celestial strings | h.js

two.

"Hmm! No-wait! Stop!" you protested within his grasp when you realized he was planning to bring you out of this place. You squirmed and moved about, hoping he would drop you to the ground. "Stop it, please! Let me go! Let me go!"

Taken back by your sudden burst of strength, the councilman released you and watched with old annoyance as you scrambled up from the ground and darted away. Fresh blood slid over the old, but the pain never once stopped. Nevertheless, you tumbled over to where Jisung lay and halted to kneel when you were near.

There was no visible detection of an injury on his body, but a pool of blood was coming from beneath his torso and head. Your agitated breathing quickened in the face of a medical enigma. There was no way for you to heal his injuries if you knew not the questions of where nor what. You needed to prepare for the type of strings, the length of them, the kind of spells, and so many more things in order to successfully maintain the greatest outcome: Jisung staying alive.

"Okay, okay," you exhaled through your words and looked affirmatively at him. "Where does it hurt? Do you-do you know?"

"It is the back of his head and the left side of his chest."

You closed your eyes, letting the burning anger in you that manifested from merely hearing the sound of the councilman's voice ring away, then you heeded his words. Reaching your hand down to his neck, you cooed at Jisung with a warning that you were going to touch for his injury before, bravely and with a lot of heartaches, you pressed the tips of your fingers against his skin.

You winced when he withered, and apologies left your lips in rapid fire. You were unsure how he managed to get a cut like that, but you have got to assume a similar issue was present on his back. Since there was nothing sharp around his neck area, that must mean whatever he landed on was protruding through his chest. It was not invisible before, but the more you were aware, the more the blood was growing in his dark-colored clothes. It soaked into his black vest, dripping to his gray uniform pants.

It must be agonizing and perhaps even weird to have something lodged in your body so violently.

"Okay, it's okay," you mumbled through an infuriated jumble of thoughts.

You moved your hands around your pockets, looking for any extra strings you could use that hadn't already been rooted deep into your arms. When you found none, you took off your bag and rummaged through all your things, hoping to find even a strand of saving grace.

The councilman watched your measly figure with intrigue. Human devotion was as intense as could be, that much the old man understood. He did not go through his life condemning himself without a thought of devotion. But what he gave his life to was power and wealth, a beyond comfortable life where he could sneer and condescend, not other people or a soulmate.

The fearful adrenaline rush must have ceased your ability to feel pain if you were desperately finding a source of string to use. Or, you do feel pain, but it was not enough to stop you from wreaking havoc upon yourself to save someone you cared deeply about. You may have weighed the consequences; between losing someone forever and being in treatable pain, you choose the pain.

But could it be treatable? To chant the wrong spell on a string that has already been used, plus contrasting the purpose with its color—the string will convulse around you because it was not being used according to its purpose. Adding that onto all the sewed strings already on your arm... painful. He could almost shudder at the amount of magic your strings will suck out of you. Even if you manage to save Jisung, you would be dead by then through blood loss and a lack of blood flow.

All of that for one boy. Soulmates or not, was Jisung worth it all? Was a human boy worth the magic inherited through your blood?

"Your strings have sunken into your skin, my child. Your body is bleeding all over, and it seemed to have corrupted your common sense," he pointed out the obvious. "You will kill yourself before you can save him. If you use up the strings now, you wouldn't be able to fight me anymore, and it would also be much easier for me to kill him if he is without your protection."