Memento mori || Jongsang ✓

20| Tentiginous

Yeosang's head still throbs when he opens his eyes abruptly to find two lit candles in the room as the only light sources. Instantly, he pushes his hands flat down against the bed's surface, heaves his upper body, and stares around in the room with wary eyes. He wants to think that the beating pulse that touches his hearing comes from his own heart, but when he moves a hand to touch his naked chest, he feels no beat. He feels no life.

The boy gasps surprised as he presses his hand harder into his chest, digging for the slightest feeling of a heart that should work for him to be awake. But there still is nothing despite how the thumping sound resonates clear for his ears, suddenly blending with the difference of so many sounds that he never has noticed before; he can hear the wind outside stretching around the building of the fortress smoothly, and he can hear the voices outsides of these solid walls which he never has been able to do before.

And he hears the soft breathing by his side.

Turning his head, he flickers his tense eyes down to the knight, who has fallen asleep sitting on the floor with his head resting on the edge of the bed. The mellow glow in the chamber illuminates the man's handsome features, cupping his round cheek but cutting his jaw strongly, making the trails of saltwater glister from his eyes to the pool that has gathered on the stone floor. Guilt tightens somewhere deep inside when he realizes how this unfearful Knights Templar has shed tears on a cause this needless. Yeosang should be a nobody to him.

Jongho stirs his limbs and he must seek for dear mercy when all his senses topple his mind with unknown desires. The chamber suddenly smells strongly of sweat and holt and the savor of a sweet scent. Yeosang blinks unbelievingly with his eyes as he tastes it on his tongue and feels how saliva accumulates in his mouth from the pleasing tint. His mind hisses at him to do something he has never dreamt of.

The man draws in an unstable breath of air before he finds the presence of Yeosang different from what it has been the last days and nights. Black pupils widen and his body paralyzes, caught in the moment when he finds Yeosang looking very much alive down at him. The boy sees how the knight's eyes slowly fill with water as his hands tremble like he never has seen them do before. His own hands carefully reach for the other's as he struggles to believe that Jongho has worried this much about his health. His eyes follow how he slowly lets the hands slide along the skin, trailing over Jongho's knuckles until he softly holds him around his wrists, heaving his sight to the man's quivering eyes.

"Yeosang.." he draws across his lips in a whisper. Suddenly, the knight inbreathes and tugs his hands out of the smaller male's and pushes his body to his feet before embracing the other tightly, "You are fine."

When his chin falls upon his nude shoulder, Yeosang feels how the hot tears pass down his bare back as strong arms lock around him; a hand tangling in his dark hair and the other taking him closer, spraying on the sturdy surface of his ribs. Yeosang lets the other handle him, moving his own to clutch around Jongho's shirt.

"You are actually still here."

His heart clenches at the words and he lets his eyes close, pulling in tighter until their chests flush so nigh they barely cannot be any closer. Through the thin fabric, Yeosang feels the thumping beat of the knight's heart and the rhythm has him calming together with the madly soft caresses that work from the hind of his head. He can barely hold on to the thin strings that keep his mind from freeing. He bites his bottom lip forcingly.

"I thought you would never come back - they all told me so," Jongho whispers as he lightly touches the boy's neck with his lips. He feels dizzy from the blend of agony and tenderness.