c020

Citrus and vanilla. Crackling fires and sea-salt caramels.

Honey and…something else. Something sweet, familiar, and deeply satisfying.

Seokga breathes in the fragrances as he stirs awake, opening his eyes to a deep chocolate brown that smells of sweet shampoo. He blinks, confusion settling over the blanket of weariness already coating his mind. That color, that smell…

Hani's hair.

And then he realizes, with dawning horror, that he is holding the fox. Her back is pressed against his stomach, and her hands rest over his where they lay on her abdomen. She is asleep, her shoulders rising and falling to a slow tempo.

Seokga stares at the gumiho for a moment that feels like a small eternity. Her skin is warm, and she's snoring a little—shallow puffs of air that blow a stray hair strand away from her face. He swallows hard against a sudden, tender emotion that tightens his throat. Forces it down, pushes it away.

How long have I been holding her like this?

The god pulls away as if scalded, his eyes bulging out of his head in disbelief and horror.

No.

No no no no no.

He needs to get out of this hotel room immediately.

Seokga scrambles out of the bed, his cheeks burning with shame. He can only be grateful that he's awoken before she has. He can't imagine the questions she'd hurl at him if this had been the other way around, but he knows that they would be questions that he would not be able to answer for the life of him. To his immense relief, despite his panicked jostling, the gumiho is still fast asleep. Hani apparently sleeps like the dead.

Cuddling.The word nudges its way into Seokga's brain, an invasive thought bashing down the door to his mind. You were cuddling her, you fool.

Seokga runs a hand down his face in horror. He was cuddling her. Kim Hani. Seokga shakes his head, staring at the sleeping gumiho. Seokga has done many, many questionable things in his lifetime, but this…

This tops them all.

This is awful. Absolutely, irrefutably awful.

A noise of horror rumbles in his throat as he gapes at the bed. How in Jeoseung has this happened? Seokga has never…cuddled somebody before.

So lost is he in his horror that he barely notices Hani stirring until she's sitting upright in bed and gawking at him as if he's grown two heads. Belatedly, Seokga realizes that he has been staring down at his own two hands with an expression of complete betrayal.

"What," Hani demands, rubbing her eyes, "are you doing?"

He stiffens. "Nothing," he snaps hastily. "Absolutely nothing." Seokga thinks that he sees a spark of realization in Hani's bleary eyes, but it fades as fast as it appeared. She slides out of bed and busies herself with rummaging through her duffel for a fresh set of clothes.

"We should question Ji-ah today," she mumbles as Seokga stares at her. Does she know? No, she must not. She'd been sleeping. "We need to move, too. If Dok-hyun isn't the eoduksini—if it's still out there—we're in danger. Especially if it realizes that Ji-ah is on Geoje. Like the other victims, she's been having nightmares. It's only a matter of time before the eoduksini tries to kill her."

Seokga turns his attention to his own duffel, pulling out his own clothing—a smart emerald sweater and sharp black pants. She doesn't seem to know that she'd been in his arms. Good. "We'll go back to New Sinsi. Wipe Ji-ah's memory and assign her guardians."

"Is it wise to bring her back to New Sinsi, though?" Hani scratches at her head. "Maybe we should put her in Seoul, Busan, or Incheon until we've gotten rid of the eoduksini. Maybe Thailand. Or even America."

"Let's get answers first," Seokga replies, forcing himself to meet her eye. Cuddling. He is appalled with himself. "And then we'll decide on the rest."

The Lotus Hotel's dining room is nothing more than a cramped corner stuffed with mismatched plastic tables and chairs, and a spread of questionable-looking bagels, toast, and eggs. There is coffee, but to Seokga's eternal disappointment, it is warm, watery, and altogether disgusting. He forces himself to drink it, though; some caffeine has never hurt him—unless it is spilled all over his suit by a certain barista at the Creature Café, or poisoned with too much cream and sugar by that very same barista.

Hani and Seokga sit across from Ji-ah, who is morosely picking at a blueberry bagel with her fingernails. If Hani still holds a grudge for the lamp that was thrown at her head last night, she gives no indication as she leans forward and says, "We know that this must be hard for you to talk about."

Ji-ah stabs at the bagel with a yellow fingernail, broodingly silent. Her eyes are red-rimmed and puffy, signaling a night of no sleep.

Seokga shifts impatiently in his seat. His answers are so close—and yet so very, very far away. He needs to know if it's truly Dok-hyun. Part of him hopes it is, so that this strange, prickling feeling whenever he thinks of Dok-hyun confined to the precinct goes away.

"But in order to stop the eoduksini—the demon you saw near your café—we need you to walk us through exactly what happened that night." Hani's jittering leg is the only sign of her waning patience. They have been sitting in the dining room for thirty minutes now, attempting to pull answers out of their witness. Shim is expecting Seokga's call this morning. "Okay? Can you do this for us, Ji-ah?"

No response.

Fine, then.

Seokga will get his answers another way.

His grip on his already-frayed patience snaps completely, and he leans forward, summoning the threads of his power. As much as he hates to admit it, last night was one of the best, rejuvenating sleeps of his life. Seokga doesn't know if it has anything to do with Hani's presence next to him, but hopes not, if only to preserve the dignity he has left. The gumiho frowns as the emerald strands, invisible to Ji-ah, begin to creep toward the morose witness.

"Seokga—"

"Do you want answers?" he demands from the corner of his tight mouth. "Or do you want to sit here watching her destroy her bagel all day? We gave her a whole night to recover. We can't waste another." Not when Chunbun is now only thirteen days away, and Dok-hyun—potentially innocent—wastes away in a New Sinsi holding cell.

Hani falls silent.

Tell us what happened,Seokga demands silently as the jade magic coils around Ji-ah's body. Tell us what happened the night of the murder. The night that you fled out of New Sinsi. Tell us what happened. He grits his teeth together in concentration. This is no small demand, and his weakened power recognizes that. Sweat pools at the nape of his neck. Tell us what happened, Ji-ah. Tell us—

The words wrench from Ji-ah's mouth all at once, and her eyes widen as they spill out uncontrollably, even as her skin whitens to a deathly pale. "I was working at the café," she says, clenching her bagel in her hands. "I was working at the café with a boy named Yang Chan-yeol. We had night shifts. Night shifts were the worst because that was when I was supposed to be studying for my classes, but I couldn't do morning shifts since there were no openings, and—"

"We get it," Seokga mutters. "You can skip ahead."

Ji-ah's bagel crumbles to bits. Her eyes are darting wildly between Hani and Seokga in fear as her mouth continues to move. "It was time to take out the trash and the recycling. Chan-yeol said that he could take out the trash and that I could do recycling. He took the bags and he went outside. I heard him throwing the bags into the garbage dump and I was going to go, too, but then Sora called me on the work phone. She wanted to know if I could come over later and watch a movie. We hadn't seen each other in a while, because of our schedules, but I said I couldn't because I was so tired. And then we had a fight, a small one, for maybe three minutes. Five minutes. I-I don't know. Sora was upset, and I was upset, too. She said that I was a slacker at being a friend, and I said that I wasn't. But then she hung up and I took the recycling outside and I saw…" Ji-ah gasps, attempting to press her traitorous lips together.

Tell us what you saw.Seokga struggles to maintain control over the emerald threads that have already begun to flicker. Tell us. Now.

Hani has leaned forward, her expression rapt.

"I saw…I saw a man who was not a man standing over the body of—of a beast. A big beast, almost like a lion with no mane or t-tail, but w-with horns and—and golden scales instead. He was crouched over the lion-beast, and there were…There were shadows in the alleyway, shadows that looked like they were flowing from the man. And the man was bent over the lion, who was snarling, and—and black veins started to run all through the lion's scales. It looked like he was stealing something from the lion—stealing something because the lion stopped moving. And I-I knew, I don't know how, but I knew that the lion was Chan-yeol. And I knew that he was dead." Tears flow down Ji-ah's face as she continues. "And I-I dropped the bag of recycling and the noise had the man turning. H-he looked at me and the alleyway got so dark, so, so dark and I sc-screamed and I r-ran away. I ran," Ji-ah repeats in a whisper. "I ran to Sora…"

"The man. What did he look like?" Hani asks urgently. "Describe him."

Describe the man,Seokga commands, straining to deliver his order. Do it now before I lose my patience.

"His hair was graying," Ji-ah whispers hoarsely. "He was w-wearing glasses, and some sort of b-black coat. I think it had a golden symbol on it. The symbol looked like the l-lion thing that he k-killed…"

Seokga's eyes flare wide, and it's an effort not to drop his hold on Ji-ah. "A lab coat?" he demands, one hand fumbling for his cellphone.

"I g-guess…"

"Hwanin's tits," Hani chokes out, eyes darting to Seokga's. "We were right. We were right."

Seokga is inclined to agree. Heart pounding, he begins to punch in Shim's number. Ji-ah just described Lee Dok-hyun, down to the custom coat worn by all members of the Lee family throughout the years. The black lab coat with the golden haetae embroidery—the one that Dok-hyun has worn every single day at the precinct.

Ji-ah is still speaking as Seokga presses the call button. The phone rings once, twice.

"I th-think he was going to chase me, but he wanted to finish whatever he was doing to the h-horned lion first." Ji-ah presses a hand over her mouth as Seokga's grip over his power slackens and disappears, leaving him in need of some more coffee. "Wh-what…How did you…" Her eyes are round with terror as she abruptly shoves back her chair, clenching fistfuls of her bagel. "You're one of them," she breathes. "A monster. You're a monster!"

"Ji-ah—" Hani stands in concern. "We're not—"

Shim hasn't picked up.

Something is wrong. Something is very, very wrong.

The girl is stumbling backward, emitting a low keening noise as she trembles. "Monsters," she mumbles to herself. "Monsters here, monsters there, monsters everywhere…"

"Ji-ah," Hani repeats gently, making her way toward the girl. "Let's—"

It happens in an instant.

As Hani approaches the upset girl, her hands raised in supplication, Ji-ah stumbles into the spread of breakfast foods and closes her fist around a knife originally meant for cutting the bagels in half.

Seokga barely has time to shout a warning before Ji-ah hurls the knife toward Hani and makes her escape, sprinting out of the room and into the hotel beyond.

With an inhuman swiftness, Hani dodges the blade, leaving it to embed itself on the wall behind her with a thud, quivering in the cracked plaster.

Seokga has shot to his feet. "Are you—"

"I'm fine." Hani's face is flushed with agitation and worry. "We need to go after her. She can't have gone far, and we can't afford to lose her again."

"I know." Seokga tightens his grip around the cane. "I'll go up and check to see if she's gone back into her room. You go to the street outside, search the surrounding area. Call me immediately if you find anything." He's already dialing Shim again. Pick up, he thinks desperately. Come on, old man.

Hani nods and tenses as if to run—but pauses, panting. "I need your number. I don't have it."

Impatient, Seokga rattles off his number, hoping that the fox has a good memory. She nods, breathless, before turning on her heel and sprinting through the door. If Hani's injured leg pains her, she doesn't let on, and the fallen god feels a surge of respect for the gumiho.

Seokga turns his attention back to the still-ringing phone, his mouth tight. Shim always picks up immediately. Always. He has never answered later than the fifth ring, not once in all the years he's known him. Panic begins to rise in Seokga's throat. The old haetae could be dead, in a pool of his own blood…

"Shit!" Seokga curses, running a hand through his hair and imagining the horrors that could have happened at the precinct. It could be a massacre. His fingers itch to grip the steering wheel of his car, to hear the bestial roar of its engine as he closes the extra miles between him and whatever the fuck has happened.

And although it's necessary to check, he doubts that Ji-ah will be anywhere within the Lotus Hotel. Damn it.

His mouth tightens. They'll have to let her go. There are larger matters at hand. Shim isn't picking up. Seokga can't take it; he needs to know what's happened, and the drive back is too long. If he doesn't get answers soon, he'll go mad.

An idea creeps into his mind, nothing more than a whisper against the crevices of his consciousness, a whisper that he wants to ignore—but knows that he must not.

Call upon the yojeong,the voice whispers. Follow the fairies.