#distant daylight.viii

[atinytokki]

Distant Daylight

viii. New Strategy 

“I hope you boys have somewhere to stay the weekend in Panhang,” a voice broke into Yunho’s sleep, and he startled from his position slumped against Gunho to face the cart driver.

Oh, right. They had finally made it out.

“Why do you say that, sir?” He asked respectfully, pulling some hay out of his hair when it poked him as he went to rub his tired eyes. Gambling in the tavern all week when he should be in bed had worn him out.

“Because this cart stops there and returns to So-ai. So unless you want to be right back where you started, you’ll need to get off when we arrive in the morning,” the driver explained, turning around for a moment to make sure he’d been heard.

“But…” Yunho tried to argue, suddenly faced with the fact that he hadn’t made any arrangements and would once again be thinking on his feet. “But we’re trying to get to the archipelago, doesn’t this cart go to Kon?”

“No, young man, it does not. For that, you’ll have to hire a carriage that travels south,” the driver answered with finality, unable to be persuaded on the matter.

Yunho hadn’t been on a carriage since the day he left for the orphanage, and he knew even if they could afford one, no self-respecting driver would take on a pair of street rats.

So he invited himself into the front seat and tried a different angle. The sun was already rising and he didn’t have much time.

“Sir, do you have parents?”

The man gave him a quizzical glance before returning his gaze to the road. “No,” he admitted after a moment. “Not since they were claimed by the mountain.”

Not entirely sure what that meant, Yunho continued on anyway, “From one orphan to another, what sort of place is Panhang? Somewhere a couple of poor homeless children could survive and earn enough for the carriage you speak of?”

When the man eyed him knowingly for a moment, Yunho sat up straighter and did his best to look completely innocent. It was Gunho’s skill, but unfortunately he was still asleep in the back.

“The business of the city consists mostly of fishing and finance,” the driver finally said in a gruff voice. “There are a few wealthy families, but they keep to themselves and won’t be frequently seen in town, not when they can send servants instead. You’ll not be able to steal money off them.”

Yunho widened his eyes and feigned a gasp, acting shocked that the driver would mention such a thing when he and Gunho clearly only secured their funds through reputable and entirely legal means.

“And there’s already some competition between beggars,” the man continued, unfazed. “It’s a bigger town than So-ai. Any luck you had there will not guarantee you survival here. Not with winter blowing in.”

Yunho couldn’t help but pout as the distant rooftops finally came into view. He had never been outside his hometown in all his ten years of life, and the unfamiliar world on the horizon was intimidating.

He would need a new strategy, both here and wherever the road took them next.

But it was no matter; he didn’t fear what was to come. Jeong Yunho loved a good challenge.

___

“We picked the worst time to jump ship.”

Yunho crossed his arms to trap some body heat and sighed in response to yet another complaint from shivering Gunho.

“We didn’t exactly have a choice,” he reminded him, turning yet another street corner as they explored Panhang, looking for anything and everything that could be of use to them. “Can’t go back now.”

A stranger brushing past and jostling him forced Yunho to find a way out of the crowded market. “Let’s try the town hall,” he suggested, turning into the alcove where the stately building was located and hoping the officials hadn’t seen his tricks before elsewhere.

Before they could even open the door, another beggar sidled up to ask for change until he took stock of them and returned to his corner, knowing they wouldn’t share.

“The driver was right,” Yunho groaned, abandoning the idea until later. “It’s too crowded with beggars here, we’ll get no pity for being poor.”

“What about the tea house?” Gunho tried hopefully.

“We passed one a few streets back,” Yunho reminded him. “The owner is outside tending to the garden.”

“Could we afford the inn?” Gunho asked quietly, glancing at the place with longing eyes. “What money do we have left?”

“Half a bag of gold, a couple of silvers, and enough copper coins for one loaf of bread maybe ,” Yunho listed, honest despite not wanting to crush Gunho’s hopes. “It won’t get us lodgings. The most we could do is hire another cart back to So-ai, but that’s out of the question.”

“Well, why is it out of the question?” Gunho mumbled. “If this place is so unfriendly, then maybe it would be better to return…?”

Yunho ignored the comment, trying to avoid the same disagreement that had driven them apart at the orphanage. Gunho clung to what he knew out of habit and a sense of duty, even if it kept him in a dangerous situation, but Yunho was an escape artist, an adventurer, always moving on and up when he could and leaving the dark days of his past behind.

Even so, he refused to leave Gunho behind.

“You see that lighthouse there?” Yunho suggested, pointing past smoking chimneys they were barred access to and over to the seaside. “Let’s climb it for a better vantage point.”

There was really no denying him, so Gunho trailed behind and followed his brother to the eastern side of the city, taking the road to the beach. It only took ten minutes or so to be in sight of the sea, and it was a priceless one.

There was a salty smell on the air, not unpleasant but distinctly foreign to the brothers. The ocean lay before them, boundless and blue— not the pristine turquoise blue of picture books, but deep and full of mystery.

It evoked a similar feeling as seeing the mountains, with its expansiveness instead of majesty, but instead of turning Yunho away, it beckoned to him.

Gunho cleared his throat before he got too far away. “Hyung? The lighthouse?”

“Oh, right,” Yunho mumbled awkwardly, having gotten lost in the view. “Careful on the rocks.”

Together they made their way down to the beach, slow but sure footed on the bluffs as if they really were descending a mountain. This time, the prize at the bottom was worth much more.

Gunho said nothing but turned and gave his brother a smile, and Yunho knew what he was suggesting.

“It’s winter, Gunho, it might be cold…”

Throwing off his shoes and sprinting across the sand anyway, Gunho’s laugh became a shriek at stepping in the freezing water and then dissolved again into giggles.

Yunho had followed suit and pulled off his worn boots to feel the sand under him. Little rocks, shells, and pieces of coral were scattered throughout but it wasn’t painful to walk across provided you knew where to step.

He’d never been to a beach before and had nothing to compare it to, but to Yunho, it was heaven.

“There’s the lighthouse,” he observed, pointing up the coast. “Let’s head that way.”

Gunho looked up from where he was already digging through the shallows for little tidal creatures and nodded.

Being so tall, the structure looked a lot closer than it was, and by the time they drew up to it Gunho was hungry, cold, and tired and had long since stopped splashing in the surf.

“Are we sleeping here for the night?” He asked in a pout, clinging on to his older brother to steal some of his warmth.

“Yes,” Yunho tried to answer confidently, regardless of the fact that it was their only option with evening fast approaching. “Let’s just hope no one sees us.”

The lighthouse appeared to be empty, though the cottage next to it was illuminated by candles in the windows, and the door swung open when Yunho gently nudged it.

“Quickly!” He whispered, beckoning Gunho in and closing the heavy door behind him. A tall metal staircase spiralled up into the lighthouse, so high they could not see the end of it, but there was a small space underneath the curve of the railings that could house the pair of them if need be.

“It’s still cold in here,” Gunho sighed, already pulling his blanket out from the bag he carried.

“We’ll just have to make do,” Yunho answered redundantly, knowing he was powerless to change the situation. “At least we’re shielded from wind and snow.”

Perhaps they could try knocking at the lighthouse keeper’s cottage next door, where a wisp of smoke emanated from the chimney invitingly, but Yunho didn’t trust this town or anyone in it and it was better to hide out in the lighthouse undiscovered.

“You don’t think anyone will come in here while we sleep, do you?” Gunho asked, suddenly pausing as he was about to lay out his blanket.

Before Yunho could respond, the sound of footsteps approaching from outside shocked the pair into freezing in place.

“Behind the door!” Yunho whispered quickly, pulling his brother into the cramped corner just as the door swung open and obscured them from view.

He could barely hear anything beyond the sound of his heartbeat and Gunho’s shaky breathing, but it seemed that a man had entered and was making his way up the steps to the top of the lighthouse.

“It must be the lighthouse keeper,” Yunho surmised when he was safely out of earshot. “The tides have changed and night is coming… he needs to turn on the light.”

“How will you go up and look around if he’s there?” Gunho sighed, remembering the original purpose of coming there.

Yunho bit his lip and peered up the tower hesitantly. “I suppose that… I’ll have to climb up the outside.”

“Hyung, are you insane?” Gunho hissed, taking a step forward and out of his sheltered corner. “There’s nothing but brick to cling onto, you could fall!”

“Quiet!” Yunho shushed his brother sharply before softening and taking his hand, leading him outside to survey the outside of the lighthouse. “There’s a way up, see?”

He pointed to the small window holes that trailed up to the balcony where the light was.

“Please don’t die,” Gunho whimpered, still trying to cling on even as Yunho found his first foothold and pulled himself up.

“I’ll be fine,” said Yunho with a grin, climbing out of reach within a few seconds. He’d only climbed trees and rooftops in his life, but he loved the feeling of it. A chilling wind battered him and his arms shook from the effort of clinging on when his reach didn’t quite meet the height of the next window.

Almost losing his grip when a shiver overtook him, Yunho had to press himself close to the wall and relax his limbs for a moment. He could see Gunho nervously pacing below but continued up the second half of the stretch without calling down unnecessarily.

When his hand made purchase on the railing at the top, he found enough energy to vault over it and land acrobatically on the balcony, a rush of adrenaline granting him some extra wind.

“Easy!” He mouthed in Gunho’s direction, not yelling in case he was heard by the man inside but not above some bragging when he’d made it up in good time with nothing but his own strength.

The view from the lighthouse was beautiful, and Yunho became lost in it again as he surveyed the land around him.

There was, of course, the glittering ocean at sunset which he couldn’t tear his eyes away from and atop his perch he could see more of it, but no land on the horizon. The archipelago was still much further south.

Glancing in that direction, he saw Panhang nestled into the coast and the road the carriage would take winding out of it through forest and farmland to the city of Kon. That was where they would make the crossing, and taste the sea air instead of only smelling it.

Investigating finished, Yunho couldn’t help but steal a few more moments to himself up there. He didn’t mind the heights or the force of the wind, even the snow blowing in from the north.

He would like to let Mother’s music box play up there, soft twinkling carrying on the breeze and putting the entire town to sleep, but he let Gunho keep it safe in his bag until he was ready to climb down.

When some of the circling gulls had swooped too close for comfort, Yunho finally decided to begin his descent.

The light above him came on just as he vaulted the railing and, thankful for good timing, he scampered down with ease and hurried to hide behind the door again with Gunho just as the lighthouse keeper came down and returned to his house.

“What did you see?” Gunho whispered, still wary even though they were alone.

“The road that leads south. If we have trouble getting money in town, I say we start walking on it and hitch a ride if we can. Winter will be a harsh one here in Panhang.”

“We won’t have to steal, right?” Gunho asked in a quiet murmur as he laid out his blanket and sat on it this time.

“I can’t promise that,” Yunho finally responded with a sigh, stretching out next to his brother and covering both of them with his own blanket. “But I won’t force you into anything. I’m looking out for you, Gunho, you can trust me.”

Gunho didn’t answer, but snuggled closer to his hyung, and for Yunho that was answer enough.

___

He thought he’d be at home in the tavern, but Yunho struggled from the moment he set foot inside to find his place there.

“Which way to the pub?” He had asked a boy who was digging up holes in the snow and dirt of his front garden. The treasure hunter, about his age, gave him a puzzled look and simply pointed towards town.

“There’s only one. The Boar’s Head, you can’t miss it.”

It was a snowy day which meant by noon all the tables nearest the fireplace were taken and the place was so packed full of miners on their lunch breaks that it was all the orphans could do to find a seat that didn’t feel like ice on their backsides.

“I want to order something,” Gunho announced while Yunho kept his eyes glued to the men playing dice across from them.

“Gunho, this is a tavern,” Yunho reminded him distractedly, following even the slightest movement of the players. “You wouldn’t like any of their drinks.”

“Not true!” his little brother whined, pointing to the menu on the board behind the counter. “They make soup, too. A thing called chowder. I want to try it!”

Yunho sighed and finally faced him, pressing a couple of coins into his outstretched hand. “Fine. But if it costs more than this, you’re responsible for bargaining.”

Judging by the teary puppy eyes Gunho was currently displaying, he would have no trouble with that.

The tides of the game changed as Yunho looked on. An old woman had joined in the bets and seated herself at the head of the table. From the way the miners looked at her, he guessed she wasn’t well known. Yunho, too, fell for her guise of ignorance when she lost the first two rounds after upping the bid.

Just as Gunho returned with a steaming bowl big enough for both of them to share, the old woman took the pot in a landslide victory the likes of which Yunho had never seen.

He gulped and stood from his seat. The games in the tavern at So-ai were child’s play compared to this. He didn’t stand a chance.

“We’re leaving.”

“But I just got the soup…” Gunho complained with a mouthful already in his cheeks.

“No,” Yunho explained frustratedly. “I mean we’re leaving Panhang— tonight. We’ll just have to take our chances on the south road, we can’t do business here.”

“Well, why not?” Gunho scoffed. “The barmaid liked me well enough.”

“ That woman is a witch,” Yunho whispered harshly, nudging his head in her direction. “She knows every trick in the book and, I’d wager, exactly what die everyone else rolled before they even know it themselves. It’s mathematically impossible, there’s no other explanation. She’s a witch.”

“You can’t beat her? Well, she doesn’t know you, maybe there’s another game…”

“No, Gunho. She could con us out of all our money without breaking a sweat. It doesn’t matter if I avoid her, she can join in at any time,” Yunho insisted urgently, remembering the incident with the tea house owner. “I barely secured enough in So-ai to get us here and this is much more of a gamble.”

Gunho simply looked away and took another bite of the chowder. “Here, have some,” he offered dully, weary of all the business discussion. “It’s good.”

Yunho followed his conscience instead of his stomach and declined. He felt bad enough for Gunho as it was, starving on the streets and moving uncertainly from place to place, driven on by an incompetent older brother with no friends or family otherwise. He needed as much nourishment as his hard-earned stew would give him.

As for Yunho, he’d have to figure out a new strategy.

His stomach was rumbling so loudly the next morning that Gunho insisted they drop by the tavern again so that he could beg another chowder bowl from the barmaid for a poor, ill baby sister that didn’t exist, secretly giving it to Yunho, and Yunho could steal some firewood for the journey ahead.

He saw the witch again, this time in a different form— the body of a younger woman— but he knew it was her by the way she played. Feigning defeat at first and then raking in all the bets, the way he used to play, but with certainty in her wagers due to some nefarious form of sorcery.

Yunho pitied her victims.

“We go by foot until we see a carriage,” he decided when he’d licked the bowl clean and packed it away with everything else.

“I like walking,” Gunho chirped brightly, throwing his bag over his shoulder.

Yunho’s head was full of maps and worries, so he was glad to find his brother in a good mood.

They’d evaded the lighthouse keeper until now, but left him a small offering Gunho had found in the snow, a bright red camellia flower. Yunho didn’t have the heart to remind him it would die now that he had picked it.

But the brothers were no wilting flowers. They could move from place to place and gain vitality, not lose it.

That was what Yunho was betting on.

___

“I don’t like walking anymore.”

Yunho stopped where he was trudging through the snow piled on the road for the second day in a row and turned around to see his brother lagging behind.

“Do you want to switch? You carry the firewood and bedding and I carry everything else?”

Gunho shook his head and slumped over in a full-body pout. “It doesn’t matter which bag I take, they’re both too heavy.”

“But we’ve been over this, Gunho,” Yunho reminded him gently. “We can’t get rid of anything else. You have the money and the cooking pots, I have the campsite supplies.”

“Then why can’t we stop now? My feet are tired,” he whined, trying his pitiful eyes on Yunho despite knowing he was immune.

“Because at this rate it’ll take two weeks, not one, to reach Kon,” Yunho repeated for the umpteenth time, surrendering and walking back to meet his brother where he was stopped. “Besides, we just stopped for lunch.”

“Just a small break? Please?” Gunho sounded on the verge of tears and almost dropped his act accidentally as an idea crossed his mind. “I have to relieve myself!”

Yunho resisted the urge to pinch his nose and gestured to the tree line. “Fine, go in the bushes. There’s no outhouse here on the road.”

As Gunho scampered off, Yunho pulled out the atlas again, a bit worse for wear than it had been when they stole it from the library. His life and Gunho’s depended on that thing, so he studied it again, trying to surmise their position and hoping he hadn’t led them astray.

“We’re still on the main path… right?” He muttered to himself when he didn’t see the small village they should have passed by now anywhere in the vicinity.

Doubt overtook him, seeping into his stomach the longer he stared at the map and then at his surroundings. He had made a wrong turn somewhere, and retracing their steps could cost them a day or two depending on how long ago he had made his mistake.

Feeling unsettled in his stomach, Yunho turned to give Gunho the bad news before seeing his brother come hurtling out of the trees, pans clanging from inside his bag as he sprinted over, yelling unintelligibly.

“Hyung, hyung!” He finally got out, breathless. “There’s a carriage, it’s going south. We can catch it if we run!”

“You found the main road!” Yunho gasped excitedly, following behind as he was led through the evergreens and into the open.

There it was, stretching south and slightly more east than they had been headed. If not for Gunho, they’d have continued on the smaller path and eventually deviated so far off course they might have passed Kon as well, ending up so lost he wouldn’t know what to do.

He would be nothing if not for Gunho.

“Hurry, toss me!” The younger boy called, redistributing the weight of his bag and preparing to be thrown at the carriage as it dwindled away.

“Try to land quietly, we don’t want to be discovered,” Yunho cautioned before pulling Gunho into arms and hoisting him up.

Almost missing it, he managed to grasp the trunk rack fixed to the back and turned around to catch Yunho. “Quickly, hyung, it’s speeding up!”

With a few large bounds courtesy of his long legs, Yunho accelerated into a leap, gracefully landing next to Gunho aboard the carriage with the passengers none the wiser.

“We have to whisper or the driver will catch us,” he warned his brother, who was already pulling a blanket out of his sack.

And it was a good thing, too, because snow began to fall not thirty minutes later.

As the two once again shared their shivers, Yunho found himself wishing they’d stayed in Panhang awhile longer.

At least they’d had a roof over their heads.

“The firewood…” Gunho whimpered in realisation when they pulled out some dry crackers for supper several hours in. “How are we supposed to use it on the carriage?”

“We can’t,” Yunho sighed, again forced to be realistic. “We’ll have to eat dry food until we arrive. In order to make a camp we’d have to jump off.”

“It’s a slow enough carriage, we’d be fine,” Gunho pointed out hopefully, letting desire get the better of him.

“And we’d have to wait who knows how long for the next carriage… that, or walk the distance to Kon,” Yunho finished, pulling his brother closer so he wouldn’t have to see the disappointment written on his face.

Like he often did when he was sad, Gunho brought out the music box from his pocket and ran his finger along the swan carvings that decorated the outside. They both knew he couldn’t open it or the passengers inside the carriage might hear.

Yunho’s heart felt stale inside his chest, and he didn’t know what to say. Instead, he reached out a hand and Gunho took and squeezed it.

That was all he had to hold on to. Mother’s music box, and Yunho.

___

Yunho liked Kon even less than Panhang.

It was dirty, crowded, and crawling with enemies— be they other beggars and street rats or town officials and navy soldiers.

He could tell already from how high the prices were in the market they explored on the morning of their arrival that they’d be forced to blow all their money on food and sneak aboard a ship instead of pay their way like they’d initially planned.

But as he surveyed the towering masts of the ships practically climbing over one another all crammed into the harbour, he realised he didn’t know enough about sea travel to even figure out where to start.

Yunho would have to do something he had avoided since Sangwoo’s disappearance; ask for help.

In a city of cutthroat thieves and suspicious seamen, it was difficult to find a candidate.

The only people Yunho trusted were those as naïve as he had once been, and Kon had precious few innocent types lurking on its street corners.

Since the orphanage he’d learned he could only trust those he could predict, and rarely could a stranger’s movements and loyalties be predicted more than once.

“That man there,” Gunho pointed in the direction of an old sailor selling sponges and starfish on the street corner, already a step ahead of Yunho despite his shyness around strangers. “Maybe he knows how to get to the archipelago.”

“Indeed I do,” the man spoke up without lifting his head from his work, having heard them whisper about him already.

Cherry red, the two properly approached and bowed to him, smiling back brightly when he grinned and shook his head.

“I assume you haven’t the funds to do so legally?”

Biting his lip, Yunho nodded. Gunho was tugging at his sleeve in a plea for him to reconsider revealing so much, but admitting their situation was a risk he’d have to take.

“Unless you know exactly which island you’re headed to, I’d recommend the Dalhae ferry. It’s less guarded than the Namhae one and will get you almost as far. Backtracking from there to whichever island you intend to stay at should be easier.”

“Thank you, sir!” Yunho praised a bit excessively before turning with Gunho to the docks.

“Now hold on a minute!” The man interrupted them, standing and letting his nets fall to the ground.

Yunho froze in place, afraid that once he turned around, the old sailor would demand payment for his generosity.

Slowly he turned his head and cocked it innocently, seeing Gunho clutch the money bag tightly in his hand out of the corner of his eye.

The old man chuckled and took a seat again. “If you mean to stow away, you’ll need supplies to last you; food, water, medicine— haven’t you ever been to sea, lads?”

Yunho went to shake his head and ask for more information but Gunho was already arguing back.

“But the sea is water, silly! We can drink anytime.”

The sailor stared blankly at them before bursting into a hearty bout of laughter and wiping mirthful tears out of his eyes. “I take it that’s a no.”

Gunho frowned and looked to Yunho for direction.

“Thank you again!” He called to the stranger, who waved them on with continuing wheezes.

“We have no choice then?” Gunho asked nervously, chewing his lip while they bought as much food as they could afford and filled their stolen flasks with fresh water. “We have to sneak on?”

“Everything I’ve seen here leads me to believe that starfish man was telling the truth,” Yunho admitted as he screwed the lid shut and shook it to ensure it was properly sealed.

“You trust people more than I do,” Gunho muttered in the opposite direction, perfectly aware Yunho could hear him but too grumpy now to care.

“I trust people who have nothing to lose by helping us or nothing to gain by betraying us,” Yunho responded coolly, aware that Gunho’s experiences at the orphanage had destroyed his ability to trust other beggars, despite his childish charms being his main act.

“Which category was Sangwoo in?” Gunho shot back, finally turning to face him.

“Sangwoo doesn’t matter anymore,” Yunho grit out, slinging his bag over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”

As always, the argument was forgotten as soon as the two were huddled in the hull of a supply ship bound for Dalhae, clinging to each other for warmth.

It wasn’t as cold as it had been in So-ai or Panhang, but the bilge water that washed around when the boat rocked back and forth was cold enough to chill them to the bones. There was no tasting the sea air.

“I’m sorry,” Gunho whispered as he buried himself in Yunho’s arms. “It wasn’t your fault he left us.”

“We have each other,” Yunho managed to answer around the ball in his throat. “That’s all that matters.”

It seemed that each town they arrived at was more different even than the last.

In Dalhae there were only a few things Yunho recognised.

The stars, for one, were visible again thanks to the island being smaller and less populated than Panhang or Kon.

It was a hillier coast than Kon had been, and at the bottom of the slope where the market was located, dark caves beckoned them, inviting mystery and danger.

“Let’s head that way,” Gunho suggested when they’d successfully disembarked to the jetty without being seen, pointing to the lights of the market and away from the spooky cave system.

Yunho agreed wholeheartedly and found a dry alley corner for them to spend the rest of the night in, too tired to explore another town and beg for shelter.

At least it wasn’t raining or snowing on them.

Just before dawn, a rustling sound roused Yunho from his sleep.

Sitting up straight and peering into the darkness, he watched a figure suddenly emerge and jumped a foot in the air, startled.

“This is my alley!” A voice growled, low and rumbling but loud enough that it woke Gunho too. “Go on, get out! And don’t come back!”

Gunho gasped, but Yunho was already pulling him away, dragging their bags behind him. “S-Sorry,” he stammered, clutching a dusty blanket and backing away in more of a stumble than a walk. “We didn’t know! It won’t happen again...”

The stranger was hardly even visible in the grey light, but a grunt sounded in response and after, only silence.

It may not have looked to be the case when they arrived, but Dalhae was just as full of street rats as Kon had been.

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” Yunho sighed, setting up their things outside what seemed to be the tavern, always his temporary base of operations.

“I want a few more hours,” Gunho whined, rubbing his eyes and pulling the blankets closer. It left Yunho with only the rubbish heap to lay on, but rather than argue, he pinched his nose and tried to sleep.

It didn’t work.

When the noise in the street was becoming too loud to ignore, Yunho arose and brushed any excess garbage off of him, wandering away to see what was going on while Gunho poked through the pile for breakfast.

It didn’t sound like the regular hustle and bustle of a market, but entertainment of some kind. The crowd reacted with one voice, cheering sometimes, gasping sometimes, always with a buzz of excitement.

Sure enough, when he reached the end of the road he saw a circle of people surrounding something. They were too tall to peer over so Yunho pushed his way through.

Two boys had just finished wrestling in the middle of some type of dirt arena, and money was changing hands between the spectators who stood around.

“We have our winner!” A brightly dressed woman announcer entered the ring and held up the arm of the champion. “Han Changhwa!”

“It’s a street fight!” Yunho realised aloud as the defeated boy stumbled to his feet and pushed his way past.

“No kidding,” the boy grumbled, barely understandable with all the blood in his mouth. “Bet on the other fighter if you want to get paid.”

Yunho was speechless and did nothing more than wince at the wounds on the boy’s face until he hobbled away, empty handed.

“Place your bets on the final round, ladies and gentlemen!” The announcer bellowed over the excited crowd from a table for money to be collected, and right and left the audience emptied their pockets to make their wagers.

Yunho dug through his own pockets until he landed on a silver piece and placed it on the table in favour of Changhwa, following the losing boy’s advice and staking his claim.

“It’ll be tripled if you win then!” The announcer told him before returning to the arena.

At her command, another contestant appeared, bigger than Changhwa. Yunho bit his lip with second thoughts. Maybe the defeated contestant had given him bad advice and he’d wasted a silver coin.

The boys wasted no time going head to head when the announcer yelled, “Start!”

Both of them tried to tackle each other, but when neither could gain an advantage, Changhwa realised it first and released his opponent to clock him in the head.

The other boy dodged and returned easily with a roundhouse kick. Just as Yunho was beginning to wonder what the rules were, Changhwa was kicked in the face and fell to the ground. Wiping blood from his ear, he used his slick hands to squirm away before the other boy tackled him.

With the opponent in a bent position, Changhwa could deliver a kick to the midsection without sacrificing his footing and jumped back when the boy got to his feet.

Changhwa was punched again in the nose and Yunho sucked in a nervous breath. In a few seconds he could lose his silver.

Twice more, Changhwa was punched, his arms coming up too late to be of any defence, and not until he lowered his stance and rammed his opponent in the gut did he get him on the ground long enough to put him in a hold.

When the required ten seconds had gone by and the opponent couldn’t wiggle his way out, the match was ended and Changhwa fell back, exhausted.

“Once again, we have our winner!” The announcer yelled over the cheers, hoisting him up and raising his arm. “Han Changhwa!”

Yunho sighed, relieved, and joined the line to collect his money.

Either way, it had been too close and he’d almost lost his coin over it. Betting on street fights was no better than betting on tavern games when it came to probability. Unless…

It had been awhile since he’d brawled with anyone, but if the odds were in Yunho’s own hands, he could be much more confident in winning.

Yunho set his jaw and turned to the announcer.

“I can fight. How do I join?”

“Sign up for tomorrow morning’s games, same place and same time,” the announcer answered distractedly as she distributed everyone else’s winnings. “Make your mark here, a fingerprint will do.”

She pointed to a paper that Yunho signed in a flourish with the proffered pen.

“You can write?” The woman asked with a raised eyebrow. Apparently that was exceptional for a street rat.

Yunho nodded and skimmed the rest of the list. “I can read, too. Does Changhwa advance now that he won today?”

“As long as he shows up for it,” the announcer answered affirmatively before putting away the list and beginning to pack up.

Changhwa was collecting his own earnings and, noticing Yunho’s stare, gave him no more than a forced smile before walking off.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, thanks for earning me a few silvers!” Yunho called after him, voice bright with the thrill of possibilities.

It was time to go inform Gunho.

This was it. This was his new strategy.

___

A/N: It was a long time coming but I bring you a long one because the writer’s block is gone (for this chapter at least)! Take your time enjoying it but don’t forget to leave a comment if you did <3

P.S. You may or may not have caught the Ateez member cameo but I’ll reveal that it was in fact a pre-My Way Hongjoong digging up holes in the garden as referenced in Zero to One chapter 6, because this chapter takes place before the deaths of his parents. 

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