Archive of Our Own

Magic had always had a distinct smell, for as long as Yunho could remember. It used to make his stomach churn with an anxiety that felt like the world was ending, smoldering metal and something strangely spicy signaling the notes of an omen. It meant demons were nearby, or at the very least that you were about to encounter someone you probably shouldn’t.  

Growing up in the church meant carrying a burden of fear that had been passed down for centuries, constantly spoon-fed stories of monsters that crawled their way out of hell and found a way to roam the earth. Yunho had been told stories of the Old World by his grandmother, often so magnificent in spirit but broken in constitution. It was a fantasy world, a fairytale that Yunho had never had any part of and knew he never would. 

“Mingi Song. Charged with unsafe practice of third degree necromancy without a Bishop’s Seal,” Wooyoung read aloud while flipping through the pages of his file as if it would say anything they didn’t already know. “He got messy while trying to free the hordes in the Southwest and got himself trapped in a salt spell.” 

There was nothing but a two-way mirror separating Yunho from the very creature he had been chasing for years of his career, arms scrawled with dark ink as he sat in a metal chair with iron cuffs around his wrists. The mirror was old and scratched, just like the rest of the crumbling cathedral they operated out of. Mingi didn’t look so good himself, his leather jacket torn open to show nothing underneath, and his leather pants were singed all along the bottom hem. 

If Yunho hadn’t watched San’s team drag him in themselves, he would have assumed that the bastard crawled his way directly out of hell just to be here. This was a monumental occasion, after all. Mostly for Yunho. 

“Did he manage to free any of the hordes?” Yunho asked while adjusting his vest, the metal of his artificial claws clinking as he did. “He’ll be free of those charges before the sun rises. There are never any magic signatures.” 

And Mingi had never been caught. There had been plenty attempts, nearly 4 years of a never ending cat and mouse in which Yunho was often left as the severely pissed off tomcat without a meal. Mingi sold his soul—or put it on loan, as members of the Children of Moloch were known to do—and was therefore beyond Yunho’s jurisdiction.  

It was a loophole that should have been enough to anger God Himself, because the Bishop’s Order could only do dealings with souls, or a complete lack thereof. When a mortal bargained their soul and allowed it to be held by a demon, they weren’t considered human or demon, but something incomplete and in between. Something blasphemous.  

“Guess I could at least annoy the son of a bitch enough to make him be more careful,” Yunho grumbled while rolling the beads of his rosary up and down the length of his forearm, the soft wood making pretty sounds as it was met with cold metal. 

Mingi’s fingers had been morphed with claws to allow him to do necromancy, another distinct sign of a bargained soul. Blood magic was only allowed through the church and required extensive training, to which Yunho was the most skilled in his entire department. Being in possession of the silver claws was a calling card, a warning to others that Yunho had every right and every capability to expel monsters from the earth.  

Things would probably be easier if Mingi had simply corrupted his soul to the point of complete disintegration, because at least then Yunho wouldn’t look at him and see the face of a man who should have  known better.  

“I’m going in.” 

Something mocking and teetering on the line of insulting buzzed from Wooyoung’s chest, an amused snort making itself known to further relay to Yunho that he was in way over his head. 

“I’m sure you are,” Wooyoung quipped in return, but Yunho ignored him. He also ignored the shit eating grin that pulled up Wooyoung’s cheeks as he snatched the file away.  

It was one steel door to push open, and then Yunho smelled it: the unmistakable itch of magic right under his nose. Demon magic and human magic smelled a bit different to Mingi’s vaguest credit, the typically stomach-churning acridness of it only mildly upsetting Yunho’s nervous system. Demons smelled foul, rancid, but Mingi just smelled wrong, that spicy scent almost resembling an old incense left to burn for too long.  

“Mingi,” Yunho said while approaching the metal table and finding his own seat, keeping his features steady when their eyes met with an ease that should have been unsettling. “Finally, you’ve found the time to visit me at work.” 

A humorless laugh puffed out of Mingi’s nose like a tired dragon, his white-blonde hair contrasting the reddish hue of scars littering tanned skin. Various marks painted his arms that were visible thanks to the rolled-up sleeves, disappearing just long enough for them to bleed onto his chest as well. Yunho recognized most of them, demon scripture that would glow if the right words were chanted into the air, marking Mingi as owned and effectively off limits. 

It pissed Yunho off beyond comprehension that Mingi was untouchable, and he felt the muscle in his cheek jump when a smirk bloomed on Mingi’s full lips.  

“Jeong, how many more times do I have to tell you to stop calling?” Mingi chided like he was dealing with some schoolyard bully, hands loosely threaded together on the table in front of him. “It’s getting a bit pathetic, you know. Obsession isn’t healthy.” 

And this was partly why their meetings never went anywhere. Mingi was completely unserious, the antithesis of reasonable and any other number of things that would describe somebody that Yunho couldn’t like on principle. There were other soul-bargainers, there always was, but none of them got under Yunho’s skin quite like Mingi did. Yunho assumed that none ever would again.  

“Why were you trying to free the hordes?”  Yunho asked, glancing down at Mingi’s bare file before flipping it shut in further annoyance. There was nothing to go off of.  

“They wanted to go home.” Mingi shrugged, his smirk shifting to something a bit more genuine. 

If that was possible.  

“Isn’t hell crowded?”  

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Mingi shot back with his entire body rearing forward, the force of it making the table scrape against the floor. Yunho had no trouble maintaining his composure, but Mingi showed teeth nonetheless, smug even in chains. “Maybe we can visit together and call it a first date.” 

This was why being near Mingi never went anywhere. He had convinced himself somewhere in their back and forth that this was an opportunity to flirt, either to throw Yunho off or make him angry. It never really worked either way, just contributed to the overall annoyance that Yunho felt about him. Maybe that was the goal too.  

“Just tell me what you were doing there, and maybe we skip the time-wasting bullshit.” Yunho sighed, already regretting letting San bring Mingi there at all. Years of chasing someone could only result in a strangely intimate understanding of their patterns, and Mingi was transparent on top of it all. 

“Isn’t breaking protocol a sin to you people?” Mingi asked while slumping back in his chair once more, the clank of the iron chains around his wrists echoing off the metal table. “If not, you definitely smell like sin. Did you know that?” 

That same damned smirk sharpened Mingi’s features, turning him all at once into the one thing that Yunho hated—the one thing that Yunho needed to wring through his bare hands until it bled. Being with Mingi ignited the worst in him, because he was a person that could have been no different than himself, or Wooyoung, or San. Mingi chose this life, and Yunho hated it. He hated it more than he knew what to do with. 

“So, tell me, Jeong. What has your little human heart beating so fast?” 

Yunho’s eyes flitted up from where he’d been staring at Mingi’s hands, his ash-tipped fingers and sharpened claws melting so seamlessly into the black markings. There were a lot of things on Yunho’s mind, things that could constitute as sin and also righteousness. A part of him wanted to lunge across the table and gouge Mingi’s eyes out, but another part of him felt inclined to simply… wait. What about Mingi Song drove Yunho so mad? Would he figure it out if he stared long enough? 

“You’re human too, you know. Just because you like to play demon house doesn’t mean you’re part of the family,” Yunho replied through the haze still blanketing his decision making, eyes sharpening to focus away from the open slit of Mingi’s leather jacket. 

“And that keeps you up at night, doesn’t it?” Mingi taunted with his hair falling into his eyes, black irises flexing like an animal. “It eats you up from the inside out like a goddamn parasite that I’m untouchable to you. You spout your holy crap but you blaspheme your blood just as I do. We’re the same, Jeong.” 

Those words bludgeoned Yunho right in his chest, shattering bone and dislodging cartilage that pierced his lungs. The sensation of blood pooling in his most vulnerable places made something in Yunho snap, his composure waning like a moon receding for the sun. 

“You and I are nothing to each other. I sacrifice in the name of the lord. You answer to the child eater,” Yunho gruffed, digging the tip of one clawed finger into the thick material of his leg holster. It cut right through to his slacks beneath, but Yunho didn’t grimace when the point pierced his skin, the pain somehow numbing to whatever rage that was accumulating inside of him. 

Mingi appeared to be quite aware of just how much this conversation was affecting Yunho, his entire aura oozing with cockiness and pride. Access to blood magic meant an automatic connection to whoever else may be conversing with the dead, and Yunho felt Mingi in his bones. A graft that Yunho’s body refused to reject. 

“It was your people who wrote the bible, and still, you believe that men can make no mistakes?” 

“You are a man!” Yunho shouted while rising from his chair, the sharp sound of metal scraping concrete making his ears want to bleed. Despite believing himself to be calm until that very moment, Yunho was acutely aware of just how much his jaw ached, and he stumbled back in belated horror. Away from Mingi. “You are made of flesh and blood, and I will stop you.” 

The display only seemed to delight Mingi more, his perfectly white teeth catching the overhead light. There was a symbol etched into one of his canines, Yunho couldn’t tell what it was, but it made his smile that much more unbearable.  

“How? Tell me exactly. I’ll need some new inappropriate touching material to use while I’m stuck in my cell,” Mingi crooned like he was sure that he’d struck a nerve, sharp eyes relaxing just enough to relieve his face of that piercing look. 

In a blink, Mingi was a man again, too soft and too breakable to be a monster. Too human to be the demon that Yunho so desperately needed him to be. 

“We’re done here.” 

Yunho ignored the chair that had been knocked several feet away, taking a few pointed steps back before turning on his heels with only a mild second thought. He knew he’d made a fool of himself, showed vulnerability when he was meant to be the one chipping away at weak spots. Four years was an awfully long time, but Yunho needed more hours, and he wasn’t going to let the few he had go to waste. 

“For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.” 

The last words that Mingi uttered were cut off with a slam of the interrogation room door, warm air hitting Yunho’s cheeks that were already flushed with his anger. Demons and their dogs didn’t like the cold, so interrogation rooms and prison cells were kept cold to keep them weak. It often had a double effect of keeping a human levelheaded, but Yunho felt like he’d run a fever and simultaneously contracted the chills. 

“Damn,” Wooyoung said with a low whistle, Yunho looking over to see his friend standing where he’d left him, arms crossed against his chest. “He really knows how to rile you up, Yunho.” 

“He didn’t rile anything,” Yunho bit back, rolling his shoulders to loosen some of his strained muscles. He was angry, and had the right to be, but he wasn’t ruffled. Mingi wasn’t allowed to have that power over him. “Lock him back up. Solitary minimum. I don’t need him interacting with any low-level guards with weak wills, got it?” 

Yunho tossed the file back into Wooyoung’s hands, not waiting for him to be ready and feeling a little bit better after watching him drop it nearly three different times. It wasn’t unlike Yunho to be a little teasing, but the satisfaction he got from being mean felt very different after being steamrolled in his own interrogation, and the prickle of pleasure found root somewhere deep inside of him before he could stop it. 

“Uh, sure, but you’re not just asking for minimum because you’re going to try and do something stupid, are you?” Wooyoung called after him, making Yunho pause just long enough to turn and face him, incredulous. 

“When have you ever known me to be that fucking reckless?” He shot back, feeling the force of anger and frustration as it fought to free itself from wherever Yunho kept it hidden.  

“Yunho, you go to confession more than anyone I have ever met,” Wooyoung replied with calculated softness, the cadence forcing a stabbing image of Mingi to the surface of Yunho’s mind. 

These were feelings that Yunho had been told were best left in prayers and confessional boxes, even if they haunted him no matter where he went. It wasn’t just Mingi, and it wasn’t the fact that he’d felt a little shame for having lost—again. Yunho knew, and had always known, that something inside of him was a little bit wrong. A little bit off balance. It made itself known when he was in over his head or greedily biting off more than he could chew. 

Yunho knew himself, and the accusation only made him so angry because he knew that lying to Wooyoung would not make it easier to lie to himself. 

“Whether you acknowledge it is your business, but nobody has that many sins to confess without doing something to warrant being cleansed.” 

A solid clap of Wooyoung’s hand on Yunho’s shoulder signaled the end of the conversation, and Yunho couldn’t bring himself to be mad about the fact that he didn’t get the last word in. What could he have said that wasn’t a sin in itself?  

♰ 

The only difference between minimum and maximum security was the presence of guards. All the magic wards and cells were the same, with the same chains jutting out of the walls and slots for food to go through. Mingi Song was the only resident in minimum security despite the rows of empty cells, and Yunho had made explicitly sure of it. 

One thing about the Old World was that there were eyes everywhere, on everyone. Yunho’s grandmother used to talk of these great eyes attached to buildings and connected to communication devices people kept in their pockets, making it nearly impossible to commit harmful acts without reaping any consequences. As a child, Yunho had always been envious of that world, because he believed that God could somehow be eased of so much sin if man were also helping to right it. He was the only great eye in the sky these days, but the Bishop’s Order was on the ground, and Yunho felt like inciting justice. 

“I can smell you, Jeong,” Mingi called through the food slot in his cell, his clawed hand poking out while lazily waving back and forth, as if he was feeling the breeze through a window. “Was this really your plan all along? Get me alone so that you could finally scratch that itch that bothers you so much?” 

Yunho stepped over rubble that crumpled beneath his feet, the old walls of the prison cells refracting each echoed sound of his boots. It was far too quiet in there, so quiet that Yunho could hear the rodents scurrying somewhere further down. Mingi was the only other being in here, and Yunho paused right at his cell, catching a glimpse of his eyes through the small glass window just above the food slot.  

“How many times do I have to tell you that you mean nothing to me?” Yunho prodded while tucking his hands into his pockets, the clink of his metal claws catching Mingi’s attention for just a moment.  

“Then why are you here? Do you even know?” Mingi asked while looking back up at Yunho, away from his body and right into his soul. 

Yunho swallowed down whatever nerves he had been feeling, because Mingi would be able to smell them right away. If he wanted to do this—if he really wanted to be free—then he needed to be strong.  

“It is my job to protect people. You make that job difficult, and therefore need to be removed.” 

Mingi raised an eyebrow at Yunho’s words, head tilted so condescendingly that Yunho wanted to rip it off. One slice through sinew and a few gnaws of his teeth and Mingi’s head would roll away, his soul lost forever with no way of being returned.  

“You can’t exorcise me, Jeong. I’m not a demon,” Mingi replied lazily, retreating his arm from the opening to meander back into his cell, the scrape of chains against the concrete following him as he went.  

“No,” Yunho agreed while placing his palm on the lock to the cell, popping it open with nothing more than a bit of magical energy. “But you still bleed like a man.” 

Yunho entered the cell without worry that Mingi would try to escape. He was already a free man, and Yunho would have to let him go at sunrise, just as he said. There were only so many things that the Bishop’s Order could do to people whose souls could not be punished. It felt futile and ridiculous, because Yunho could think of many punishments to inflict upon Mingi. He already had something specific in mind.  

But the problem lay there that soul-bargainers did not care. They relished in pain and punishment or else they wouldn’t have relinquished their souls to a master at all. The only time Yunho had ever violently put his hands on Mingi, the demon dog moaned and tackled him to the ground like a humping retriever.  

There was no punishment when the punishment was the reward, so the Bishop’s gave up, and Yunho was cursed with an enemy who had every means of hurting him.  

“Are you going to kill me? I knew you were sick in the head, but I have to say, I’m impressed,” Mingi said as he watched Yunho shut the cell door once more, the distinct lock making them both tense imperceptibly.  

It was nothing more than a shift in the air, but they both felt it, and Yunho wondered if this is what an archaic God felt like.  

“I don’t plan on killing you.” 

Yunho sauntered further into the room, hands still in his pockets and rosary swaying around his neck. He could feel Mingi’s eyes boring holes into him as he moved about the cell, stopping only when Mingi’s bare feet were in line with the steel toe of his boots.  

“Then what are you planning? Enough with the cryptic messages and spit it out,” Mingi blurted as if he was finally frustrated, eyes looking up through dark lashes from where he sat on the stone bench. 

Yunho towered over him like this, and it felt like justice. It felt terribly right. 

“You offered your soul up as a bargaining chip to do dealings with demons. You claim them as your family because they own you, and you are nothing more than a vessel for hell,” Yunho said while sliding his hands free of his pockets, taking the moment to unbutton his wrist cuffs and roll up his shirt sleeves. “Your soul is in limbo, but it can be taken back. It can belong to someone else.” 

The first glimpse of true and honest fear flashed across Mingi’s semblance, fleeting not a moment later to return him to his hardened indifference. There was a tense set of muscles all around Mingi’s mouth, giving away the fact that he was not ignorant in the slightest, and understood all too well what Yunho was alluding to. 

“You believe yourself so above heaven and hell that Moloch would hear to you? You can’t return my soul to me if I am unwilling, I had offered it and intend for it to stay locked away,” Mingi said while moving as if he intended to stand, stopping the very moment that their eyes connected once more. 

Even that small display of surrender was enough to convince Yunho that he was doing the right thing, and he tried to tamper down the bloodthirsty excitement that roared to life like a forest fire deep in his belly. 

“I don’t intend to return it to you,” Yunho chided, feeling his own impatience as it bubbled to the surface, effectively displacing his rage. “You have shown yourself to be unfit and irresponsible with your own God-given gift of life. If you wish to be owned—if you wish to be led around by a leash for the remainder of your days—then it will not be in the hands of any demon. It will be in mine.” 

Something like horror bled into Mingi’s gaze, his throat bobbing as he presumably attempted to swallow it down. Beyond his dislike of Mingi, Yunho understood him in ways that should have felt invasive, because he watched each of Mingi’s emotions move through his body and felt them through his own. He knew who Mingi had been before, had read the bare bones file over so many times that the paper wore down on the edges. 

Mingi was born alone and found by a cult of Moloch worshippers. A baby given to the child eaters should have been a sacrifice, but he was saved for reasons unknown and raised in the cult’s image. Yunho understood him because his upbringing was a direct mirror, both growing parallel to each other in an unstable world. It was inevitable that they should have crossed paths when things were thrown off balance, but Yunho had never felt closer to Mingi than now, and it prickled his already nervous atoms angrily. 

“What?” Mingi huffed, disbelief coloring his deep voice. “That’s illegal. You can’t own someone’s soul in the church.” 

“But you exist outside of the law by your own volition and had effectively removed yourself from any protections the Bishop’s Order may have given you before,” Yunho shot back none too gently, already meeting the end of his rope as the seconds ticked down to what he had planned. “I have every right to practice blood magic and to do so within the thinnest stretch of what I deem necessary, and I do deem this very necessary.” 

Mingi stood then, stance wavering but eyes bleeding with fire. He looked like everything that Yunho wanted to destroy, everything he aimed to understand, and it was far too addicting to watch him crumble. 

“You’re more delusional than I originally thought if you really believe that Moloch will hand me over. Or that he’d answer to you at all,” Mingi bit out, anger turning him into the creature that Yunho desired to witness.  

It was Yunho’s turn to be prideful and condescending, his head tilting with a slight bare of his teeth to mock Mingi’s earlier confidence. There was barely any light in the cell, only what glowed through the slats from the window that looked out to the moon, and whatever bled in from the hallway. Mingi was bathed in shadows that turned him into nothing but harsh lines and expanses of skin that didn’t melt into the darkness, so Yunho assumed he looked about the same. 

“Am I?” Yunho asked, taking a singular step forward into Mingi’s space. “Then why do you look so afraid?” 

Something in Mingi splintered before he roared back to life, his chains rattling as he pushed right up against Yunho. Iron kept him from being able to use magic, but Mingi was still a strong man, broader than Yunho if he was looking into technicalities. If things got physical, it would have stood to reason that Mingi could hold his own despite Yunho being lethally trained. 

It wouldn’t come to that though, because much like Yunho understood Mingi’s power, he also knew his weaknesses. 

“I am not and have never been afraid of you, Yunho Jeong. I don’t intend to start now,” Mingi said through gritted teeth, his eyes suddenly bloodshot and pulsing. The hold of a demon inside of him was fighting back, probably even against his will, and Yunho delighted in the fact that he was powerless despite it all. 

“That’s a pity. I was hoping we could make this easier.” 

“Why would I make anything easier for you?” 

Mingi’s bare chest was pressing into Yunho’s, his overheated skin practically burning Yunho through the fabric of both his vest and his buttoned shirt. It ignited something primal in Yunho, being so close to skin on skin but stopped by nothing but some thread. 

The smell of burning stole Yunho’s attention as he looked down to see Mingi’s skin smoking, the beads of Yunho’s rosary melting into the black ink and scars that littered his chest. Mingi was not a demon, but he could still be hurt like one, and Yunho’s head tilted back with a sickly satisfied laugh. 

“Oh, not for me. For you ,” Yunho said as his hands came up to grip Mingi’s arms, keeping him trapped right up against the rosary. Mingi’s eyes twitched with pain, but he didn’t cry out, and Yunho knew he had to discover what he sounded like when he did. “You see, Mingi, I don’t need to ask for Moloch’s permission to steal your soul. Because you are going to give it to me willingly.” 

Mingi’s chest rattled with the barest display of a laugh, his head lulling to the side with a groan as Yunho forcefully pushed him back. The rosary made a sticky sound as it dislodged itself from Mingi’s flesh, and Yunho spared a glance down to see his shirt stained with his blood. 

“Now I know you’ve lost it. There is nothing you could do to me that would make me hand it over like it’s nothing,” Mingi said with a slight breathlessness in his voice, eyes glazed over with a look that Yunho knew all too well. “You’ll have to kill me.” 

“Then we shouldn’t waste any time, should we?”  

Yunho took a step back, away from Mingi. He held up his hand that was adorned with the silver claw and watched as it caught the overhead moonlight. This had been his plan for weeks—months—days upon days stacked on top of each other where Yunho was haunted by Mingi in dream and on the streets. Everywhere Yunho looked, or during any spell he cast, or any alley he traversed down, he wondered if Mingi would have been close by. A part of Yunho wanted Mingi to be as obsessed with solving matters between them as he was, but it was okay if he wasn’t, because Yunho was determined to see it through, nonetheless. 

“Be careful, Yunho.” Mingi leveled his gaze from his spot on the stone bench, the rumble of his name sending sweltering waves down Yunho’s spine. “You might do something you regret.” 

Yunho brought the sharp point of one claw to the inside of his left forearm, holding Mingi’s gaze as he slowly and deliberately sliced through the skin. It was just deep enough to have the blood drip out and onto the floor without reaching muscle, and Yunho felt himself grin as Mingi struggled to decide where to look. 

“That’s the big secret about faith, my little hellhound,” Yunho muttered as he took a step closer, reaching out for the collar of Mingi’s jacket to force him back to his feet. “You can repent, and you can beg for forgiveness, but you can never absolve yourself of guilt.”  

Mingi grunted as Yunho shoved him down onto the stone table by the window, the grip on his neck bringing with it droplets of Mingi’s blood that spilled down his throat. Yunho’s own blood was staining Mingi’s leather jacket as he fought against the hold Yunho had on him, but he couldn’t resist him and the chains, and Yunho kicked his legs apart to keep him just a bit more at his mercy.  

“Jeong— Yunho!” Mingi shouted, the rattle of iron only spurring Yunho on more. 

Keeping Mingi pinned was the easy part, Yunho tugging his leather jacket down to use as a makeshift restraint, holding Mingi’s arms behind his back. He rattled with his anger, trying and failing to kick back at Yunho like some frightened mare. Yunho watched as the muscles on Mingi’s back flexed with his struggle, but it went nowhere, and Yunho bunched up the extra fabric with the hand still coated in his own blood.  

“You know, I actually doubted myself for a moment there,” Yunho muttered with the slightest tremble to his voice, Mingi not letting up with his attempts at escaping. “I was so worried about big strong Mingi, son of Moloch who slipped through my fingers for four fucking years.” 

Something resembling a bastardized laugh broke free from Mingi’s chest, the sound morphing into a scream as he effectively lost some of the fight in him. If Yunho was honest, he was a bit disappointed, but he knew things weren’t over just yet.  

“It’ll never w—work, Yunho. I like pain, remember? You can’t torture me,” Mingi spat while trying to look back at Yunho, growling in pure annoyance when Yunho shoved his head back down into the concrete.  

“No, I can’t torture you with pain,” Yunho agreed, tucking himself in closer until his hips were flush with Mingi’s leather-clad ass. He was definitely… well, he was hot, and Yunho felt something flicker to life inside of him upon allowing himself to realize that. “But I can make you beg. I can make you wish to never be free of me.” 

“Thats a bit egotistical, don’t you think?” Mingi returned without much bite left in him, his body almost imperceptibly pressing back into Yunho’s hips, as if mindlessly seeking him out. 

Four years was too long, not nearly long enough, and Yunho was not a blind fool. He knew exactly what Mingi had wanted from him, and Yunho would be a sinner if he lied about how he felt on the matter, because he wanted Mingi too. Beyond justice or spiritual righteousness, Yunho desired Mingi in a carnal and inhuman way, his baser instincts guiding him through when all humanity inside of him felt so very lost.  

“Then perhaps we should make a wager.” 

Yunho shifted his hold just enough to keep his right hand free, the usually shiny metal claws adorning his pointer and middle finger stained with his own blood. The soft pad of Yunho’s thumb swiped through his slowly drying blood, right over the coagulating wound, and came down to draw a symbol over the black markings that covered Mingi’s back.  

“You like to be controlled, Mingi. You don’t want to think… don’t want to have to face the world that has abandoned you,” Yunho said while meticulously painting Mingi in his own blood, relishing in each twitch of his muscles that gave him away far too easily. “If I can make you beg for mercy, then your soul is rightfully mine. Moloch will have no choice but to relinquish you to me.” 

“Fuck you.” 

“The idea is that I’ll be fucking you, actually,” Yunho corrected with a smile curling his lips, leaning down just enough for his warm breath to ruffle Mingi’s white hair that whisped down his nape. “Cmon, I know you want it. I know you’ve always wanted it. Just say yes.” 

Mingi struggled pathetically once more with nothing to show for it but a clinking of chains, forcing Yunho to feel just the smallest bit of pity for him. This was probably not how Mingi had anticipated this inevitable convergence to go between them, after all, but Yunho couldn’t have imagined it better. 

“I’ll kill you for this, Yunho. I’ll wear your insides like a fucking trophy,” Mingi prattled out while sinking down onto the stone table, the symbol on his back turning matte as it dried on his tanned skin. “Yes.”

Demons were much simpler than most people would think, and easily destroyed if you knew their weaknesses. Yunho felt the soul crushing weight of what this meant for the both of them, because Moloch must have known his name by then, and he would never forget the name of the human who outsmarted him. Would all of this really be worth it in the end? Or would Yunho come to live with the ghost of regret Mingi had warned him about before? 

Somehow, the answers to those questions mattered so little to Yunho, his senses coming alive with newfound permission to do as he pleased. There were so many things he had wanted from Mingi—sick, filthy, awful things—and it was finally his moment to reap the seeds he had sown. 

“On your knees,” Yunho ordered while actively dragging Mingi off the uncomfortable stone, relishing in the slightly pleased hum that left him when his knees met even more concrete. “I assume you know how to use that mouth you love to run so much.” 

A snarl that sounded purely animalistic but was all for show accompanied Mingi’s wolfish smile as he looked up at Yunho, his skin flushing red with too much heat. Whether the heat was from demonic retaliation or Mingi’s excitement, Yunho decided that he liked the deep color of his cheeks regardless.  

“Don’t forget that I have teeth.” 

Yunho couldn’t stifle the laugh that surfaced at Mingi’s threat, seeing very vividly just how weak Mingi truly was. He liked being led around and needed someone to control him, no matter how big and tough and scary he pretended to be for the average onlooker. Even now he was trying to fight, but his eyes lacked fire, and Yunho smelled his lust on him like a potent perfume.  

“I think you literally eating my cock would tether you to me faster than any demon deal,” Yunho said while threading his blood-soaked fingers in Mingi’s hair, effectively ruining the effect of pure white. “Don’t forget the kind of magic we share.” 

Mingi grimaced, but then he smiled again, yielding. “You’re sicker than I thought, Jeong.” 

Yunho’s free hand was deft as he pulled open his belt and unzipped his slacks. The soft fabric of his briefs was all too easily pushed down for him to pull out his cock, the length of it bobbing up into the air between them and making Yunho hiss with newfound sensitivity. It had been a while since he had touched anyone, let alone allowed anyone to touch him, but this was an inevitable conclusion that couldn’t be passed up.  

Yunho was a sinner, and a liar, and he was sick in ways beyond human comprehension. A lifetime raised in the church made him greedy and ungrateful—more terrified of how much he was unafraid of the demons than of the actual evil itself. He was not good at his job because he was so holy and altruistic, but because he was dangerous, and Yunho felt power flow through his veins like electricity. 

“Shut up, and suck.” 

The grip Yunho had in Mingi’s hair tightened, Yunho using his leverage to guide an only mildly annoyed Mingi closer to his cock. Despite the way Mingi squirmed as if he intended to escape, his lips parted easily, tongue lulling out to cradle the leaking tip.  

Yunho hissed with their first contact, unsure where his own confidence stemmed from when not even Mingi seemed sure. They were designed to destroy each other, quite literally bred to drive each other to insanity, but Yunho looked into Mingi’s hooded eyes and saw nothing but lethal curiosity. 

It was sweeter when Mingi hummed, eyes fluttering for a brief moment of weakness as his lips wrapped around the head. Yunho had done this once before—given a blowjob—and he knew the salty taste wasn’t all that good. Mingi  groaned as if he disagreed though, and the vibrations sent a shiver all the way down to Yunho’s toes in his boots. 

“You look good like this,” Yunho said with a tightness in his voice, fingers aching with how harshly he was holding Mingi’s gritty hair. He was absolutely filthy, still singed and dirty and covered in Yunho’s blood. “So pliant for me.” 

At the comment, Mingi’s gaze sharpened, his chains rattling as he tried to bring his arms back around. The leather jacket was still pulled down over his wrists behind him, making him effectively immobile, and undeniably vulnerable. No magic, no hands, just whatever Yunho decided to give him. So much power could probably scare away a weaker man, but Yunho knew who he was, and he knew Mingi. 

“Don’t die on me, alright?” Yunho chided before starting a slow rhythm with his hips, thrusting in and out of Mingi’s warm and wet mouth. 

Yunho knew he wasn’t exactly the most average guy, the sight of barely half of his cock disappearing past Mingi’s pink and full lips igniting something so familiar yet foreign inside of him. It wasn’t hard to guess that Yunho was enjoying degrading Mingi in this way, slick sounds of Mingi swallowing around his cock with each slightly deeper thrust echoing off the stone walls. 

This cathedral used to hold mass right above their heads, with hundreds of people gathering to beg for forgiveness and pray for a better tomorrow. Even before the demons came, the world had fallen beyond disrepair. People were starving, children were dying faster than they could be born, and resources had stopped replenishing. Amongst all the suffering, there was still worship, and there were still songs to be sung. 

Yunho wondered if any of it really mattered in the end, or in what ways those cries for help meant more than his own. The tight, brutal heat of Mingi’s mouth stole the edges of Yunho’s sanity, placing him somewhere between dream and reality. He didn’t want to believe that what he was doing was wrong or right, selfish or just. For once in Yunho’s life, he felt the need to push aside whatever end goal he had been running towards in favor of savoring what was happening right in front of him. 

Mingi’s chin was beginning to glisten with drool, his lips stretched thin and throat bulging as Yunho fucked in and out of his mouth without grace. Each time he thrusted in, Mingi groaned until he couldn’t anymore, his chained hands squirming behind him with a desperation that made Yunho want to scream. The sight was incredible, melting with how it felt to have Mingi so submissive below him, each drag of his plush tongue shooting reckless sparks all along Yunho’s skin that threatened to stoke a fire.  

“Fuck, Mingi—” Yunho grunted, adjusting his grip in Mingi’s hair to tilt his head back as he continued his torture. Mingi already looked dazed, eyes teary but overall content, and Yunho knew this wasn’t nearly enough. “Since you’re being so good, what do you say we keep going?” 

It wasn’t really a question, Yunho ignoring the way Mingi whined in protest as he pulled his cock out of Mingi’s throat with a complete lack of care. It felt wrong in the best kind of way to watch as Mingi collapsed down onto his knees, coughing and sputtering with a rattle in his chest now that he was finally free. Not once during the blowjob would Yunho have been able to guess that he was inconveniencing the pleased little hellhound, but his wet cheeks gave him away like a comical x right on Mingi’s forehead. 

“Up.” 

It shouldn’t have been so surprising that Mingi resisted the command, even with drool dripping down his throat that moved with what looked like painful swallows. Despite not giving much of a reaction during, Mingi looked more used up than Yunho had anticipated, and the look felt… satisfying. It felt fucking good. 

“Need some help?” Yunho asked while bringing down one steel-toed boot onto the obvious bulge in Mingi’s pants, making him wince with a pretty sigh as he rutted up against the friction. He was a sight to see, always was, and Yunho couldn’t pinpoint when he had started seeing Mingi exactly as he did then. “So pathetic.” 

Maybe that was Yunho’s big secret, the one hidden beneath a layer of accumulated sins. Their circumstances had never really been about handing out justice, or even attempting to do the right thing. If Yunho was banking on getting away with being just a little misguided, then he was deeper in his own delusion than he had originally thought. Never had Yunho thought of Mingi as  pretty, but maybe he had, and he only now found a dark enough home to admit it to himself. 

Yunho tapped Mingi’s trapped cock only once before forcing him to his feet by his hair again, bringing them face to face with one dooming clatter of iron. Mingi made a sound like a kicked puppy, roughened by his overused and deep voice, and it made Yunho’s stomach swoop as if he was falling from the sky. 

“Acting cute won’t save you now, you know,” Yunho muttered while bringing Mingi down into his neck, inhaling the spicy scent that lingered in his hair and just below his ear. Something about Mingi’s magic had never smelled bad to Yunho, even if it signaled all the same alarm bells. “We’re only getting started.” 

A weak huff that Yunho assumed was meant to be a laugh buzzed from Mingi’s chest right against his own, making Yunho very aware of just how warm he was. There was a soft press of lips to the side of Yunho’s throat, then a nip of teeth that barely stung, and Yunho hoped that Mingi couldn’t hear his heartbeat jump from something so inconsequential. 

“So, you think I’m cute?” Mingi drawled as he drew his head back with a lazy smile, chest rising and falling slowly but catching Yunho’s eye, nonetheless.  

In fact, if Yunho was truly honest with himself, everything about Mingi caught his eye. There was nothing about him that didn’t call out to Yunho at the worst of times, making him feel haunted or insane for not being able let sleeping dogs lie. Yunho knew he could be digging himself into a deeper hole with this poor fantasy of his, but it still felt right, and Yunho ignored the excited thrum in his ribcage as he flipped Mingi around once more, shoving him back down onto the stone table. 

“I think you want to be cute,” Yunho finally replied, one claw-tipped finger coming down to slice open the back of Mingi’s pants. The sound of fabric ripping must have startled Mingi, because he made an attempt to get up again, only to be gripped by the back of his bloodied neck with a vengeance that Yunho didn’t know he had in him. “But  do not think it is doing you any favors. You will still obey me.” 

A garbled moan echoed off the table and onto the walls from where Mingi’s cheek was pressed into stone, his entire body shuddering as if Yunho’s words alone were enough to send him tipping over the edge. It surprised Yunho at first, but he recovered, releasing Mingi with a teasing tap to his cheek before focusing on pushing his ruined leather pants out of the way.  

The dark ink of tattoos and demon marks alike disappeared down the backs of Mingi’s thighs, intricate patterns interwoven with tanned skin that twitched when Yunho brought his bare fingers down to trace them. The part of Yunho that controlled most of this interaction suddenly whispered to him to cut Mingi open like this, to trace through the ink with his sharp claw and leave him ruined before they’d even begun. 

Yunho quieted that voice, because he’d already had a plan and wasn’t intending to stray so far from his end goal just yet. To have Mingi like this… so weak and simultaneously teeming with possibility, it felt like a drug. Yunho felt as if he was being injected with toxins that were boiling his veins from the inside out, casting Mingi in a hazy yellow glow all around. 

“So gorgeous…” Yunho muttered under his breath, slipping his rosary off from around his neck and wrapping it around his hand not already adorned in metal.  

The sound of the wooden beads made Mingi tense, but it almost seemed as if his ass rose higher in the air, body preparing for something it already knew it wanted. Yunho could think of many things to do to Mingi with the flesh-melting prayer beads, but it wasn’t time just yet.  

“This is your punishment, you know,” Yunho called as he dropped down to his knees behind Mingi, taking in the sight of his pinkish-brown hole and the soft skin of his perineum that stretched down and over his balls. Mingi’s cock hung heavy and hard between his legs thanks to his leather pants being destroyed, and Yunho faltered just long enough for it to be obvious.  

“Like what you see?” Mingi said with another small shift, just enough to make his ass jiggle. He was all muscle, but still so fucking round looking, and Yunho’s mouth watered with guilt. “This doesn’t really feel like punish—ment!”  

A sharp cry escaped from Mingi’s throat with a resounding smack filling their ears, Yunho’s palm tingling as he watched blood pool from the two new cuts that bloomed on Mingi’s right cheek. Bright crimson droplets dripped down the swell of his ass to his thighs, and Yunho couldn’t help but lean forward to lick the trails clean.  

“Even your blood tastes different,” Yunho said with a groan lacing his words, lapping up Mingi’s wounds until his tongue was leaving streaks of red.  

It almost tasted sweet, truly and honestly, and that intoxicated feeling drove Yunho to do something he had never done—had never imagined he’d ever do. It was automatic the way Yunho dragged his tongue in, in, in, moaning deep in his chest when he licked over the soft pucker of Mingi’s hole. Mingi’s skin didn’t taste like his blood, it was salty and distinctly human, but Yunho liked it just as much.  

“Fuck—Jeong, what are you—” 

Perhaps it was the sign of the devil the way Mingi’s hole loosened for him with nothing but a few prods of his tongue, Mingi whining in his gravelly voice as Yunho fucked into him with the taut muscle. Everything was wet from spit and the blood and Yunho felt his mind go fucking delirious, all conscious thought flying too far away for any hopes of it returning.  

Yunho was in this, and he didn’t see any light at the end of the tunnel to claw his way towards salvation. There was only Mingi, and his body, and the plush of his insides. Yunho brought his hand still wrapped with the rosary down to spread his cheeks, humming in pure satisfaction when the beads pressed into Mingi’s skin and produced smoke. Two of  his fingers not intertwined by the rosary swiped over Mingi’s wet hole, and Mingi screamed in pure delight when Yunho shoved them past the clenching muscle.  

Blistering red imprints of the cross began to welt on Mingi’s skin as Yunho fucked him, the wet squelching of his spit accompanying each thrust of his fingers. Yunho was inside of Mingi, all around him, soaking him in their combined blood and pressing against his walls. Yunho wanted to cut Mingi open and see what his insides looked like, check if they where any different or if Mingi was still just a man.  

One curl of Yunho’s fingers signaled that Mingi was at least mostly a man, his legs trembling as Yunho thrusted the pads of his fingers right against his prostate. Mingi’s chained arms struggled against the jacket, and Yunho decided he was tired of all this leather, dragging his pointed claw across the back of Mingi’s thigh. 

Even more blood spilled out, Yunho swiping his thumb through it before carelessly smudging it against Mingi’s tattered clothes. Yunho had prepared for this with a robe stashed away outside of Mingi’s cell, but all it took were a few muttered words of Latin for the clothes to disintegrate into nothing, falling around Mingi and into Yunho’s lap as ash.  

Mingi sighed as if in complete relief, his body going limp on the stone table as his chained hands finally fell by his head. Those once pitch-black demon claws were… smaller, gray rather than black, and Yunho felt a pang of something like satisfaction coming up his throat.  

It was working. Yunho’s reversal possession spell was working because he was quietly prodding at the magic that controlled Mingi, sexual acts igniting a domino effect of give and take. Each time that Yunho spilled their blood, and each time the blood mingled with a body it did not belong to, the demon's power over Mingi dwindled. The symbol painted on Mingi’s back was swollen and Yunho assumed it was throbbing, probably warm too.  

By the end of the night, Mingi would see clarity, and Yunho would finally get what he wanted.  

“Yu—Yunho,” Mingi panted, his shoulders tensing as Yunho forced a third finger in next to the first two. “I don’t—what’s happening to me?” 

There was what sounded like a sniffle coming from above where Yunho couldn’t quite see, and his skin roared with heat as he realized that Mingi was crying. The urge to drag him down to the floor and watch tears spill from his eyes nearly consumed Yunho, but he held himself back in favor of fucking Mingi with just a bit more haste, loving the way his body sucked him right back in each time.  

“I believe you’re feeling pain, sweetheart,” Yunho drawled with his lips kissing over the slowly healing marks of the cross on Mingi’s skin, watching in real time as they faded. “Feels weird, doesn’t it?” 

“Stop—just fuck me. Fuck me. I can't—can’t take this anymore.”  

Yunho assumed that Mingi’s wits were not being tested from the pain, but rather from the fact that he felt good too. Masochism was almost a forced side effect of demon possession, and soul bargainers relished senseless violence more than the actual act of being hurt. Mingi was probably dealing with pain causing pleasure, or maybe it was the sheer presence of pleasure at all that had him so afraid.  

Whatever it was, Yunho could practically taste Mingi’s soul as it slowly accumulated all around them, teetering further on the edge of limbo.  

“Beg for it,” Yunho said as he pulled his fingers out none too gently, easily maneuvering Mingi onto his back on the table. “Beg for me.” 

Mingi hissed in discomfort as he laid there, bare and open for Yunho’s taking just as he was meant to be. Yunho looked down at the long expanse of Mingi’s limbs, at the possession markings slowly fading into red scars. It probably felt agonizing in ways that Yunho couldn’t understand, but Mingi barely trembled, his perfect body soiled in dirt and blood.  

“You’ll… have to try harder for that,” Mingi finally replied, breathless but gracing Yunho with a half-smile regardless.  

Mingi really was perfect, especially when he wasn’t running his mouth, but this wouldn’t be enough to free him. There were words that had to be spoken, feelings that needed to be felt. Handing a soul off to a demon was almost too easy, but retrieving it from one? Yunho knew it could become very difficult, and very painful for the both of them if he didn’t act accordingly, but Mingi was blooming beneath him like a midnight flower. Yunho hoped he hadn’t overestimated his ability to be the moon. 

“Oh yeah? How much harder?” Yunho taunted while wrapping his claws hand around Mingi’s cock, barely suppressing a moan at the way he shuddered from the dangerous contact.  

Rather than expecting an answer right away, Yunho dug his thumb into Mingi’s leaking slit, watching in fascination as he writhed with a pretty whine. Mingi was so fucking easy to watch, so enticing, and Yunho understood why someone would want to possess him now more than ever. Perhaps that had been his true motivation all along—not just enacting justice, but keeping Mingi all to himself, away from a world that didn’t deserve to handle him. Yunho could handle him, and he would. Mingi just had to let him.  

“I will keep you locked away against the church’s wishes for as long as I have to,” Yunho continued when Mingi didn’t open his mouth for anything other than a sound of complaint when Yunho removed his hand. 

Mingi’s eyes watched through his lashes as Yunho brought his claw up to own his already scabbed arm, slowly opening a new cut to show fresh blood dripping down onto Mingi’s body below. Yunho hovered his arm over Mingi’s chest, his toned stomach, and even over his weeping cock until he was stained with splatters of red. Mingi mewled all the while, his legs kicking out as if his nerves were being prickled with static and he was no longer in control.  

“We will spend every night together, and I will do whatever I wish to you for hours and hours. But I will never give you myself fully. You’ll die having never known what it was like to finally corrupt Yunho Jeong.” 

With one deft movement of his hands, Yunho unhooked the claws from his fingers, letting them clatter to the stone floor. Mingi’s eyes were wide, frightened and simultaneously stubborn. Yunho knew it still wasn’t enough, so he took a pointed step back, fully committed to leaving Mingi if things didn’t go his way. 

“NO! No—please,” Mingi cried as he shot up from the table, wrapping his body around Yunho with a grip that did not signal any intention of letting him go. Yunho’s arms instinctively caught him, but Yunho’s insides were still trying to catch up, ears burning with Mingi’s prattled, “I’ll be good, promise. Want it. Need it.”  

Yunho came down with Mingi’s weight, laying him back down onto the table while caging him in with his arms. Mingi’s lips found his first, the taste of blood and dust mingling between their tongues with a groan that reverberated off Yunho’s teeth. There was nothing left in this world for Yunho to want, or to crave, every nightmare and dream he had ever had suddenly melting beneath his hands like wax. Mingi was so pliant, raising his bare hips with more cries of please, please, please. Yunho wouldn’t have been able to tell him no even if he wanted to.  

He definitely didn’t want to.  

“Shhh,” Yunho quieted, nipping Mingi’s bottom lip with blunt teeth and nearly faltering with how sweetly he whined about it. “Just let go, Mingi.” 

Yunho whispered the words into Mingi’s mouth, kissing his chin and his cheeks and nibbling at his chin. It was all a distraction, a silent prayer that Mingi would truly give in, all the while Yunho was pressing the head of his cock against Mingi’s slicked entrance.  

Everything fell together like a crumbling mountain closing a cave, parts of Yunho that had been barren and empty suddenly getting filled as he pushed into Mingi with ease. Mingi’s body accepted him, completely and achingly, until Yunho’s hips were pressing against the bruised plush of Mingi’s ass. There was no build up or particularly exciting words to tip Mingi’s soul over the edge, heat pooling between them as magic dripped from Yunho’s fingertips. It was a quiet acceptance that things were finite and therefore irreversible, and Yunho’s entire being halted inside of him with that realization. 

Yunho could have sworn it would have been harder, or that there should have been more rules holding them back. But no, Mingi relented, and Yunho pulled his hips back with a low groan before fucking right back into him.  

“That’s it,” Yunho muttered into Mingi’s neck, lapping up his dried blood as he felt Mingi’s soul begin to flutter between them. “Take it. Take it all.” 

A soul was kind of like sunlight, pulsing with life and teeming with energy. Mingi’s soul felt weak as it curled around them in tendrils of invisible smoke, Yunho clinging to each desperate and perfect noise that buzzed past Mingi’s lips as he fucked him. Yunho didn’t intend to completely capture Mingi’s soul—he was returning it with each press of lips and drag of his cock—but he couldn’t simply free it either.  

Yunho had known from the very beginning that this was about more than righteousness or exacting religious wrongs, no matter how hard he tried to convince both himself and everyone around him that it was the case. Mingi never accidentally fell into his lap after their first meeting, because Yunho had been hunting him down in little ways, just to catch a glimpse of the soul bargainer who made him feel like he’d discovered the exception.  

Faith wasn’t meant to have exceptions, because God was everywhere, and He was everything. Yunho never knew a world where grace meant forgiveness or even patience, not when his entire life was centered around exacting holy revenge. Seeing Mingi changed all of that, because despite how much Yunho hated him, he hated that he couldn’t have him even more.  

“Fuck—Yunho—”  

Mingi’s voice pulled Yunho from his thoughts, dropping him back down into his own straining body. Yunho’s hips ached from how hard he was fucking Mingi, but the electric sting of a freed soul had simmered down to nothing more than a faint burn, and Yunho moaned with that satisfaction of knowing that his spell was finally completed. Four years of running and chasing and fighting with himself in the most visceral of ways had finally come to a head, and it accumulated into one beautiful moment that was searing itself into the recesses of Yunho’s brain.  

“You feel that?” Yunho taunted, pulling back just enough to stare down at Mingi’s flushed cheeks. Mingi’s body moved up and down on the stone table with each of Yunho’s thrusts, and his face twisted with pleasure-pain from whatever wounds still lingered on his raw skin. “Did you miss it, sweetheart? Having a soul?” 

Another deep cry escaped Mingi’s lips, his fingers digging into Yunho’s shoulders as tears sprung free from his brown eyes. Gone were the black irises and dark circles, replaced by blushing color and the sheen of tacky sweat. Mingi was… he was beautiful, beyond seraphic description and worth more than anything heaven could have offered Yunho. Or perhaps he was from heaven, maybe this was Yunho’s own way of repenting.  

“Can’t—I can’t,” Mingi whined, the force of his arms pulling Yunho back down into another wet kiss. Heat was simmering deep in Yunho’s belly, reaching a boiling point that would soon send him over a tumultuous edge. “Feels—ngh—feels good.” 

Yunho grinned into their messy melding of lips, running his palms down the long expanse of Mingi’s sides to feel just how connected they were. Mingi’s soul was back where it belonged, safe inside of him, but Yunho still held the leash, and his every blink was marred with images of that bloody and raw connection. They would be bound for as long as Mingi would allow it, or until he figured out how to sever the bond himself, but Yunho would never release him. They belonged to each other now.  

“You gonna come for me?” Yunho teased as he rolled his hips in just the right way, sending Mingi into near hysterics with a tremble that traveled all the way down his body. “Since it feels so good and all.” 

Mean. Yunho was mean, selfish, calculating. All the things that Mingi should have been, Yunho explored with only muddied shame and no influence but his own. A life of service was also a life of resentment, Yunho constantly battling within himself on how to be the best son and most obedient follower without leaning too heavily into bloodthirstiness. Nothing was ever black and white in the world, but Yunho felt clarity for the first time in his life, deep in the confines of Mingi’s body.  

One pass of Yunho’s hands over the iron chains that dangled around them sent them clattering to the floor, Mingi groaning with relief from his newfound freedom as he wrapped his arms tightly around Yunho’s neck. They were both so close, the echos of their pleasure bouncing off of their joined ribcages until Yunho couldn’t tell who was calling out to who. Everything was sweltering and blistering, unimaginable, hellish heat consuming Yunho from head to toe.  

Yunho grunted with the sting of Mingi’s nails carving patterns into his back when his hips stuttered, lips no longer meeting with each panted breath out into the air. Mingi’s cock twitched pathetically between them, long and veiny and painted in its own swirls of black ink. Yunho barely caught a glimpse of white spurting from the tip and staining their stomachs, but Yunho threw himself right after him, a sacrifice in the name of the lord. 

Yunho came with a prayer in the shape of Mingi’s name, his entire body trembling through wave after wave of mind-numbing pleasure. Overheated skin turned molten, static dancing over their limbs and leaving sparks behind Yunho’s eyelids to remind him that he had still failed to send himself to hell.  

It was done, and Yunho collapsed onto Mingi with a delirious laugh that echoed off of crumbling stone walls.  

♰ 

The shower water was warm thanks to it being the middle of the night, nobody else in the apartment block awake to use it before Yunho could drag Mingi inside. He was extra careful when passing by San and Wooyoung’s apartment that they shared, but nobody came for them, and he successfully got Mingi back to his cave. 

Mingi was relatively quiet up until the moment they both watched blood and dirt disappear down the drain. He let Yunho lead him through the apartment, and didn’t protest when Yunho helped him out of the thin prayer robe. Hearing Mingi hum as he carefully scrubbed Yunho’s arms clean, mindful of his slowly healing cuts, took Yunho out of whatever trance he had forced himself into out of pure survival. 

It’s not that Yunho regretted what they did, that would never be the case, but rather that his brain couldn’t accept that his body was at peace. Beyond the four years of knowing Mingi, Yunho had never felt comfortable in his own skin for reasons both known and still mysterious to him. Yunho never wanted his entire existence to revolve around anyone, but he had faith despite himself, and his world shifted to orbit so seamlessly around Mingi.  

“I never expected you to be so… docile,” Yunho muttered while reaching out to gently hold Mingi’s jaw, bringing their gazes together for the first time since leaving the cathedral. 

Irises still brown. Cheeks still pink. 

“I’m not docile. I’m grateful,” Mingi replied, stifling a smile as he nuzzled his cheek into Yunho’s palm. It was the most insane fucking thing that Yunho had ever seen, and a thrill of sick excitement shot up his spine before sparking out into affection. 

“For what?”  

Yunho could think of a million things he’d done wrong, even more that he intended to do later. Never had Yunho imagined that Mingi would feel happy about being forcibly removed from his home—from the only life he’d ever known.  

“I was raised by the Children of Moloch, but I was tired of doing their bidding. I don’t particularly like the church, or what you stand for, but I didn’t deserve to have my soul handed off on my behalf. It wasn’t my choice,” Mingi admitted while running the wet and soapy rag over Yunho’s shoulder, as if trying to cleanse him in some backwards repayment. “I was... manipulated, much like you.” 

Yunho pointedly ignored the jab at his faith, still unsure where he stood in the eyes of God or his church. Admitting that he had been forced into this life wasn’t the difficult part, but admitting that it hurt him was. Yunho didn’t understand why belief was like a guillotine at his throat, or why it scared him so much that he couldn’t see the man holding the rope.  

He was determined to understand better, and to ask Mingi a million different questions about things like sin and freedom, maybe after they found a proper rhythm. They had nothing but time now, after all. 

“So, I got myself a tamed hellhound?” Yunho teased by way of explaining his thoughts, unable to help the grin that spread on his lips when Mingi   laughed   so sweetly.  

This time it was Mingi’s hands that found Yunho’s face, large fingers nearly encapsulating his entire head as Mingi brought their foreheads together. A chaste and gentle kiss separated one moment from the next, but Yunho didn’t chase more, knowing that Mingi wasn’t going to let such a comment slide. 

“Sorry, handsome. I’m afraid that this is your last chance to actually free me before I become your worst nightmare,” Mingi whispered with another flash of teeth, looking oh-so-dangerous in the dim lights of Yunho’s bathroom. 

“I think I’m willing to take that risk.” 

Famous last words, Yunho knew that, but he also meant it. Yunho meant it more than any desperate amen spoken before an altar covered in blood spilled on his behalf.  

“Then welcome to hell, Yunho Jeong.”