Not prudishness.
Just—ignorance. Unknowing. The sheer, elemental innocence of someone who’d never once been shown a roadmap for any kind of intimacy, never mind this one.
He let go, hands gentling instantly. Lowered Haneul to the furs, steady, upright, palms open, not crowding—kneeling at eye level, the world holding its breath.
“Haneul,” he said, voice gone quiet, grave.
Haneul glared. Didn’t speak. Chest heaving, fists clenched.
“You didn’t know,” Seungho said, so softly that it sounded almost like an apology.
Haneul’s mouth opened—then snapped shut, nothing coming out but a sound of confusion.
“You didn’t know this was a thing. Between men.”
Silence. No movement. Just the crackle of dying magic and the hush of something huge shifting between them.
Seungho didn’t smile. Didn’t scoff. “I’m not mad,” he said, voice rough with something unnamable. “I’m not going to touch you like that again unless you ask me to.”
He let the words settle, firm as an oath. “I’ll still throw you. I’ll fight you. Pin you. Pretend to tame you. Scare you. But this—” He gestured, broad, gentle, all-encompassing, “—between us? That stops. Unlessyouwant it.”
A breath.
“But you need to tell me.”
The words didn’t crack. They landed. Solid. Absolute.
And Haneul reacted the only way he could when cornered—not with surrender, but with chaos.
He grabbed a tray and threw it. The tray flew. WHAM—metal ringing off stone, plates clattering, meat flying—a tantrum, a spell broken by fury. It missed Seungho, deliberately, as if even in the storm Haneul wanted him spared.
He sat, knees drawn up, robe rucked, hair wild, jaw locked in a grimace that was pain and frustration and—most of all—fear of the unknown. His fingers dug into his calves, eyes shining with confusion, not moisture. The fire’s ghost still flickered across his skin.
“You ruined the fun,” he grumbled, voice like wet ash. Not real rage. Just the heartbreak of someone who realizes the rules have changed, and no one taught him the new game.
Seungho stayed where the tray had landed, unmoving, breathing, waiting for the air to shift. His heart slamming against his ribs, wild, equally confused by it all.
It took a long time for Haneul to speak again. When he did, it was a whisper, more question than accusation.
“…So… men can do that… too?”
He didn’t look up.
“Like… making babies, or what?”
His voice, for the first time, trembled on something that wasn’t bravado or curse or challenge. Pure, wretched not-knowing.
Seungho’s own heart twisted. He shook his head, slow.
“Not babies,” he said. “There’s other ways. Not for creation. But for wanting. For… connection.”
Haneul flinched. But didn’t run.
Seungho watched his hand twitch, drifting toward his thigh, as if instinct could fill the gap where knowledge never grew.
“That heat?” Seungho said, softer, so gentle he barely recognized his own voice. “What you felt when I pinned you?”
Haneul’s breath stuttered, the muscles in his arms trembling.
