Seven

“Why are all of these old consoles so difficult to hook up?”

“They aren’t meant for our TVs. They weren’t made to be displayed on these.”

“Are these TVs really that different from the old ones?”

“Apparently. Otherwise it wouldn’t be so hard to hook up the console.”

“Why aren’t there new consoles that aren’t bitches to hook up then?”

“June, I’m not a video game engineer.”

“And I know that, but could you let me complain for like once.”

Sehun and I found ourselves setting up shop in the rarely used entertainment room. It’s late afternoon and we’ve been trying to figure out how all of the toys and games in this part of the castle work. After nothing ended up being any fun, Sehun suggested trying the video game consoles.

Unfortunately, these are the olden systems and neither of us have any experience with having to hook up stuff like this.

“Tao would know how to hook this up.” I grumble from my spot on the ground surrounded by colorful plugs.

“Tao?” Sehun hands me a purple plug while frowning with his eyebrows.

“My friend.” I say quietly. I connect the purple cable to the side of the television. It looks like we only need a green one now. “Hand me the black thing with the green end.” I point to the mentioned chord at his feet. He hesitates before picking it up.

“Is that person still…alive?” he holds the chord in his hands while waiting for my response. His mouth is straight, but his eyes are sincere. He looks afraid to be asking such a question.

I hum. “He is. I just miss him is all. He is perfectly fine…the last time I checked at least.” He stretches out his arm so that I can grab the final chord. I take it and plug it into its respective spot. Finally, the system comes to life on the large screen. He keeps his eyes trained on me while I finger through the game cases that we can play.

Talking about him aloud here feels kind of taboo. It’s not like I’m not allowed to have old friends, but voicing his existence makes me feels as though he is just an old friend. Someone I’ve lost touch with. Someone I’ve drifted away from, and can barely remember.

But he isn’t that.

I can remember Tao as vividly as I can remember what color my room is. I can remember his laugh, his smile, his touch, and his voice. Thinking about all of it is painful. Being away from him for as long as I have feels as though I’ve lost some part of myself. Sitting here and being able to actually have a moment to remember how much I miss him hurts so fucking much. It sucks that the only thing I can do is just remind myself that he’s alive out there and that he’s fine.

And really, I’m not sure if he is still alive. I can only hope he is since I haven’t been told otherwise. I know that my frown has gotten deeper, and I know that Sehun wants to say something to try and lift my mood, but I don’t want him to feel burdened with the task so I plaster on a fake smile and pull out a random game that my hand had stopped on.

“This one looks fun.” I tried to sound bright, but even I could hear the lingering sadness in it. I clear my throat and hand the case to him. Grabbing the two controllers, I stand up on my feet and walk over to the couch so that I we can sit on the cushions to play.

He sets himself down on the cushion closest to me and picks up the second controller. “Do you…want to talk about it?” he asks after a moment.

I press a few buttons until we get to the starting screen of the game. “No. I feel worse just thinking about it.”

“You know,” he looks at the television thoughtfully before directing his eyes to my profile. “If you just hold feelings in then you only feel worse about them. You have to say them out loud so that you can come to terms with them. If you miss your friend, it’s fine to talk about him…to me…” I look at him as his speech drifts off and he looks back towards the TV screen. “Or whatever.”

I smile a small smile at how he tries to hide when he has meaningful things to say. He is right, but I still don’t think I’m ready to talk about anything from before…not yet at least. It’s too soon after I left. “I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you Sehun.” He grunts and clicks away choosing the difficulty level and stage for our game.

The sound of someone clearing their throat alarms the both of us in to turning around towards the entranceway.

It’s the Queen and some tall boy with deep dyed red hair.

“June,” Sehun and I stand up at the sound of my name; he drops down to his knees and I glance down at him before studying the Queen and the subservient boy behind her.

I wonder…

“Sehun…stand up.” I say loud enough for both him and the Queen to hear. He stiffens, the boy with the red hair’s eyes widen, and the Queen’s expression doesn’t change. This is risky, but I have to test out my theory at some point. I’m supposed to be allowed to do whatever I want with my Charmers. Do my commands overrun hers when it comes to them? The Queen says and does nothing to indicate that I should stop, so I nudge Sehun’s leg with the toe of my foot. “It’s fine. You can get up.” I crouch down and place a hand on his shoulder reassuringly.

He shakily gets on his feet and poorly hides behind me. He is too tall to try and hide behind me, but I don’t stop him. I look back to the Queen who is still only looking at me with the same expression. She doesn’t appear mad, but she doesn’t look pleased. If I had to guess, I’d assume that she is…just observing.

“What were you two doing?” she asks calmly. Again, no trace of anger, but not the usual happiness either. I contain my nervousness and step to the side so that I can link my arm with Sehun’s while keeping my eyes trained on hers.

I’m really pushing it, but she did say that I can treat my Charmers as I want. However, I don’t think I’d ever be able to explain to her what I want from them so I have to show it to her. I’m challenging a lioness in her own den, but I can’t back down now.

“Sehunnie and I were about to play some video games.” I smile at the end and squeeze his arm comfortingly. She looks down at the innocent contact and then nods.

“Ah.” She turns to face the other Charmer in the room. “Well sorry for disrupting, but this is Chanyeol. He will be your personal servant from now on as well.”

I resist the urge to wave at the boy and instead utter an, “Okay.” I hope my death is quick for what I’m about to do. “Chanyeol, come over here and play with us. We need an unbiased referee.”

I wait for the sun to explode or something for me speaking so boldly to the Charmers and having them do things that don’t follow standard procedure. The Queen only smiles and nods approvingly before turning on her heel. “Have fun darling.” She calls back with a wave. I exhale and deflate. All the tension leaves my body once she is out of sight. Sehun wriggles his arm away from my weak grasp and boldly smacks me on the shoulder.

“Why’d you do that! You aren’t supposed to give commands in front of the Queen, you could have gotten us killed. We almost got in trouble. I can’t even fathom what she would have done to us because of your stupid stunt!” he whisper yells. I hold a hand to my heart and let out another relieved breath.

“But she didn’t do anything.” I bite my lip to keep from smiling too wide at the realization. “I had to prove a point. To you and myself. She doesn’t care how I treat you as my personal ‘servant’ or whatever. If I want to be nice, then I can be nice. That’s such a relief. I was tired of acting distant whenever I leave my room with you.”

He grips his black hair harshly with his hands. “You almost gave me a heart attack with your little experiment.” He hisses. I laugh shortly and throw my arms around his neck while on my tip toes.

“Calm down. You’re fine, and now we can both be reassured that as long as I’m around you won’t ever be hurt again.” I let go of him and as expected he is stunned by both the words and the sudden physical interaction. I pat his cheek affectionately. “Now, let’s both relax and have some fun. Can you finally be you and not a palace servant when we’re together now? I want friends, not servants.” I whip around to point towards the stunned redhead. “You too Chanyeol.” He looks up briefly at the mention of his name. “You can look at me. I prefer it. We are all just…” can’t say humans. “…people here. I want you guys to like me, and to not hate having to ‘work’ for me or fear me or anything. You have as much say in what you do when you’re with me as I do. Okay?” I look at the each of them and then clap my hands together loudly. “Now that all of that is worked out, Chanyeol would you like to join us? We’re actually playing video games, and it’d be nice if you’d join us. If you don’t want to you can just…go back to your room or whatever.”

I hope I don’t have to break through this Chanyeol guy. I’m tired of having to re explain my intentions. I know it isn’t their fault for not believing me, but just this once I want someone to just trust me on what I’ve said. I think I proved myself well enough in front of the Queen. I face the paused game screen and sit heavily on the middle cushion. After having snapped out of his shock, Sehun sits on my left and picks his controller back up with a frustrated pout lingering on his lips.

Chanyeol makes his way over to us and looks at the empty space beside me with apprehension. I pat it softly. “I don’t bite or smell or anything. You can sit you know.” He does without much more hesitation.

“No I’m not, you just suck.”

“I wouldn’t suck if you’d stop stretching your long ass arms to slap my controller out of my hands!”

“I can’t help that you don’t know how to keep your controller in your- yah! Don’t kick me- ow!!”

“Now who sucks?!” I laugh loudly as I pass him in the racing game. “Suck on that loser.”

“At least my car isn’t ugly.” I pause the game and look at him offended.

“Excuse me? Whose car is ugly? The last time I checked it was you who wanted this car at first.”

“I did, but since you got it first it’s ugly now. I hope you’re happy with your ugly car.”

“And I hope you’re happy with your ugly face.”

“Yah!”

“Don’t get mad just because you don’t know how to handle getting your butt whooped in a video game.”

“I haven’t ever played video games before.” He whines. I roll my eyes.

“You’re just making up excuses, you loser.”

Sehun and I have been going back and forth like this for at least two hours now. He’s a giant baby with a smartass mouth apparently. Being able to see this new side of him feels amazing. He’s smiled, he’s laughed and he’s been throwing back insults just as quickly as I can form them.

I haven’t gotten the chance to have this kind of harsh playful banter in a while. It’s nice to let off steam this way. Chanyeol also quickly fell into the rhythm of things within the second hour. When he first spoke up to tell me how to beat Sehun I was taken off guard. His voice was deeper than the very pits of hell. For someone who looked like he was an overgrown elf child, his voice was surprisingly deep and husky.

I thought he was on my side when it came to playing the game, but I quickly found out that he was helping and sabotaging us both. He’d tell me ways to beat Sehun, and then turn right back around telling Sehun how to prevent it. He would giggle whenever his plans to fuck us over would work, and I was getting more frustrated with this whole game the longer it went on. I only kept playing to see and hear the joy radiating off the two. I don’t know if Sehun is going to go back to being guarded around me, and I don’t know if Chanyeol is going to lose his smile once this is over. So I play on for their sake, the giant smiling elf, and the sassy straight faced baby.

At a particularly hard level Sehun begins to sufficiently kick my ass and Chanyeol tries to coach me through it, but it doesn’t work. I press the buttons hard and Sehun chuckles.

“Having trouble?”

“Suck my ass.” I mutter.

“Pressing the buttons harder won’t help. You have to pay closer attention to the track and find the shortcuts.” Chanyeol’s deep voice rumbles from beside me. Without pausing the game, I hand him the controller. My car careens off the road on my screen while Sehun’s advances on.

“You do it. I give up.” I sit back in the couch and cross my arms over my chest while the two Charmers continue to play on as if they could care less that I’d just given up. I roll my eyes playfully while they play on as if this is the most fun that they’ve ever had in their lives.

I finally look out the window and see that the sun is going down. None of us have eaten since coming here, and I’m hungry so I assume they must be as well. I’ll go and get us all some food and come back before they’ve even noticed. The two of them are so engrossed in the game and bickering that I don’t even think they will notice my absence.

Without a word I stand and quickly leave the room.

In the kitchen, I’m not greeted with Minseok’s familiar face but instead with someone else I’d seen in here, only briefly, before. The last time he was injured. This time, he looks perfectly fine and as if he’s never been hurt in his life. He has nearly black hair and wide brown eyes. He is quite handsome. The guy bows his head politely upon my entrance.

“I haven’t seen you in here before.” I lie. I don’t want him to know my first time seeing him was when he was bruised up. “Where is Minseok?” I ask pulling out the chair at the counter.

“He is in the back baking for one of the other Mistresses at the moment ma’am.”

Ma’am? What am I, his mother?

“Oh okay…well what is your name?” I ask. He looks up for a second clearly confused.

“Why do you need to know my name…um Mistress?”

I shrug knowing that he probably can’t see the movement. “If you don’t want to tell me then that’s fine. I was just curious. I like having names for people that I’ve met is all.”

He doesn’t answer. Instead he asks, “What would you like to eat Mistress?”

“Whatever is easy. Can you make 3 servings though?” he bows in response before turning away to pull out ingredients from this open kitchen. I sit in silence and watch him move around the kitchen as if it’s his home. The way he chops up ingredients and opens up containers is very cute. His muscles show as he twists open a particularly tight jar. Such a handsome chef.

“What are you staring at?” I jump in my seat at the voice. Jongin sits beside me with an innocent smile after having ‘poofed’ in and nearly given me a heart attack.

I pinch his arm. “Where have you been!?” I smack his arm for good measure. After Moonbyul took him, I haven’t seen the boy and I was worried something had happened. Yeah it had only been like a day and a half but still.

He laughs and only hugs me in response. “Where is Sehun?”

I jerk my thumb towards the door. “In the game room. I snuck away to get us all some food while him and Chanyeol are distracted by the racing game we’re playing.”

He tilts his head to the side and his hair brushes across his forehead at the movement. “You’ve met Chanyeol?”

“Yeah. The Queen came in with him earlier because I asked her for some extra protection.”

“Why do you need extra protection?”

“It’s no big deal.” I say waving off his worry. “There was just an altercation while Sehun and I were outside.”

“Sehun hit you?!” he asks incredulously. I snort.

“Wow. That’s not at all what I was saying. Sehun was just there with me when two women dumped the fountain water in the garden on us. It was Sehun’s idea for me to have the extra reinforcements.”

He visibly relaxes and scans my body for injuries as if he’ll be able to see anything. “But you’re fine?”

“Never better.” I respond honestly. “Just hungry. I figured the two losers in there are hungry as well.” I place a hand on my aching belly. Jongin turns to face the wide eyed boy.

“Can you make me something too Kyungsoo?”

The boy who I now know as Kyungsoo looks at the two of us with a mix of astonishment and concern. “You…you know each other?” the both of us nod with smiles. “Are you…friends?” he says friends as if it’s a term he isn’t used to saying.

“Yep. Jongin and I are friends.” I lean down and cup my mouth to whisper, “I knew him before coming here.”

“She’s not like them. She’s okay Soo.” Kyungsoo appears to be glaring at the two of us attentively, and I try to offer a grin to ease the growing awkwardness. It just comes off as awkward itself. Well this has been sufficiently uncomfortable.

I stand up. “Well I’m going to go back to the game room, I’ll come back for the food.”

“No, I’ll bring it to you guys.”

“I’ll just come back myself, I have arms and legs for a reason Jongin.” I bow my head at the two males and make my way out of the kitchen with sweaty palms. Kyungsoo is scary.

“There you are!” a large hand grips my wrist. Chanyeol looks relieved to have found me, and seems to be thinking nothing of the skin contact. This is a surprise. He guides me back to the game room with his loose grip on my wrist. “I was looking for you! You can’t just walk off; I’m supposed to be watching you. Why would you just leave like that, you can’t protect yourself wandering around alone.” He rambles in that deep but friendly voice.

I feel warm at the amount of concern he is showing right off the bat. I wonder if Sehun told him about why he was brought in so suddenly. He stops in the middle of our walk and let’s go of my wrist as if I’ve burned him. His eyes are wide when he says, “I-I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have spoken to you like-”

“It’s fine.” I interrupt. “You’re doing your job, and you were right. I should have said something.” Even though I blatantly walked in front of them when I left the room it seems as though they really didn’t notice me leaving. I grasp his hand in my smaller one and pull him in the direction that we were headed. “Let’s go back to Sehun.”

10 minutes later Jongin poofs into the room with us while Chanyeol and I are playing against one another. He sets a plate of kimbap on the ground in front of us and shoves one into his mouth.

“I told you I would come get it.” I tell him dismayed. He just shrugs and continues trying to swallow down the food. I pause the game and leave my spot on the couch so that I can sit across from him and within reach of the food. Chanyeol and Sehun slide off the furniture and sit around the large plate as well. We all reach out to start eating.

“Why is no one ever down here?” I ask to no one in particular before taking a bite of my food.

“Most of the Mistresses have all the entertainment that they need in their own rooms. They don’t have much use for the other rooms outside of special occasions.” Chanyeol’s eyes flicker in the direction of the stage behind Sehun.

Jongin notices and jumps in. “After dinner they don’t even really leave their rooms. That’s when most of us are called for their use…” he drifts off after realizing what he’s said. He tried to change the topic of conversation, but I can’t help but feel he’s only made it worse. I watch as the other two look away from me ashamed. I place a hand to my face frustrated at the fact that all of them are just fuck toys. They’re people, don’t the Gaia get that?

“It’s really okay,” Sehun speaks up. “All of us have been doing this since we were young. It’s nothing at this point. I don’t even think it bothers any of us anymore.”

“He’s right. It just when we fuck up and are punished that things go…bad. Doing even one thing can get us sent to the dungeon and I think that’s the only thing we fear.” Chanyeol puts more food into his mouth after he finishes his admission.

I look at all three of their faces. “Like I said before, as long as you’re under me I’ll protect you. I’ll protect all of you.” Chanyeol smiles a small smile before returning his attention to the plate I front of us shyly.

“Since Kris left things have been on edge. We have no one who looks after us any longer. It’s just nice to have someone who cares about our wellbeing again I guess.” Jongin’s words from earlier this week come to mind.

Looking at the boys in front of me I can see that his words ring true. I wouldn’t call myself a Kris, but I do care about them all. I feel like a mom, and they are my babies that I need to protect even though I’m like 87% sure they’re all older than me.

“I have to go. I’m supposed to uh meet one of the Mistresses.” Jongin gives me a worried look. I know he’s trying to make it seem like it’s not that, but I know that he’s a booty call for some woman here. He stands up to leave and then vanishes right before our eyes. I look at the almost empty plate and feel my appetite vanish.

“I’m going to head back up to my room.” I say standing and dusting off the front of my sweatpants. They both stand up as well.

“Okay let’s go.” Sehun says. I look down at the plate and then back to them.

“Um, you guys can stay I know how to go to my room.”

“No, come on.” Sehun grabs my arm and starts to pull me out of the room.

“But the food-”

“A human will pick it up.”

I don’t like the sound of that, but I let the two of them do their jobs and take me to my bedroom. Upon entry I go right to my closet so that I can take off the bra I was wearing. Once I reenter the main part of my room, I see the two of them still there standing vigilant as ever.

“Um, shouldn’t you be going to your hall now? I’m fine here.” Chanyeol looks at Sehun and they share a worried look.

“Whee-”

“We’ll see you in the morning.” Sehun keeps his hand over Chanyeol’s mouth as he drags him out of the room. “Don’t leave you room, and don’t let anyone in okay?” he says.

I roll my eyes playfully. “Yes, yes.” I wave at them as they finally exit. What is their deal anyway?

Notes