Yoongi.. Yoongi didn’t want to walk away.

He leaned in.

Just a fraction. Just enough.

Eventually, Taehyung’s breathing slowed. His lashes stilled. And Yoongi, half-hovering at the edge of sleep, watched him one last time.

He reached out slowly, brushing his knuckles over Taehyung’s cheek, feather-light. Then leaned forward just enough to press the softest kiss to his lips. A whisper of a thing. A breath. Barely there.

“I would’ve kissed you first,” Yoongi murmured, so quiet it might’ve been a thought, “if you’d given me the chance.”

And then, like a coward, he closed his eyes. Let the comfort of warmth and exhaustion take him.

He never saw the way Taehyung’s lashes fluttered open again. Never saw the stunned, open look on his face, the shock that turned slowly into something else. Something impossibly tender. He didn’t see the pink in Taehyung’s cheeks or the tremble in the breath he tried to steady.

Yoongi drifted to sleep with his heart pressed close to the witch who wasn’t sleeping at all.

And Taehyung lay there, wide-eyed and burning, lips still tingling with the echo of a kiss that felt like it might ruin him.

Or remake him completely.

The morning crept in slowly, the kind of gray, soft light that blurred the edges of the room and made everything feel like a dream still hanging in the air. The snowfall hadn’t let up. It clung to the windows, muffled the sounds of the world, made the small cabin feel even more distant from the outside.

Taehyung had been awake for hours.

Or maybe he’d never really fallen asleep.

He hadn’t moved. Not when Yoongi’s hand slid away in the early hours. Not when the wolf rolled onto his back, mouth slack with sleep and brow furrowed like he was arguing with someone in a dream. Not even when the heat of the night faded into something cooler, when the room dimmed and grayed into morning.

Taehyung lay there, eyes open, throat tight, remembering the kiss.

It had been so soft. Barely there. Like Yoongi had stolen it from a dream and returned it just as quickly.

“I would have kissed you first, if you’d given me the chance,” he had whispered. As if it hadn’t wrecked Taehyung to hear it.

He turned the words over again and again, like a smooth stone between his palms.

But now Yoongi was up. Quietly, carefully moving out of bed. He didn’t look at Taehyung. Didn’t glance back even once. Just murmured something low under his breath and padded into the hallway, presumably toward the bathroom, or maybe the kitchen. Somewhere he could get coffee and keep pretending.

Taehyung stared at the ceiling, lips pressed tight.

So that’s how it was going to be.

He’d felt it too.

Taehyung knew it now, as sure as he knew his own heartbeat. Knew it in the kiss, in the whisper, in the way Yoongi had hovered too long in the doorway last night and looked at him like he was something fragile he didn’t know how to hold.

And now Yoongi was pretending it never happened.

Taehyung sat up with a huff, blanket slipping down his chest. “Unbelievable,” he muttered to himself.

He made his way into the kitchen where the scent of coffee was already strong in the air. Jimin and Jungkook were finishing breakfast, chocolate chip pancakes this time, sweet syrup in a warmed pitcher between them. They paused when they saw him.

“Good morning,” Jimin said, a little too cheerful.

Taehyung narrowed his eyes. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?” Jimin batted his lashes innocently.

“Don’t look at me like that. I’m not murdering anyone. Yet.”

Yoongi chose that exact moment to enter the kitchen, cup already in hand, freshly refilled. His eyes flicked to Taehyung, then away just as fast.

“Morning,” he muttered to the room at large.

Taehyung stared at him. 

Yoongi didn't so much as flinch. Didn’t meet his gaze. Just took a slow sip of coffee and leaned against the counter, acting like nothing had happened at all. Like he hadn’t kissed Taehyung with lips trembling and whispered a confession straight into his skin.

Oh, he’s good, Taehyung thought. Pretending like he didn’t set fire to my entire nervous system.

Fine. If Yoongi wanted to pretend, then so could he.

He sat at the table across from him, keeping his posture relaxed, his expression perfectly unreadable. “Smells good in here,” he said casually, reaching for a pancake. “Is that chocolate chip?”

“Yours,” Jimin said with a sunny smile, sliding the plate closer. “Thought you might need comfort food.”

Taehyung narrowed his eyes again, but only for a second.

Yoongi didn’t say anything. Just sipped his coffee like it was the only thing tethering him to the earth.

The room settled into soft conversation, punctuated by the sound of forks on ceramic. But Taehyung caught Yoongi glancing at him, twice. Quick little flickers. Like he couldn’t help it.

He saw the way Yoongi’s fingers tapped his cup when Taehyung laughed at something Jimin said. The way he shifted in his seat when Taehyung licked syrup off his thumb.

And Taehyung smiled to himself, quietly.

He knew Yoongi felt it too.

He just hadn’t figured out what to do with it yet.

And Taehyung could wait. For now.

He wasn’t planning to go anywhere.

Not with a storm still outside.

Not when Yoongi couldn’t seem to stop looking at him when he thought no one was watching.

Jimin was the worst patient in the world.

“I’m dying,” he croaked from the couch, swaddled in enough blankets to qualify as a hazard. “Tell Jungkook to bring me more tea. And a warm towel for my eyes. And to kiss my forehead at least once every ten minutes.”

Taehyung didn’t even look up from the book in his lap. “You don’t even have a fever.”

“I could develop one,” Jimin sniffled. “At any moment.”

“You’re being dramatic.”

“I’m being adored. There’s a difference.”

Jungkook, passing through with a cup of tea and a plate of toast with perfectly peeled orange slices, leaned over the arm of the couch to press a kiss to Jimin’s hair. “My precious, sweet, sick little bean sprout.”

Jimin blinked up at him with glassy eyes. “Love of my life.”

Taehyung rolled his eyes. “You two are disgusting.”

“You’re just mad you’re stuck with Yoongi hyung and he’s stubborn,” Jimin whispered gleefully, snuggling deeper into his cocoon.

Taehyung was mad. And not just because Jimin had declined his healing magic in favor of being pampered into recovery. He was mad because now he was standing alone in the kitchen with Yoongi again, sleeves rolled up, water boiling, and no one else coming to rescue him from the slow-brewing hurricane of unresolved tension between them.

The house was quiet. Snow still fell outside. Jimin’s dramatic coughing fit had faded to the background, and Jungkook was humming softly from the next room.

It was just the two of them.

Taehyung stirred the pot with forced concentration, very aware of Yoongi slicing vegetables beside him. The soft scrape of the knife on the cutting board. The low sigh he let out when his shoulders rolled back. The way he moved, precise and fluid, always holding a little tension in his neck like he was waiting for something to go wrong.

Taehyung said nothing. Neither did Yoongi.

Until his voice sounds and startles Taehyung.

“You always this quiet when you cook?” Yoongi asked, not looking at him.

“I usually talk to myself.”

Yoongi paused his slicing. “That sounds about right.”

Taehyung huffed, half-laughing. “And here I was thinking we’d made progress.”

Yoongi gave him a look, sharp and unreadable. “Did we?”

The question hung in the air, thick and fragile.

Taehyung swallowed and turned back to the stove. “Didn’t we?”

Another pause. Another quiet that said too much.

Taehyung barely registered the hand that reached around him until Yoongi was suddenly there, his chest a solid warmth against Taehyung’s chest, his breath brushing Taehyung’s skin.

“What are you-?”

Yoongi took the spoon from his hand gently, wordlessly, and set it down on the counter.

Taehyung froze.

“Yoongi?”

But the wolf didn’t speak.

He reached for Taehyung’s face instead, cradling it with both hands, rough, warm palms against his cheeks, thumbs brushing just under his eyes.

Taehyung blinked up at him, wide-eyed, breath caught halfway between inhale and collapse.

“What are you doing?” He whispered.

Yoongi looked at him like he didn’t know either. Like something inside him had finally snapped, tension pulled too taut for too long. His fingers trembled faintly, even as his voice stayed low and sure.

“I told myself I wouldn’t do this again,” he murmured.

Taehyung’s heart thudded wildly. “And?”

“I lied.”

And then he kissed him.

Not tentative, not questioning, but fierce and full, a crash of heat and teeth and breathlessness as Yoongi pressed him back against the counter. His hands held Taehyung’s face like it was something he needed to memorize, like he’d go mad if he didn’t. 

Their mouths met with a kind of desperation neither of them fully understood, only that it had been building, aching, clawing up their throats for days now, and it had finally broken loose.

Taehyung gasped into him, grabbing at Yoongi’s shirt, clutching the fabric like it could anchor him to something. Yoongi kissed him like he couldn’t get close enough, like he was starving and Taehyung was the only thing he wanted to taste.

And gods, Taehyung kissed him back.

They broke apart too soon, chests heaving, breaths tangled.

Yoongi didn’t move. His hands stayed at Taehyung’s cheeks, eyes searching his face like he was still waiting for it to all go wrong.

But Taehyung was trembling for an entirely different reason.

“I thought you were going to keep pretending,” he breathed.

“I tried.”

Taehyung tilted his head, still breathless. “Guess we’re both liars, then.”

Yoongi exhaled a sharp, quiet laugh. “Yeah.”

They didn’t move right away. The pot simmered gently behind them. Snow tapped soft against the windows. Jimin sneezed dramatically from the living room and immediately demanded soup.

And Taehyung, leaning into Yoongi’s hands, whispered, “We’re burning the rice.”

Yoongi didn’t even look. “Who fucking cares.”

The storm passed in the night. 

The snow stopped. 

Morning came golden and calm, sunlight sparkling across the untouched white that blanketed the forest.

They packed in near silence. And Jimin lingered, dramatically mournful, but well enough to bustle around and "accidentally" delay their departure by repeatedly misplacing Yoongi’s scarf and putting Taehyung’s boots in the freezer “for safekeeping.” Jungkook just watched with the air of someone far too pleased with himself.

Eventually, there were no more excuses.

Taehyung stood on the porch, arms wrapped around himself, watching the clouds overhead until Yoongi stepped out a moment later, shrugging into his coat, jaw tight.

They didn’t look at each other right away.

“Thanks,” Taehyung said quietly. “For not burning down the kitchen.”

Yoongi huffed. “Thanks for not poisoning me.”

Taehyung’s smile flickered. “Would’ve been too easy.”

Yoongi looked at him then. Really looked. Like he wanted to say something else. Like he didn’t know how. The wind tugged at his coat, swept a lock of hair across his forehead.

Taehyung ached with the want to fix it.

But he didn’t move. Neither did Yoongi.

Instead, the wolf nodded once, low and almost reluctant, and turned towards his house.

Taehyung watched him go, the distance between them stretching like a taut string.

And then Yoongi looked back. Just once.

Their eyes met across the snow. And in that one glance, Taehyung felt everything he didn’t want to hear out loud.

I don’t want to go. I don’t know what happens next. I don’t know how to want this and survive it.

Taehyung didn’t wave. Yoongi didn’t speak.

Then Yoongi turned, stepped into the forest, and disappeared down the snowy path between trees.

Taehyung didn’t want to go back to his empty house either.

It snowed again last night.

Yoongi wakes to the muffled hush of a world buried in white, the weight of silence pressing into the corners of his cabin like an unwelcome guest. He lies there, eyes open, staring at the grain of the wooden ceiling, and waits for his heartbeat to settle, though it never truly spiked. Not physically, anyway. Not enough to count. Just enough to feel off.

The bed is too big again.

He throws the covers off with more force than necessary, feet hitting the cold floor like a challenge, like punishment. The fireplace has long gone cold, and no one is here to stoke it but him. He dresses in layers, not for the cold, but for the stillness. His territory is quiet in winter, but this silence feels sterile. It wraps around his throat. Every inhale drags lavender and river stone up from some phantom part of him and he exhales hard, like it’ll help.

Like he didn’t fucking ask for this.

Yoongi finds himself chopping firewood with more aggression than needed. Again. The axe splits frozen logs with clean, sharp thunks, snow kicking up with each blow. He doesn't need the wood yet, but the movement helps. Kind of. Just not enough.

His hand brushes the edge of his own scarf, one Taehyung had accidentally brushed fingers over, two nights ago, while reaching for the tea tin. Yoongi had frozen like a fool, afraid to breathe.

The pinky touches.

The kiss he thought went unnoticed.

The way Taehyung didn't say a damn word when they left, just looked at him with something Yoongi didn't want to name. Not hope. Please not hope.

Yoongi presses the heel of his palm to his sternum. It does nothing to still the storm beneath.

He should shift, should run, should clear his head on four paws and remind himself who he is. What matters. What doesn’t. But the moment he thinks of the river, the flash of blue hair haloed in winter water, it’s over.

So instead, he makes tea. He pours too much sugar in it. He doesn’t drink it.

The cabin is too quiet.

Taehyung drapes another wet bundle of herbs from the rafters to dry, fingers methodical, precise. He counts the bundles twice. Then again. It doesn’t help.

Jimin used to hum in the mornings. Loudly. Off-key. Sometimes on purpose, to make him laugh. Now it’s just the faint crackle of the fire and the distant ticking of the old brass clock that used to belong to his mother. Its rhythm has become unbearable.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

Like something counting down. Or winding up.

He doesn’t bother with breakfast. Nothing tastes like anything anyway.

There’s a bowl of lavender sugar on the windowsill, sun-warmed and waiting. He should store it. Or use it. Or give it to someone. 

Yoongi doesn’t even like sugar, Taehyung remembers with a quiet, bitter huff. Still, he’d made the blend too sweet on purpose that morning, hoping maybe Yoongi would try it. Just once.

The river outside hasn’t frozen over yet. Taehyung walks to it barefoot, coat wrapped tight, breath clouding in the morning chill. He presses his fingers to the water’s edge. It recoils. Or maybe he does.

His magic is misbehaving.

It ebbs and flows in fits, sharp where it should be soft. Like it doesn't trust him to touch it gently. He tries to shape it into something familiar, a ball of light, a healing thread, anything simple, but it just trembles in his palms before slipping away like oil on skin.

He doesn’t tell Jimin. He knows the cause.

Yoongi kissed him.

No, Yoongi kissed sleeping him. Or what he thought was sleeping him. It was the way Yoongi held him after. The way his hand stayed warm on his thigh, steady, possessive. The way he smelled like pine and frost and something tender underneath.

The audacity. The cruelty.

The heartbreak.

Taehyung presses his cold fingers to his lips and closes his eyes. The warmth there is long gone, but he remembers the shape of it. He remembers everything.

He thought maybe, maybe, Yoongi felt it too.

But now they're apart again. And Yoongi hasn't come back.

Not even once.

Taehyung hadn’t meant to pass by the training grounds. He was on his way to the infirmary, arms full of bandages and bottles of tinctures, when the distant echo of Yoongi’s voice caught him like a snare around the ankle.

His steps slowed.

Down the path, past a low rise in the woods, he could see a loose ring of young wolves crouched low in the brittle grass, listening intently. And in the center of them stood Yoongi.

Not glowering, not cold, but focused.

He gestured as he spoke, slow and deliberate, using his own stance to demonstrate. Broad shoulders loose but watchful, weight low and controlled. “You can’t charge a deer head-on,” he said, voice carrying easily across the air. “They’ll smell you before they see you. Feel your pulse in the earth.”

The young wolves murmured, listening hard.

Taehyung couldn’t stop staring.

There was something wild about him like this, yes, but also steady. His face open in a way Taehyung rarely saw. He wasn’t trying to be intimidating. He was just being. Patient. Present.

Beautiful.

Taehyung’s breath caught somewhere behind his teeth. He stood half-shielded by a tree, forgotten herbs tucked against his chest, and couldn’t seem to make himself move.

Yoongi glanced up.

Just a flick of his gaze, but it caught on Taehyung. He faltered midsentence. His shoulders stiffened, but his eyes didn’t leave Taehyung’s, not for a long, full second.

And then he looked away again, returning to the circle. The pause was barely noticeable. But it was noticed.

One of the younger wolves, a freckle-faced boy with ears just a little too big for his head, squinted at Yoongi as he resumed. “Alpha Min?”

“Hm?” Yoongi didn’t look up again. His voice was gruff, but not unkind.

“Do you not like that witch?”

Yoongi blinked. “What?”

“You were makin’ that face,” the kid said, pointing a finger vaguely in the direction Taehyung had disappeared. “At him.”

Yoongi frowned. “What kind of face?”

“You know,” the pup said, as if that explained it. “That face.”

Yoongi opened his mouth to argue. Then closed it again.

He didn’t mean to say it. Didn’t even realize he had until the words came out:

“I like that witch.”

There was a beat of stunned silence.

“Oooooooo,” the pup gasped, eyes huge. “You like him.”

Yoongi dragged a hand down his face. “I didn’t say-”

“You like like him.”

The tips of Yoongi’s ears flushed red. He rubbed the back of his neck and muttered, “Yeah. I think I do.”

No one said anything after that. Not even the pup. But Yoongi didn’t miss the knowing smirk that curled on his lips as he turned back to the group.

Yoongi tried to shake the moment off, to bury it beneath lesson plans and postures, but he felt the weight of that glance, Taehyung’s glance, pressed tight behind his ribs.

And somewhere far down the path, Taehyung walked faster, heart hammering, cheeks flushed, herbs forgotten.

Because he saw the way Yoongi looked at him.

And he knows.

The knock was soft. Almost hesitant.

Yoongi frowned as he set aside the whetstone and knife he’d been working on, the quiet scrape of steel against stone replaced by the hush of the wind outside.

No one knocked on his door. Not unless it was important.

He rose, joints stiff from training and long hours, and padded across the cabin. When he pulled the door open, he froze.

Taehyung stood there, coat buttoned to his throat, hair damp from snow, cheeks flushed pink from the cold. His hands were tucked awkwardly in front of him, and when he lifted them, Yoongi saw a small jar cradled carefully in his palms.

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

Both of them looked down at the jar.

“I-uh,” Taehyung started, voice stammering in a way Yoongi had never heard from him before. The witch who always had a sharp tongue, who met every word with sarcasm, was suddenly tripping over his own breath. “I got you some-some balm. For soreness. Since you’ve been.. training the pups. And all.”

Yoongi stared. At the jar. At Taehyung’s hands. At the faint shimmer of lavender and rosemary clinging to the glass.

He can’t fucking do this anymore.

One second, he was standing frozen in the doorway. The next, he was dragging Taehyung inside, slamming the door shut, and pushing him back against the wood with a kiss that stole the air from both of them.

Taehyung gasped, the jar nearly slipping from his hands before Yoongi caught it and set it blindly on the nearest shelf. His palms cupped Taehyung’s jaw, fingers trembling as they pressed into soft, warm skin.

“You’re driving me fucking mad,” Yoongi rasped against his lips. Another kiss, hard and desperate, teeth clashing, breath spilling between them. “I can’t stand it-can’t stand you not being here.”

Taehyung clutched at his shirt, eyes wide, lips bruised already. “Yoongi-”

“Your scent,” Yoongi growled, like it was tearing out of him, raw and helpless. “It’s stuck in my head. I can’t fucking get it out. Everywhere I go, I smell it. Lavender. Rain. You. Fucking maddening.”

Taehyung shivered, though it had nothing to do with the cold.

“I miss your voice,” Yoongi went on, forehead pressing to Taehyung’s as though he needed to anchor himself. “I miss the way you won’t shut up. I miss, fuck, I miss your lips. I miss your warmth. I miss you.”

For once, Taehyung had no sarcastic retort. No clever jab. He just stared, wide-eyed and undone, and then surged forward to kiss him back with equal desperation, like he’d been waiting for this moment all his life.

When they finally pulled apart, both of them breathless, Taehyung’s hand lingered against Yoongi’s cheek, thumb brushing over the corner of his mouth. His voice shook when he whispered, “Took you long enough.”

Yoongi huffed a short, wrecked laugh. “Shut up.”

“Make me,” Taehyung said, smiling crookedly, and kissed him again.

Outside, the snow fell in soft, endless silence. Inside, in the warmth of Yoongi’s cabin, the wolf and the witch finally stopped pretending.