“Are you saying I was the one who taught you?”
“Yes. When I turned sixteen, Eid was the one who taught me how to hunt for the first time. From how to hold a bow to how to track animal trails. I got lucky, too—the first animal I caught was a wolf… So today, I wanted to hunt a wolf with Eid.”
Ressas whispered the words, his eyes gleaming with something close to rapture, as if just remembering it made him blissfully happy.
Even though the story was clearly about him, Seiyad couldn’t shake the strange feeling that he was listening to someone else’s tale. The vague irritation he’d felt earlier began to thicken into something sharper.
A rush of tangled emotions stirred within him, unsettling his calm.
Seiyad couldn’t remember what he’d been like back then, or how he’d behaved. Even if he could, it wouldn’t change anything. The person he’d been in that time had lived a completely different life, one that had nothing to do with who he was now. Those years had shaped him, yes—but they weren’t him. Not anymore.
Until now, Ressas had always seemed burdened by guilt when it came to Seiyad’s past self, so Seiyad hadn’t minded. But now, seeing him smile at the memory—reliving it—it stirred something odd and unwelcome.
Should he point it out? Or just let it go, call it a good thing and move on?
For the briefest moment, it felt like he was sharing his lover with someone else.
Just as Seiyad’s expression began to shift, he sensed movement in the distance. Instinctively, he turned toward the presence, and Ressas followed a beat later. Their eyes locked onto the same spot.
At the edge of the snowy field, the faint silhouette of a small wolf came into view.
“…It’s a male. Probably around three or four years old.”
“You can tell from here? Eid, is there anything you don’t know?”
“I just have slightly better eyesight, that’s all.”
After years of fending off beasts that threatened the villages, this kind of knowledge had become second nature. Or maybe it really was just instinct. Even among the Tither, Seiyad’s senses were considered unusually sharp.
“He’s likely a sentry. If we miss this chance, we might have to relocate.”
At Seiyad’s low whisper, Ressas raised his bow. He gripped it firmly, nocked an arrow, and aimed with slow precision.
One eye closed, his profile looked calm and focused.
He exhaled, gently steadying his stance and minimizing any tremor in the string. His control was impressive—almost second nature. Seiyad found himself nearly certain that Ressas would take the wolf down in one shot.
Apparently, the first Seiyad had done a decent job teaching him.
“Do you think that wolf already has a mate?”
As he praised a version of himself he couldn’t remember, a touch of bitterness colored the thought. Then Ressas’s quiet question cut through it.
Seiyad blinked. He hadn’t expected that.
He had never liked hunting, and had only ever gone after creatures that had lost reason. Questions like this had never even occurred to him.
“…That I couldn’t say.”
“I heard wolves only ever take one mate in their lifetime. That just crossed my mind.”
Ressas tilted his head slightly. His pale, porcelain face was unreadable as he looked straight at Seiyad.
“If I kill this wolf… would that make Eid sad?”
Seiyad fell silent, quietly absorbing the past wrapped in that question.
A memory surfaced—Ressas’s confession to him in the garden near the ballroom.
“Every action I took came from your kind words. And yet, the one who gave me those words no longer follows them.”
The weight of it pressed on his chest.
Ressas had embraced even the twisted, broken version of him as still being Seiyad. But at the same time, he clearly still carried the image of the first Seiyad Brosius in his heart.
The idea of being jealous of his own past self was almost laughable.
He felt the urge to say something spiteful. But he didn’t.
He couldn’t bring himself to answer in a way that would hurt Ressas—not just to satisfy a bitter thought.
“Life’s always a cycle of predator and prey. That wolf we’re about to kill probably just hunted a rabbit or deer not long ago. It’s right to avoid unnecessary killing. But the wolf Your Highness hunts today will become food for the people of this domain.The North has never known a generous winter, so I can’t say your bow holds no meaning.”
Ressas listened quietly, then smiled.
Slowly, he turned his head back. He drew the bowstring once more, and without so much as a tremble, released it.
Twang.
The arrow shot through the air.
A perfect hit.
The wolf died instantly, without pain.
Seiyad rose to his feet, his eyes following the fallen wolf in the distance.
He removed his leather gloves and stepped toward Ressas, who remained kneeling in the snow.
Snowflakes dusted Ressas’s dark hair. He lifted his gaze, long lashes brushing upward.
There was something quietly sorrowful in his eyes.
“Sometime in the distant future, we’ll have the chance to repay the lives we owe. In whatever form that takes.”
“Then let me carry your share, too.”
“No, Your Highness. We’ll carry it together.”
Ressas finally smiled at Seiyad’s firm response.
His deep violet eyes lingered on Seiyad for a long moment. There was something so intense in the way he looked at him, like he was being pulled in, unable to breathe.
Then Ressas took his hand.
Though bare, his palm was warm—like spring sunlight. The cold that had settled in Seiyad’s body melted away in an instant. For the first time in a long while, he felt alive.
They had spent longer hunting than planned, and by the time they finished moving the wolf’s carcass, the light was starting to fade. In winter, the forest darkened not long after noon, and by the time they left it, evening would have fallen.
Since it was already growing dim, Seiyad decided they should stop to rest.
Thankfully, he remembered a place.
A small cabin, tucked near the center of the woods—the same place where he and Ressas had shared their first kiss.
The only problem was that Seiyad didn’t quite remember how to get there.
He’d stumbled across it during a crisis, and it hadn’t stayed in his memory clearly. Just as he considered using his abilities to sweep the forest quickly, Ressas spoke first.
“It’s getting late. Should we stop and rest at that cabin in the woods? It’s just past here.”
They’d thought of the same place.
Ressas pointed east, clearly pleased with his own suggestion. Seiyad sharpened his vision in the direction he indicated—and sure enough, there it was: a small stone cabin.
Now that he looked more closely, there was a stream nearby too. A good, well-placed shelter.
He didn’t know who built it or when, but it had clearly been made for resting.
“…So you remembered.”
“Of course. That’s where Eid and I…”
Ressas trailed off and pressed his lips shut.
The last light of the setting sun filtered through the trees, painting the curve of his neck in soft dusk. Red and gold mingled over his skin, glowing across his cheeks and collar like a fading blush.
“Where you and I…?”
The sight was so charming, Seiyad almost let him off the hook—but then he remembered how Ressas had recalled the first Seiyad earlier. He wasn’t going to let that slide.
He pushed the question.
Ressas glanced at him in panic, then quickly looked away when their eyes met.
“…It’s where we performed our first Purification.”
“And where I stole Your Highness’s first kiss.”
Ressas let out a small cough and adjusted the wolf slung across his back, then picked up his pace.
Seiyad quickly matched his stride, falling into step beside him.
“Now that I think about it, Your Highness’s first kiss was a little… rough. I used to think it was because you were inexperienced or nervous. But when I remembered the last time, I realized—it’s just your preference, isn’t it? You like it that way?”
At that blunt question, Ressas’s steps quickened again.
Seiyad found his flustered retreat too adorable to resist.
He decided to give him a moment to escape.
With their long legs and matching strides, the chase turned playful, almost childlike.
And before long, they reached the cabin.
With nowhere left to flee, Ressas cast a flustered glance back at Seiyad, then carefully laid the wolf down outside the door.
Seiyad, having given him enough time, circled back to the earlier topic without missing a beat.
“So? Are you still not going to answer the question I asked earlier?”
“No, Eid. It’s not that… I just…”
“Yes?”
When it came to his feelings for Seiyad, Ressas was always so open. But when it came to his own wants, his own desires, he hesitated. Held back.
Seiyad could feel it now too.
Softening his tone, he gently coaxed him forward.
“Whatever it is you want—whatever it is you think—I’ll accept all of it. I told you before. I love every part of you, even the ones you think are flawed or difficult. So please… tell me more about the man named Ressas Solias.”
Of course, the ideal would be to learn each other slowly, side by side.
But the thought that he might not fully know Ressas—even during the time they’d spent together—was beginning to gnaw at him.
It made his heart race.
His face, once teasing, now softened with urgency.
Ressas’s brows knit, as if the weight of it all had finally become too much.
And then—like something he couldn’t hold in any longer—he confessed:
“I love you, Eid. I love you… more than anything.”
It was a voice filled with love, trembling with fear.
And in that moment, Seiyad couldn’t hold back any longer.
That love—so desperate it hurt—came crashing down on him.
He reached out and cupped Ressas’s cheeks, his palms gently warm against his skin.
Lifting his chin slightly, he brought their lips together.
Ressas’s eyes widened.
For once, it wasn’t just a fleeting brush.
He claimed his mouth—fully, deeply—and finally, it felt like he could breathe again.
It was nothing like the hesitant kisses they’d shared before.
This one was real. Fierce.
Ressas’s lips were just as soft and warm as his cheeks, and Seiyad feared they might melt in his mouth.
Driven by the need to savor him more, he sucked on Ressas’s lower lip, slow and firm.
Ressas flinched—just slightly—and the tremble sparked a chill up Seiyad’s spine.
Lost in the rush of it, he pushed his tongue past parted lips, tasting the damp heat inside, brushing the roof of Ressas’s mouth, before finally touching his tongue.
Their breaths mingled.
Seiyad kissed him the way he remembered Ressas liked it—slow, deep, with no room left between them.
He barely recalled their last kiss—it had been some time, and only once—but he remembered how Ressas had clung to him, how he’d gasped for air, like he wanted to be consumed.
That memory sent another shiver down his back.
He tried to imitate it now—still clumsy, but intent—trying to give Ressas everything he wanted.
And then suddenly, Ressas wrapped his arms tightly around Seiyad’s waist.
No—he lifted him.
