Chapter Text
As a good witch, Kang Yeosang has a personal set of rules he lives by. They’re straightforward, and on the whole not hard to keep to. Don’t try risky spells with someone else in the house. Ethically source all your spell components. Don’t put a curse on anyone unless they really, really deserve it.
And there is only one thing that makes someone really, really deserve it: hurting Yeosang’s friends.
“I hate him,” says Wooyoung, wiping away angry tears. “I hate, hate, hate him.”
Next to him Seonghwa nods understandingly, wrapping an arm around him to take him into a comforting hug. Yeosang, awkward as ever with tears, sits at a distance and says nothing. But in his head all the gears are turning.
“He must’ve been cheating on me,” says Wooyoung, still hiccuping. “He had to be. There’s no way he got another boyfriend so quickly. He literally dumped me two days ago, and now he’s walking around campus being all cute with some new guy.”
“I’m sorry,” says Seonghwa as he hugs Wooyoung. “Junki was a prick who never deserved you in the first place.”
No, Wooyoung’s ex-boyfriend never deserved him. But he does deserve something very, very awful, which Yeosang is thinking up right now.
Right at that moment Seonghwa looks up and makes direct eye contact with Yeosang. He shoots him a Look with a very obvious warning: don’t.
Yeosang gives him a meaningful look right back, one that says you can’t be serious. But Seonghwa only intensifies his Look, and shakes his head slowly. Yeosang sighs.
“I’m sorry, Wooyoung,” he says, with an awkward pat on Wooyoung’s shoulder. Wooyoung just nods, face crumpled as he tries not to start crying again.
Yeosang stays for a few more hours, and along with Seonghwa tries his best to cheer Wooyoung up. After dinner in front of a cheap horror movie, Yeosang has to go home to finish a potion for a client, while Seonghwa volunteers to sleep over and keep Wooyoung company overnight.
“Thanks for coming, Yeosangie,” says Wooyoung, as he stands in the doorway. His eyes are rimmed red, and there’s a glassy sheen to them, but he still puts up a smile.
That’s when Yeosang knows. Junki has to pay.
He is good at formulating curses (rather disturbingly, according to Seonghwa) so thinking up a fitting punishment doesn’t take longer than the journey back to his apartment. Actually building the spell takes much longer. He has to use his last three drops of heartneedle essence, which is unfortunate because heartneedle is always a bitch to (ethically) source, but as far as Yeosang is concerned it’s worth it. He never liked Junki. The asshole treated Wooyoung badly throughout their entire relationship, and now he has the gall to cheat on him and break up with him too? Yeosang can’t rest easy until he makes Junki regret it.
So for eight days Yeosang shuts himself up in his tiny apartment, bent over spellbooks and mortar and pestle and his cheap gas burner stove (witching needs an ambiance—induction stoves are just wrong). It takes a little trial and error, one (minor) explosion, one little incident when he accidentally inhales Parmol’s tincture and then lies down flat on his back and stares at the ceiling for four hours high out of his mind. But, in the end, Yeosang is successful. He has one perfect little curse bottled into a vial.
Now he just needs to cast it.
If he had a strand of Junki’s hair, Yeosang could’ve brewed the target into his curse, but past Yeosang did not have the foresight to try and pick Junki’s hair from Wooyoung’s clothes. He has to cast it directly on the target, which is never easy. Yeosang can’t go to Seonghwa for help. The older witch is very anti-curse and would never approve, no matter how much the target deserved it, and telling Hongjoong anything is just telling Seonghwa with extra steps. He doesn’t want to involve Wooyoung, because if Junki realizes he’s been cursed his angry ex-boyfriend would be the first person he’d suspect. Jongho never does anything without asking for a favor in turn. And Mingi is a damn wizard, so Yeosang can’t ask him anything on principle.
So it’s left to Yeosang to do it himself. Which is perfectly fine. There’s no one else to do it, after all.
Except. Well. There is San.
Yeosang dismisses the idea as he pours the potion out of the little cauldron. San is part of their circle, but he’s more Wooyoung’s friend than Yeosang’s; Yeosang never hangs out with him without Wooyoung there too. He and San are more like friends-in-law, or friends once removed. Yeosang could never put him to use like that. Besides, San is so sweet and nice, Yeosang doesn’t think he’d willingly curse anyone (not even a deserving ass like Junki).
So it’s up to Yeosang. He can and will handle this.
One absolutely lovely spring morning, Yeosang makes his move. Wooyoung’s university campus is a sprawling mess of tall buildings in cream white, all almost completely identical, and it takes Yeosang a while before he finally finds the one he was looking for. He hovers outside the building, trying to look casual as he watches. Junki’s statistics class will end soon, and then Yeosang can cast the curse. It’s a little risky, because Wooyoung also does this class, but it’s the only part of Junki’s schedule Yeosang knows. He has to get it done quick and hope Wooyoung doesn’t see him.
A few minutes later, Yeosang spots his prey.
Junki is tall, and (Yeosang would begrudgingly admit) more than decent looking. Yeosang keeps his eyes on him as he exits the building, and after a quick glance around to make sure Wooyoung isn’t around, makes his move.
He downs the contents of the vial in one go. He feels the charged energy of it spread through his veins, mixing with the power of his own soul. Yeosang’s innate energy will power the components and make the curse active. Like this, he can keep the damaging effects contained, and then release it according to the mechanism he has brewed into the potion.
Which is speech. Now that he has the dormant curse in him, Yeosang just needs to speak to Junki, and the seed of the curse would transfer from him into the dickwad and activate to full power.
Yeosang smiles and starts walking.
He knows Junki won’t recognize him. They only met a few times before, and Yeosang wasn’t very interested in impressing then. He is now. He has his long black hair tied away from his face, letting only a few wisps of his long bangs frame his face. He’s wearing a nice dark jacket that shows off the lines of his shoulders and arms, his favorite pair of jeans. He even put on makeup.
Yeosang knows he looks good. He keeps his gaze focused on his target as he walks towards him. He knows Junki won’t walk away from him, he knows when he opens his mouth and says words that will be his doom Junki will reply, and then the curse casting will be complete, and Junki will finally get what he deserves for hurting Wooyoung—
Something crashes into Yeosang’s side.
He loses his balance and falls over. He’s able to break most of the fall, but he does bang his elbow against the concrete. Daggers shoot up his arm.
“Oh, my god, I’m so sorry!”
Yeosang looks up and sees a familiar face. It’s San.
“Shit, I’m sorry,” says San, immediately going to his knees to help Yeosang up. “I should’ve seen where I was going. Are you okay?”
He looks so genuinely worried, eyes sparkling and lips pouting a little, that before Yeosang can think, he says, “It’s okay.”
And then he realizes what he’s just done.
It smacks Yeosang in the face as soon as the words leave his lips. And with the words go the curse, from Yeosang’s soul straight to sweet, lovely San.
Yeosang cursed San.
He wants to scream.
“You don’t look like you’re okay,” says San, blissfully unaware Yeosang just made his future a living hell through his own stupidity. “Are you sure you’re not hurt? The health center is really close, I can take you—”
“No,” says Yeosang. San is so nice. “No, I’m okay. Um, thanks for the offer.”
San helps him up. Yeosang glances over and sees that Junki is gone, disappeared into a crowd of students. It doesn’t matter anyway. Yeosang already wasted the curse, and he has none left over to cast another one.
Yeosang stares at San, his not-even-proper friend, who is smiling at him like he’s sincerely happy to see him. He can’t bring himself to tell San what just happened, not in front of that smile. He’s all ready to slip away with a quick, awkward word, when the situation, impossibly, gets worse.
“Hey, San!”
Like a thunderstorm Wooyoung comes running up to them, throwing himself straight at San. San doesn’t seem surprised or even put off (another testament to his niceness) and just throws a casual arm around him, revealing a dimple as he grins.
Only after he almost knocks San over does Wooyoung realize Yeosang is there. “Yeosang, what are you doing here?” he asks. He looks from him to San and back. “You came to hang out with San?”
“No,” says Yeosang. The full picture hits him, and now he really wants to scream. Instead of cursing Wooyoung’s rotten ex, he accidentally cursed his sweet friend. Yeosang is a fucking disaster of a witch.
“We could hang out,” says Wooyoung, lighting up with the idea. “We don’t have classes, and if you’re free—”
“Sorry, Wooyoung, I’m here on business,” says Yeosang, hoping the lie lands. He’s already backtracking, all ready to escape. “Make sure you come see me later, okay? It’s urgent. But right now I really need to go.”
“Really serious?” asks Wooyoung, looking kind of worried.
“Somewhat,” says Yeosang. Wooyoung has no idea.
“Okay, then, I’ll come by after my last class is over,” says Wooyoung. “See ya.”
San smiles, all bright and cheeks dimpling, and says, “It was nice seeing you for a sec, Yeosang.”
Yeosang forces a terrible mockery of a smile. And then he turns around and flees, wishing he could just curse himself and his stupidity.
“You cursed San?”
“Shut up,” hisses Yeosang. “Do you want the entire city to know?”
“You cursed San!” cries Wooyoung, even louder. “You cursed San, oh, my god, Yeosang!”
Yeosang hurriedly looks around the ratty little café they are in, but nobody seems to be listening. “It was a mistake,” he hisses. “It’s not like I wanted to curse him! It was an accident.”
“Of course it was, no one would ever want to curse him,” says Wooyoung. “He’s the nicest person ever. And you cursed him.”
“Stop saying that!”
“What did you do to him?” demands Wooyoung. “Is he going to, like, grow a third eye or something? Because he’s in my presentation group and we can’t have him present with three eyes!”
“No, of course not,” says Yeosang. Growing extra body parts is way above his skillset. “We don’t even need to tell him. The curse is really easy to reverse, so with luck he won’t even realize he’s been cursed before I take it off him.”
“What do you mean, ‘with luck’?” asks Wooyoung.
Yeosang curses under his breath. Wooyoung is always the sharpest when it’s the most inconvenient. “Reversing this specific curse depends on the target,” he says. “The curse itself triggers depending on the target’s mood. It’s not like continuously harming him, just in doses depending on what he’s feeling, you know? So if he doesn’t feel the wrong thing, he won’t even know he’s been cursed.” He beams.
Wooyoung screeches again. “You can’t be serious!”
Yeosang just groans. This is so completely new for him it doesn’t feel real. He never gets a curse wrong, he never plants a spell on the wrong person. And to end up putting it on San? He can’t believe his luck. He’s even getting scolded by Wooyoung, and that’s the most surreal thing about it all.
“We need to tell San.”
“No,” says Yeosang immediately. “He doesn’t need to know. I’ll fix it before he knows anything’s wrong.”
“That is so not a good idea,” says Wooyoung.
Everything really is backwards. Wooyoung warning Yeosang about a bad idea? Yeosang would laugh if things weren’t so shit. Instead he says, “Trust me.”
Wooyoung doesn’t look convinced, but he doesn’t say so. “So what are you going to do?” he asks.
“Start working on the spell to remove the curse,” says Yeosang. “It’s not that complex but I’m gonna go over to Seonghwa-hyung’s to ask for help, just in case.” The older witch is more experienced in spell reversal, and Yeosang doesn’t want to take any risks. The thought of the lecture he’ll get from Seonghwa makes Yeosang want to groan again.
“Okay, that’s good,” says Wooyoung. “This was supposed to go on Junki, right?”
“If everything turned out how it was supposed to, yeah,” says Yeosang.
“So what’s the curse?” asks Wooyoung.
Yeosang sighs, and finally reveals what he’d thought of then as a stroke of genius. “When awake,” he says, “if the target is brought to mind of the person they adore, a chill which can be dispelled by neither fleece nor fire grips their body, to bring upon them misery.”
Wooyoung frowns, trying to work out the old spell language. When he finally gets it, he snorts. “You were gonna curse him to freeze whenever he thought about his new boyfriend? You’re evil.”
Yeosang knows. It’s the source of all his problems.
“I am disappointed, Kang Yeosang. No, I am more than disappointed, I am dismayed, I am shocked, I am appalled—”
Yeosang takes a deep breath. He knows this won’t end any time soon.
“What were you thinking?” demands Seonghwa, stopping his pacing. “Cursing someone? And in such a risky way!”
“You should’ve just punched him in the face,” says Hongjoong.
Without missing a beat Seonghwa turns his Look from Yeosang to his boyfriend. Hongjoong raises his hands and backs off. Yeosang kind of wishes he didn’t, because it brings the full force of Seonghwa’s disappointment back on him.
“He’s an innocent boy,” he says. “And you put a curse on him—”
“Yeosang says he can undo it,” says Wooyoung, cutting in. “So can’t you guys just do it and save San?”
“It’s not that easy,” says Seonghwa. He walks over to his impressive shelf of spellbooks (all meticulously divided by section, type and age) and pulls one out to leaf through the pages. “Heartneedle, right? It links curses to the target’s emotions. But it means the remedies are linked to their emotions too.”
“Yeah, Yeosang explained it,” says Wooyoung. “San’s gonna feel cold whenever he thinks about the person he likes.”
“And to lift the curse we need a hair from the person he likes,” says Seonghwa.
“That’s not that hard,” says Wooyoung. “It’s just a hair.”
“Yeah? And if the person he likes is Chris Evans?” demands Seonghwa. “You’re just going to fly over to America, knock on his door, and ask him can you have a strand of his hair please?”
“San doesn’t like Chris Evans,” says Wooyoung. He stops. “At least I don’t think he does.”
“Maybe he doesn’t like anybody,” says Yeosang hopefully. “Maybe the duration of the curse will pass and he’ll never even get a shiver.”
“How long will the spell take to wear off?” asks Hongjoong.
Yeosang unwillingly admits, “Three months.”
Hongjoong snort-cackles. “Good luck.”
Yeosang wants to collapse onto Seonghwa’s pristine coffee table. San probably likes Chris Evans. He probably thinks about him twenty times a day, which means he’s probably shivering right now, all because he was so concerned for Yeosang who likely walked into him—
“That’s not how the curse works,” says Seonghwa, flipping through the pages of the book in his hands. “You added blackwyrm, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” says Yeosang. “It was part of the base I modified.”
“Blackwyrm is a hook, Yeosang,” says Seonghwa. “It ensures the curse sinks in. It’ll modify the curse until it’s served its purpose.”
“What does that mean?” asks Wooyoung.
“It means the curse is going to keep evolving until it finds something to afflict San with,” says Seonghwa. “If he doesn’t like someone, it’ll hook to something. If it takes long, it might hook to many somethings. Meaning San might feel it every time he thinks about anything he likes—food, or hobbies, or anything at all. For three months.”
Yeosang did not know that. How can he have messed up so badly? He wants to tear all his hair out.
“We can’t let that happen!” cries Wooyoung. “How do we stop that?”
“If he likes someone, it’s easy enough,” says Seonghwa. “If not, we’ll have to rework the spell from the base. All the ingredients from the original curse, plus more.”
Yeosang curses. “I don’t have any more heartneedle,” he says. “Hyung, do you?”
“Not at the moment,” says Seonghwa. “I’ll have to talk to my supplier. In the meantime you should warn San.”
“Do we have to tell him?” asks Yeosang, already knowing the answer.
“You cursed him, Yeosang, the least you could do is give him a head’s up,” says Hongjoong.
Yeosang groans. He knows Hongjoong is right, and that might be the worst. He really doesn’t want San to know just how bad a witch he is. San always smiles so bright when he sees Yeosang, and now he’ll know Yeosang cursed him. He’ll probably never smile at him like that again.
“Make sure you do that,” says Seonghwa. “I will start preparing the antidote in case he does like someone, and Yeosang will gather the ingredients in case he doesn’t. Unless Yeosang is too busy trying to curse someone else?” He raises an eyebrow at him.
Seonghwa’s disappointment is easily the second worst thing about this whole mess. “No, hyung,” says Yeosang, like a scolded child.
“Great,” says Seonghwa. “With any luck, Choi San will be un-cursed soon.”
Yeosang falls back onto the sofa. He really hopes so.
It’s their usual café, the one Yeosang always goes to with Wooyoung, where all the furniture is too old to be in good condition but too new to be vintage. The whole place is a mix of different styles, nothing shiny or expensive, but it radiates an aura of warmth, giving off the feeling of home.
Yeosang wishes he was never born.
He sits, stiff-backed, at one side of the pretty pink table, hands in his lap. On the other side, hands around a cup of steaming latte and a smile on his face, is Choi San.
He looks so pretty. He’s wearing a soft, caramel brown sweater, resting nicely on his broad shoulders and hanging loose about his slender middle. His black hair is down, and Yeosang notices it’s getting a little long, the ends of his bangs falling into his eyes revealing he’s overdue for a trim. It’s charming on San. Everything is, if Yeosang thinks about it. San’s just a charming person.
Wooyoung is right. No one would want to curse San. Except Yeosang did.
“Sorry, I’m a little early,” he says. “Wooyoung will be here in a few.”
“That’s fine,” says Yeosang. I’m so sorry I cursed you instead of Wooyoung’s asshole ex. Please don’t be in love with Chris Evans.
“I’m kinda glad,” says San, with a secretive little smile. “We never get to hang out, just the two of us. Are you sure you don’t want a drink?”
“No, it’s okay,” says Yeosang. He doesn’t think he should have any caffeine with his nerves like this.
“I’ll get you a latte,” says San, and Yeosang protests but San flashes him that double dimple smile while he says it’s nothing, and that’s that.
With a fresh cup of hot coffee, Yeosang decides to go for it. “So,” he says slowly.
“So?” San has a smile on, waiting with full interest and attention.
The absolute honey way San looks at Yeosang (at anyone really—it’s how San is) makes things so much worse. “So,” says Yeosang again. “You know I’m a witch.”
“Yeah, I know,” says San. “It’s pretty cool.”
Pretty not cool, actually, but San would find that out soon.
Before Yeosang can break the news, Wooyoung strolls into the café, beaming like Yeosang isn’t under immense mental anguish. He waves at them and slides in next to San, smiling bright. “What are we talking about?” he asks.
“We were just talking about Yeosang and his witching,” says San.
Wooyoung exchanges a look with Yeosang, and Yeosang nods. He’s telling him.
Wooyoung nods, and then he asks brightly, “Did he tell you he cursed you?”
San’s eyes go round. Yeosang hisses a vicious curse under his breath and fights the urge to climb over the table and (rightfully) throttle Wooyoung.
“Um, no,” says San. “He—he did not tell me that.” He glances at Yeosang.
“It was an accident, so no big deal, right?” says Wooyoung. “Let’s get coffee. I want a mocha.”
San turns bewildered eyes from Wooyoung to Yeosang and back. “It kinda feels like a big deal,” he says. “If I’m cursed I’d say it’s a pretty big fucking deal.”
By now Wooyoung has moved onto more important things (getting a chocolate coffee) so it’s left to Yeosang to elaborate. “It’s a curse I was trying to set on someone else,” he says. “It fell on you when we bumped into each other at your university campus.” He squirms. “I’m very sorry.”
“What’s the curse?” asks San, eyes wide with worry. “Am I gonna, like, grow a third eye?”
“No, it’s not that serious,” says Yeosang quickly. “It just… is there someone you like?”
San stops. “Why?” he asks, like he’s being cornered.
“It’s related to that,” says Yeosang. He shifts. “For the next three months, when you… if there’s someone you like, when you think of him—or her, or—or them—when you think of that person, you’ll… feel… cold? But only for three months!”
San stares. He just looks at Yeosang, and blinks. Yeosang wonders if he did so bad at explaining that San didn’t understand, and is about to try again when San suddenly snaps out of it.
“Okay,” he says. “Got it.”
“Got it?” says Yeosang slowly. “So… is there anyone?”
For the first time he considers what San might say. He might say no. That, Yeosang thinks, would be the best. Until he remembers it’s a more complex reversal spell if there’s no one San likes. But it’s still the better option. Better than San saying he likes Chris Evans, or someone he actually knows and is close to, like—
“No,” says San.
Yeosang releases a breath and nods. “Okay.”
“So,” says San. “Everything’s okay, right? I don’t like anyone, so no cold. You don’t need to feel bad, Yeosang.” He smiles bright. “No harm done.”
He has no idea how wrong he is. Yeosang wants to dissolve like the sugar Wooyoung is carefully measuring out into his mocha. “No, San, much harm done,” he says. “Much, much harm.”
“I don’t understand,” says San.
“If we don’t remove it, you’re gonna freeze every time you think about any single thing you like,” says Wooyoung, deciding now is the perfect time to rejoin the conversation. “Thinking about music? Cold. Thinking about pizza? Cold. Thinking about me? Freezing cold.”
San looks at Yeosang. “Is that true?” he asks.
Unwillingly, Yeosang nods.
“How do we break it?” asks San. Now he’s taking things seriously.
“If you liked someone, I could’ve made a simple reversal potion with a strand of their hair,” says Yeosang.
“Well I don’t like anyone,” says San with an awkward little chuckle. “Any other way?”
“There’s another reversal spell,” says Yeosang. “It’s a little more complicated, and it’ll take longer, but it’ll work just as well.”
San has the gall to look guilty. “You really don’t need to go to extra trouble for me,” he says. “It’s just three months, right? I can live with it.” He smiles.
“Are you insane?” demands Yeosang. “I’m not going to let you do that!”
He must have said it more vehemently than he thought, because he finds Wooyoung is staring at him, eyes round. Yeosang looks away and pretends like nothing happened, face heating up.
“Um, okay,” says San. He quickly adds, “On one condition.”
“You’re giving me conditions? To un-curse you?” Yeosang can’t believe what he’s hearing.
“You let me help,” says San. “With everything. Anything you need to do for this spell, I’ll help you with.”
“You really don’t need to do that,” says Yeosang. He’s the one who cursed San, San didn’t owe him anything.
Like he can read his mind, San says, “You didn’t curse me on purpose, so it’s not your fault. It’s just… bad luck. Or fate or something.” He smiles, and this one is less sunshine bright and more gentle, sweet, understanding.
San really is too nice for his own good. “Or something,” mutters Yeosang to himself.
“So you shouldn’t feel bad,” says San. “Please let me help. I want to. I’ve never done witching stuff before.”
He looks so sweet, so sincere and eager, that before Yeosang knows what he’s doing he says, “Okay.”
San lights up. “Thank you!”
San, the innocent person cursed by Yeosang, is thanking him. It’s so patently ridiculous Yeosang laughs.
“It’s nothing,” he says, while San blinks at him in surprise. San relaxes and smiles, and the sight of him makes Yeosang relax a little too.
He hopes breaking the curse will go better than casting it.