42 | THE DANCER

Remembering Jungkook was... too easy.

There was no escaping the constant reminder of what happened as word of the fire and two dead students blared over every local news station. Authorities couldn't make sense of what happened, and the story intrigued too big an audience.

We were lucky to stay out of the spotlight. Upon Yoongi's direction, we exited the building through the backside before any first responders could find us.

It was devastating for Hoseok. For all of us, but especially for him. Knowing Namjoon's blow was meant for him, recalling all the lost time he could've spent bonding with Jungkook...

I wouldn't fool myself into thinking I knew what it was like to lose a sibling. But I did relate to the mourning of wasted time. If not for Namjoon's descent to madness early on, Hoseok never would've wiped my memory to keep me safe. I wouldn't have lost all those years with him and Jungkook, and they wouldn't have had their falling out.

What kept Hoseok going the most was knowing their relationship was finally being repaired before Jungkook was taken.

What kept me going was knowing I had the power to keep the one promise I made to him.

But none of it made the process of healing any easier.
There was too much to deal with, too much to question before we could come to true acceptance.

Why didn't we fight harder? Why had Namjoon so easily left his mark on all of us? We had a hunter on our side, another Bul-Gae, two Descendants. Why had it taken so much to stop him?

The more I talked about it with the others, the more I realized I'd missed in the chaos of all that happened. Taehyung and Yoongi were more thrown by the Hood's identity than I knew. The false memories he'd used to gain their trust were so strong and so real that they still had doubts even as they fought him. Taehyung especially—he'd had the chance to hurt him, but he froze, and that's when Namjoon got the better of him.

"I've never experienced anything like it," Yoongi had mused somberly some days after everything happened. "We had years of memories where he was right there. Training with us, going on missions. Bonding. He was practically a brother to us, and there was just no possible way we could've been with him that long and not known what he was. Even now... it still feels like he was a real part of our past."

"I'm sorry," Taehyung had blurted as he turned to me, eyes watering. It was the first time I'd seen such emotion from him. "I failed, miserably. I was supposed to help you, I was supposed to keep you all safe. I just couldn't—" he paused and shut his eyes. "It's my fault he's gone."

"Mine too." Yoongi met my gaze, his mouth in a bitter curve.

"No," I shook my head, willing the tears to remain at bay, "Namjoon fooled us all. He was more powerful than any of us were prepared for. But Jungkook... he knew the risk he was taking. I tried to get him to leave, but he chose to stay. It's nobody's fault except Namjoon's."

Taehyung didn't respond, just continued to stare at the floor as silent tears streamed down his cheeks. Despite the guilt he was wracked with, I was grateful to see him there in front of me, recalling how terribly wounded he'd been as well. Mild goosebumps crept along my skin as I remembered the remainder of that night—what I'd learned about myself and still couldn't quite accept.

"Jangmi," Taehyung's voice called out, and my crying hitched. Slowly, gently, I leaned back and brought my arms to Hoseok's shoulders, meeting the worn and reddened eyes that surely matched mine. I knew with one look that he wasn't ready to speak, but I caressed his cheek before standing up. 

Turning around, I realized for the first time that Namjoon's fire had died with him, which left the space quiet and cold.

I found Taehyung sitting upright with Yoongi inspecting him for injury. When he saw me approaching, he swallowed. "Jungkook?"

Struggling to catch a breath, I shook my head.

Taehyung's eyes widened, and he started moving to get to his feet.

"Don't, you're hurt—"

"It's fine. Jangmi, your power... it healed me."

My instant reaction was denial. There was no way—not after it so ravaged Namjoon's body and nearly killed Hoseok. It was horrific. Not capable of good.

"It's true," Yoongi stated quietly as he rose. "His wound is healed."

I felt like crying again, but I held it back. "How?"

"There's a few accounts of it happening before. It's only ever been a sun Descendant who can do it, though. And it's rare that their power is unleashed as fully as what you just did."

Though I still doubted what they claimed, my heart jolted.

If it had the ability to heal... what if it worked in time to save him?

Yoongi's voice vaguely registered in my ears as he tried to stop me, but I was already crossing the room to where Jungkook lied. Glass shards crunched under my shoes, and my whole body tensed and shivered as I looked at him, finding only an empty ghost of the boy I'd bonded with in childhood.

Yoongi pulled me into his chest not a second later, where I shook and tried to ignore the pain that pierced my chest every few breaths.

That splinter of time that I allowed to fill with a speck of hope brought more pain than anything else did.

The question of whether I could've saved him if I'd acted sooner would always haunt me. And the idea that the light within me was capable of both destruction and reparation was something I never thought I could wrap my head around.

But I did, eventually.

It began with understanding why Hoseok survived when Namjoon didn't. A deep part of me always knew, but it wasn't pieced together until he realized that dark part of himself was missing.

It took two, maybe three weeks for him to tell me that it was gone. That no matter how worked up he got, no hint of the beast ever made an appearance. He admitted to me almost guiltily that he'd tried everything he could to turn, to find a piece of that shadow self that he feared was only hiding. When he was without doubt that it vanished for good, we all knew my light was the reason.

It had snuffed out the darkness in him. And, as far as I could comprehend, it had done the same to Namjoon. The difference was that his darkness swallowed him whole while Hoseok's never had. So when that power blazed through the poison, it devoured Namjoon right along with it.

Hoseok took a long time to accept the thought that he had enough goodness in him to be spared. I worked each day to gently show him how he was good. Why he was good. Whether through touch or words or simply being with him, I ensured he could see how happy I was in his presence. How safe I felt, proven by the absence of any burning when we held one another. And slowly, he learned to forgive himself and trust that he was not the monster that had tried to corrupt him all his life.

I took equally long to accept that the power I harbored within was never something bad—in fact, it was entirely good. This force entrusted to me had, for a time, felt like a curse. I blamed it for drawing The Hood to madness. I blamed it for burning Hoseok so many times before. I witnessed the destruction it brought upon Namjoon—whom my brain still wanted to imagine as the young boy who once loved me.

But all that denial crumbled away with the help of my friends. Taehyung especially helped me see the truth behind my light—that it had only survived, protected, and extinguished. Yoongi reminded me that the Namjoon who had died was not that little boy, but rather the monster who had allowed every bit of that boy to rot and decay. Hoseok, Jimin, and even Jin refused to let me believe for long that I was capable of anything intentionally harmful. That something twisted wouldn't have chosen to bind with me.

Through time, each of us came to our own understanding of what happened that night—even Jin, who had to learn in one sitting of the legend and all the secrets that were kept.

But not a day passed that I didn't keep Jungkook in my heart, where he lived on in some way.

I kept him with me through his funeral, which was one of the hardest yet loveliest days I'd ever experienced.

Kept him with me through Hoseok's graduation and then mine.

Through Jin and Jimin's well-deserved rise to fame in the performing arts world.

Through Hoseok's heartwarming decision to become a dance instructor.

Through my training with Taehyung and Yoongi, then my initiation into the Hunter's Organization. While dancing was something I always held close, it was helping other Descendants—and Bul Gae, when possible—that gave me a full sense of purpose. And each time I used the light in me, I felt that a small part of that glow somehow came from Jungkook—from everyone I cared about, really. As if their love fed my strength and kept it pure.

I never would've thought I'd face more Bul-Gae after everything I went through, but it turned out to be the best thing for me. I learned to overcome the fear that had gnawed away for so long. I made the most of my power, not only to keep those like me safe, but also to heal any Bul-Gae who had fought off the darkness like Hoseok had.

So much had changed over the past few years, including the once-forgotten opera house at the university. As I walked for the very first time through the front doors that had always been boarded up in the past, chills ran along my spine. My shoulders brushed others around me as the large crowd filtered into the theatre, unaware of how shocking it was that the space had been completely restored. Every faded color was repainted to vibrancy, every dulled piece of gold repolished to a glorious shine. The seats I'd once sat in, all tattered and wrapped in cobwebs, were reframed and reupholstered. The candles were hung in their rightful places along the walls, and the lights above were glowing a bright amber, without any flicker. The stage was cleaner than I could ever have imagined it, and butterflies stirred in my belly at the thought of who would soon be performing on it.

The ghosts that I'd imagined used to fill the opera house were gone, replaced by the beauty of the living. Still, a faint part of me would always appreciate the haunting enchantment the theatre once held when it was abandoned.

The rest of the gang was already seated at the front row, and I found my spot between Yoongi and Jimin.

"Took you long enough," Jimin teased, narrowing his eyes despite the smile on his lips, "Late as usual."

"I'm right on time," I replied with a wink, feeling my heart swell when he didn't hesitate to wrap his arm around me.

"Where's my greeting?" Yoongi questioned, to which I rolled my eyes.

"I saw you earlier today."

He just smiled and looked back at the stage. Being here brought back old memories, and I realized how much Yoongi had opened up to me since then. He'd admitted as we grew closer that he was always so short with me because he never was sure how their confrontations with Bul-Gae would turn out. I learned that his parents had both been Descendants who found each other, and the two of them were brutally killed by a Bul-Gae when Yoongi was still an infant. That, along with the few times his missions had gone badly, led him to close himself off until the mission was complete.

He was still stiff most of the time, but he had a rather goofy side that I seemed to bring out of him, and I cherished the friendship we'd formed over the past couple of years.

"Weird being back here," Jin commented as he leaned forward to meet each of our eyes. "But it's nice seeing this place all fixed up."

Taehyung cleared his throat. "Feels oddly poetic, don't you think? Like some sort of..."

"Closure," I finished for him. Ever since Hoseok told me about this performance, about the restoration of the theatre, I knew it would be the perfect closure for all of us.

Before anyone could reply, the lights dimmed until we were submerged in utter blackness. Just like my first night on campus, I sensed the crowd hold their breath with me and felt for a moment like I was drowning. Then a harsh piano note broke through the stillness, and the figure lying on stage was illuminated by a red light.

The man was dressed in all white, and as he tenderly rose to his feet, the crimson mask over his mouth was on full display. He held it tightly to his face as though it would fall on its own. And after a few steps that felt all too familiar—riddled with desperation and fear—I realized that Hoseok was continuing the choreography that Jungkook performed that first night.

My heart split between agony and joy, I watched as the music slowed and softened, his movements doing the same. With emotion that stole my breath away, he drew the mask away from his face—eyes closed, eyebrows drawn. Then the tempo picked up with a new sense of strength and hope, and the mask clattered to the floor. Hoseok broke free, exploding into artful moves that could only belong to someone who had been lost and then found.

As he continued his graceful steps that were so full of confidence and magic, I could almost see Jungkook dancing beside him—completing the choreography that had stopped on such a hopeless note before. Giving it a hopeful conclusion.

The performance was more than Hoseok's story. It was a dedication to his brother. It was a message to me—to the men on either side of me. It was a mourning and a celebration all at once. Most of all, it was the peaceful closing of a chapter.

My eyes were brimming with tears, but my chest was filled with gratitude. Watching the man I was so deeply in love with create such magnificence, I had never felt more proud.

He was not the beast that first choreography had been titled after. He was not the masked phantom so many used to name him.

He was only a beautiful dancer.

• • •

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Hello, my beautifuls! I hope this closing chapter was just enough to help you reach some closure like it did for our characters. I didn't want this chapter to be too detailed. I wanted it to cover what needed to be answered, to overview the characters' journeys toward acceptance. And I sure hope that little mirrored ending was a fitting conclusion to the story!

I want to thank you all from the bottom of my heart for supporting me through the long experience of completing this book. Fantasy has always been my thing, but mystery was something I had only dipped my toes in, and writing a plot that revolved around mystery and suspense was quite difficult for me. It was your encouragement, your comments, your patience that continued to light the fire that kept me going. So often, I felt stuck with this book. Not because I didn't know where I wanted it to go, but because I doubted if I could pull it off. I know there is still so much that could be improved, and perhaps someday I'll return to make those improvements, but I can happily say that I feel proud of what I accomplished here. I am proud of the characters I created and the story I told, and it is all thanks to you guys for getting me to this point!

Finally, I'd like to ask those of you who enjoyed this story to consider recommending it to anyone you think might also enjoy it. I would love to see new readers experience the twists and turns as you guys did, and it would make me happiest to know this story might touch an extra heart or two out there ❤️

Again, thank you so so much for sticking around and reaching the end of this story. If you liked my work and want to keep up with me, I will be turning my full focus to my two new stories, Ravenous and Hearts of Dusk. I would love to see you there!

One more upload will be made in this book to answer any lingering questions you may have, as well as to cover some of the hints and red herrings I dropped for all of you! If you have any questions you'd like answered, ask them here :)

I hope to see you in some of my other works, lovelies ❤️

Stay safe, take care, and don't forget to smile.

Your-eternally-grateful-author,

Kat

April 7, 2022