❛ so, what do i owe this pleasure? ❜ by @ssaecularis
The cold breeze murmurs an eerie lullaby through the crack of an open window — a melody he’s certain ghostly creatures were once serenaded to sleep by. But the warmth inside won’t allow it tonight, exuding from the crackling flames that burn high atop the hearth. It’s too warm, too safe.
He mustn’t forget that he stepped willingly into death’s sanctuary — or at the very least, into the presence of its herald. And if the souls do not rest, they will surely prowl, breathing down his neck. They are all too familiar, after all — the undead.
The voice that surges through the quiet night to shatter his trance is far from unnerving — perhaps because it soothes him, always has. Gentle and low, yet ever so unsettling around the edges.
And when the vampire turns, it is to meet the pale complexion tenderly caressed by the amber rays emanating from the flames in the corner of the room, those familiar chocolate hues piercing through his skull.
How malevolent, for death to walk hand in hand with something so... unsuspecting.
"You don’t look a day over thirty, Jungil." Words laced with sarcasm roll off his tongue as he paces around the living room, finally settling by the fireplace where he takes a seat in the comfort of an armchair, legs elegantly crossed lady-like.
He lost count of exactly how lost has passed since their last encounter. Some hundred years are meaningless in this limbo they share — endless, still, unwavering. Why count?
"I am searching for something," someone. But he doesn’t dare say it. "And I was reminded of your existence in the wake of it." A pause, maybe longer than intended, as Baekhyun ponders.
His eyebrows knit together for a moment, delicate fingertips tapping in a constant beat against the edge of the armchair. "Your... expertise would be quite useful."
He speaks of the affinity with departed souls, of the thinning of a veil that splits life and death, of a vessel capable of conjuring those who should long have transcended. But it’s never that simple with them, and maybe that is why his jaw locks tight and his words are short of any decorum.
"Would you be so kind as to lend a hand to an old friend?"
