Chapter Text
The 73rd Demon King glared down at the trembling man before him, his gaze cold and calculating as it dug into the attacker. He didn’t move his gaze as he spoke softly to the soldier by his side. “I want someone in here to update me on her condition every 5 minutes. And get Sangah to get all the guests out of here. This ball is over.”
Dokja didn’t see so much as feel the soldier leave. She took with her the last shreds of Dokja’s restraint. The shadows cast from the lights on either side of the cell seemed to deepen, and grow longer. Dokja imagined that if he had a mirror, his eyes would be glowing red. When he finally spoke, he put every effort into keeping his voice level, his tone flat. “I imagine you’ve realized how much of a mistake you’ve made tonight.”
The man said nothing. He shook, but he stayed silent. Dokja could feel the tips of his teeth sharpening, but he was unfazed. He had no desire to stop this transformation. Dokja made sure to bare them in a gruesome smile before he spoke again.
“You’re acting very brave. That would be admirable under normal circumstances. Unfortunately for you, these are not normal circumstances. The only thing your bravery will earn you is pain. Perhaps a demonstration?”
He scraped his clawed hands against the stones of the wall as he moved closer to the prisoner, and every step closer had the man tugging at his restraints, eyes wild. When Dokja was within striking range, he stopped, and let his claws rest an inch from the man’s throat. “Now think carefully. Who sent you.”
As the man trembled under the anger of the Demon King, any sense of composure or defiance melted away. Dokja didn’t even have to move his hand – the man’s shaking did the job for him. Blood began to run down the poisoner’s neck. He squeezed his eyes closed, his words coming out in sobs. “P-Paul. The king’s dokkaebi- I swear it wasn’t- I wasn’t- I only did what I was told- Please-”
Dokja smiled, his gaze turning colder as he listened. “The king? There are quite a few kings in this world, would you mind specifying for me?”
The man nodded aggressively, his words coming out in barely cohesive sentences. “The one- I mean- My- the- k-king Haneul.”
Dokja’s smile tightened. King Haneul? His mind flashed to the duke in the courtyard, and he felt something in him tighten, but he quickly pushed it from his mind. That was a suspicion that could be looked into later. He pulled back his hand, finally, and the man let out a sob of relief. Dokja stepped away for a second to grab a chair, and dragged it so he could sit in front of the prisoner. “This,” he said, “is a very good start.”
It took everything in him to not lose his composure. To stay focused. To make sure he was getting as much as he could. He stared at the attacker, letting the man’s imagination run wild. He was interrupted by a messenger from Donghoon.
“Sir. You asked for updates on Biyoo’s condition.”
Dokja nodded.
“Seolhwa is doing all she can, but neither she nor Donghoon have been able to confirm what the poison is.” the messenger hesitated, then added quietly, “sir, if they don’t know what the poison is, I don’t know that they’ll be able to cure her.”
Fear. That’s what Dokja was feeling. What the tightening in his chest was. He was afraid. Goddamn it. Look how far he’d come, how many things he’d changed, and still, somehow it wasn’t enough to save even an innocent child. But no. He wasn’t done yet. Quietly, he said, “Let them know that I’ll be there soon. And get Donghoon to get some of his spies keeping track of Duke Joonghyuk. He’s a person of interest.” The spy nodded once more, and left.
Dokja stood with his back to the prisoner for a second longer. Just a beat. Then he whirled around and stalked up to the man, picking him up by his lapels and slamming him against the wall. The chains around the man’s wrists dug painfully into Dokja’s arms, but he ignored it. “You’re going to tell me what poison you used on my child, or you’re going to die.”
The man had gone limp after his earlier confession, but at the mention of the poison he began frantically pulling at his restraints. “Please! I can’t tell you! I can’t!”
Dokja’s tight smile had dropped, and he could feel his pretense of calm fading. His grip tightened around the man’s collar. The shadows grew even deeper. Seemed to move around the prisoner. Strangling him. Dokja spoke through gritted teeth. “I don’t think you understand. I wasn’t. Asking . I was simply nice enough to give you the option. Tell me what poison you used. Or. Die .”
The man started sobbing harder, but finally he opened his mouth. “I-”
It was then that his eyes, wide and panicked, rolled back into his head, and he went limp. Dokja let him go, and the corpse slumped to the ground. For a second, Dokja worried that he had lost control, let the shadows take over, but no. He watched as foam dripped from the man’s mouth. Someone else had done this. Placed some sort of spell.
Dokja spun around, absentmindedly brushing imaginary dust off of his white coat, and went to check on Biyoo. He didn’t entertain the idea that she would die. He wouldn’t let it be a possibility. If they couldn’t identify the poison, they’d just have to make a better cure.
As he entered the room he was met with Seolhwa and Donghoon deep in conversation, taking turns listing off different poisons, the other immediately pointing out inconsistencies. Bihyoung was crouched over Biyoo, his fingers on her pulse to make sure she was still alive. Dokja flinched noticeably when he saw the state Biyoo was in. She was pale, too pale, and her breathing was barely discernible. He stood frozen until Donghoon called out his name.
“Dokja, we can’t figure out the poison used.” His voice was tinged with panic.
Dokja’s mind cleared at this, and he looked at Seolhwa for confirmation.
Seolhwa sat back on her heels, and took a long, deep breath. “It’s true. We’ve ruled out all of the common strains,” She counted on her fingers as she listed them. “Biyoo’s symptoms are definitely the result of poisoning, but they’re also too unique. Most poisons either leave an identifiable mark, or have unusual side effects that are well-documented. But Biyoo doesn’t have any marks or symptoms that can be traced back to a specific poison. What she does have, is this.” Seolhwa gently raised one of Biyoo’s hands, and Dokja noticed for the first time that her tiny fingers were beginning to blacken.
Dokja started to shake, he felt nauseous. He forced himself to still, to keep talking. Keep searching for a solution. He watched in silence for a moment as Seolhwa nibbled at her lower lip. She seemed…conflicted. Dokja crouched in front of her, and asked quietly, “And?”
Meeting Dokja’s eyes briefly, Seolhwa sighed once more. She rubbed her forehead, and looked at Biyoo again. Then she squeezed her eyes shut. “And it comes down to two scenarios. The first is that, although Donghoon and I have already ruled out the known poisons, the attackers used an undocumented one. This is highly unlikely. Poisons just aren’t that easy to come by. The second scenario is that…they used a strain that we don’t know enough about to identify, nor enough about to rule out completely. Something a little harder to counteract.” Her eyes flickered to Bihyoung, and Dokja felt understanding creeping up on him like a sunrise.
“I did a lot of work with dokkaebi back in my father’s kingdom,”
At the mention of King Haneul, Dokja jerked his head up. His suspicion was sharp and short-lived, it melted as soon as he saw the desperation on Seolhwa’s face. He let himself relax again as Seolhwa continued.
“He employs many dokkaebi, and they don’t have nearly the same reservations about women physicians as humans do. A few of them agreed to let me study them. Jumped at the chance, really. I don’t know why no one’s bothered before.”
Seolhwa took a deep breath. “Anyway. I don’t know this for sure. But…dokkaebi saliva has a…strange effect on humans. During one of my experiments, we found that dokkaebi saliva has a sort of…decaying effect, when combined with the proper elements. I don’t know how they did it, but…it’s possible that someone figured out how to derive a poison from it.” As she spoke, Seolhwa’s expression became more and more uncertain. Dokja glanced at Biyoo once again and noticed anxiously that the black had nearly reached the palms of her hands.
“Do you think you could reverse engineer it?” He couldn’t help the desperation seeping into his voice. “Do you think you can make a cure?”
Seolhwa hesitated. She spoke gently. “I can try. Of course I’ll try. But Dokja, I don’t know what it’ll do to her.”
Dokja’s mind raced. It was a lot to take in. But if Biyoo didn’t get help soon, she’d die for certain. The solution Seolhwa proposed may not work, may have side-effects, but a non-zero chance of survival was infinitely better than a slow and painful death. And when it came down to it, he knew he’d never forgive himself – or any of them – if she died, and they hadn’t done everything they could. He sighed.
“You really can’t think of any other remedy that might work?”
Both Seolhwa and Donghoon immediately started shaking their heads. Donghoon murmured, “At this point, an incorrect antidote could be as bad as giving her another poison.”
Dokja closed his eyes, and nodded slowly. If this didn’t work, at least he would know he had done everything in his power to save his daughter. “Okay. Do it.”
Seolhwa immediately sprang into action, gently peeling Bihyoung away from Biyoo long enough to let him know what she would need. Donghoon ran off to who-knows-where to fetch ingredients, and Dokja sat by Biyoo, humming softly to her, feeling for the first time in a long time, completely and utterly useless.
By the time Seolhwa had the ingredients combined and ready, Dokja’s face was an emotionless mask. It was as if someone had put up a wall around his heart. He couldn’t feel, he couldn’t-wouldn’t- think. He was a stripped canvas. Everything had been ripped away from him, and only the stark, bleak, and agonizingly empty white fabric underneath lay undisturbed.
When Seolhwa moved to begin administering the antidote, he stood and retreated to the corner, watching numbly as the princess carefully treated Biyoo. He was deathly still as Biyoo’s breathing grew quieter in the anxious silence that filled the room. Somewhere above him, a clock ticked its haunting tune, taunting him as time moved on without a care.
As calm as he looked on the outside, as empty as his expression was, beneath the surface Dokja’s mind was racing. It bewildered him that whoever had laid the protective spell on the assassin – the king’s dokkaebi, if the man’s information could be trusted – hadn’t cared whether they let slip who had sent them. All they had cast a protection around was the name of the poison they used. It reeked of arrogance. They clearly didn’t care about making themselves known, and why? Did they think he couldn’t reach them? If so, they had sorely underestimated him.
Dokja took a deep breath, mirroring Biyoo’s breathing. While the vast majority of him was solely focused on Biyoo, he knew he needed to act quickly. He needed to trace the attack back to the source. He knew the end – the assassin – and he knew the beginning – King Haneul. But the anger inside him demanded that he uncover every link in the chain, every willing participant in Biyoo’s poisoning. This led him back to the Duke in the garden. The Duke who had sent a significant portion of his most trusted affiliates to infiltrate Dokja’s domain. The Duke who stood above him on the brink, watching as he died.
Dokja’s first instinct was to shy away from the thought, but he couldn’t afford to put on blinders. Couldn’t afford to trust. Not when it came to his family. And so he made himself turn the thought over in his head. Joonghyuk, working for the king. Joonghyuk, sending his people to lower Dokja’s guard. Joonghyuk, distracting him during the ball.
Joonghyuk, poisoning the very child he had pushed to support?
Joonghyuk, who had sent Seolhwa to them? The very woman who now, with a determined look and shaking hands, had scraped the very dregs of her knowledge to give him hope of a cure?
Dokja was ripped from his thoughts by Donghoon shaking him. Seolhwa shouted triumphantly. Biyoo’s moans fell silent, but her chest rose and fell with deep, deep breaths. He watched as Seolhwa raised Biyoo’s tiny hand, watched as the black marks began to fade. Whatever the princess had done, whatever methods she had used, they had worked. Dokja pushed past the circle that his friends had made around Biyoo and gently took her from Seolhwa. Biyoo snuggled closer into his chest with a muttered ‘baba’.
Dokja felt his heart swell. A whispered “thank god ” pushed its way past his lips before he couldn’t hold it in anymore. He crumpled to the floor, felt his friends murmuring words of comfort, felt Seolhwa’s hand on his shoulder. And then he started to cry.