A/N: Because we definitely need more Baek Ah and Wang So bonding.
The stars have risen. Baek Ah knows that they do not really climb up the horizon lines to pin their way across the heavens, but it leaves a pleasant picture in his mind; stars on their travels.
It is hours, now, since the fateful party. He should return to his rooms, but he does not want to leave So to his own reveries.
"Since you stay here, Ji Mong must like the company," Baek Ah attempts. He sits cross-legged on the floorboards, and it is uncomfortable. He wanders how So manages to look languid and at ease, stretched out on his back with his face turned toward the sky.
"I did not ask him," So answers. His features have slipped back into something that Baek Ah cannot understand. A moment ago, when So said to always look straight at him, he had a glimmer of insight into his half-brother's mind. Now he is not sure. So is calm, immovable, as though the pain of the afternoon had not troubled him at all.
"So…"
"It is late, Baek Ah." So's voice is final. Baek Ah would never, ever say it, but it is in that tone that he only ever sees the family link between So, and Yo, and what little he knows of Queen Yoo. Steely-tongued and guarded. Baek Ah shivers. He is a lesser prince, with no claim to the throne and even less of a wish for one. His mother is not a queen.
His family is all but forgotten.
But he is happier than some of his brothers, more freely loving and loved.
.
"Ji Mong," So says, with an inscrutable smile lifting the corner of his lips, "Is not altogether pleased with my permanent visitation. Will you trouble him too?"
"Are you sending me away?" Baek Ah asks, his pen faltering in his hand. He has been coming to see So very often, it is true.
"No."
"Ji Mong does not mind you either," Baek Ah mumbles. It has been two days since Eun's birthday, and the mood between the princes is still tense. Eun had thrown himself on Wang So's graciousness, and So had forgiven him. But Yo's sharp smiles were less easy to overcome.
"What are you drawing?" So leans over his shoulder. "A girl?"
"One of many," Baek Ah replies, because it is true. Musicians and women. Baek Ah's favorite people. Well, aside from Jung and Eun, and strangely enough, So.
So snatches the sketchbook from his hand neatly, and flips through the pages. Not with Jung's usual mockery, but with what seems to Baek Ah to be real interest. He pauses over one page; Baek Ah wonders if it is his sketch of Hae Soo, but So snaps the book shut before he can see.
Hae Soo. The favor.
"I could try to draw you," Baek Ah says. So lifts one eyebrow, or maybe both—the mask hides the other.
"No one would wish to see that," So says softly. Then he smiles, a little bitterly. "If you can draw a wolf, I suppose, you are half-way there."
"No, no," Baek Ah hastens to assure him. "I—I learn what people like. I watch children playing, eating. To see what makes them happy. I have not seen enough of what makes you happy."
"The clean strike of a blade through flesh and bone," So intones. Then he laughs. It's quick, and soft, but a real laugh. Baek Ah tries to remember the last time he heard So laugh at all. "I am joking," he says. "Joking, Baek Ah."
"Very well then." Baek Ah smiles in return. "What do you like to eat?"
So thinks for a moment. Slumps into a chair with one leg dangling over the arm, his hands behind his head, the picture of carelessness save for the furrows across his forehead. "Oil and honey pastries," he says. "The ones that are so fine they flake apart. I used to eat them with Moo, and I would dream of them when—" He stops short, his eyes shuttering.
"I like sweet rice cakes," Baek Ah says, to fill the sudden, secretive silence. "And tea. White tea, green tea…"
"Fresh leaf tea," So interjects, and then waves a hand. "Enough. You have made me hungry and Ji Mong never has enough in his cupboards."
Baek Ah just ducks his head, satisfies, and starts a new sketch. If it looks like the mysterious girl on the road from Later Baekje, so be it.