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Lan Qiren was gifted with a solid awareness that bordered on the supernatural of Wei Wuxian, the man—boy if he was being honest—he was like a bug, pestering, annoying, and yet, he had cheerfully kept the flowers alive and flourishing. There had been a time Lan Qiren sought to squash the bee, but then he had trampled the flowers in the very same act. What a pitiful sight, the flowers bleeding and flattened into the earth, the bug smothered into nothing.

“You don’t have to do this,” Wei Wuxian said across the fire from him.

Lan Qiren ignored him pointedly. The boy had repeated that same sentiment over and over again.

“I know you don’t want to,” Wei Wuxian said, his gaze blankly fixed on the fire, his knees hugged up to his chest in the most singularly un-Wei Wuxian posture of all time. “I know that I’m me, and I know what that— what that means for you to do this.”

It made him furious. He had no concept of what it meant to be Lan Qiren.

“Be silent,” Lan Qiren said, gritting his teeth.

Wei Wuxian clamped his mouth shut after that, and Lan Qiren had a little peace before he observed the mandated bedtime of hai shi while the man—boy—kept watch. They had agreed to divide the night into two sections, Wei Wuxian would stay up until late at night, keeping an eye out for their enemies, and Lan Qiren would sleep first, taking the watch which would wake him in the early morning when the dew gathered on the grass and the sky was darkest. So, he was prepared when, long after sundown and in the little morning hours Wei Wuxian awoke him for his watch, and Lan Qiren sat his body down to guard the dying embers of the fire while Wei Wuxian tried to sleep.

The boy turned uncomfortably on the ground, as though he were being tortured by an invisible hand, or perhaps, as though he were searching for something. A half a shichen had passed when Wei Wuxian flopped onto his back and sighed.

“You might as well go back to sleep, xiansheng,” Wei Wuxian said. “I can keep watch for the rest of the night. Somebody should get some rest tonight.”

He stared at the boy, whose eyes were fixed on the sky above him, on the night sky as though somewhere up there was the source of his grief and if he stared long enough, it would relinquish what he had lost.

(Who knew? The boy had a penchant for bringing things back to life.)

Lan Qiren had no desire to carry a comatose Wei Wuxian to the next town in the morning because the man had gotten too little sleep.

“I will continue to keep watch,” Lan Qiren said.

Wei Wuxian shifted quietly and looked at him, his gaze holding a sliver of his usual amusement.

“Sometimes,” Wei Wuxian said. “You two are so similar, it hurts.”

He turned around after that, and Wei Wuxian must have fallen into a troubled sleep at some point, because the rolling motion slowed and his breathing turned into soft sighs.

Lan Qiren meditated while he slept, contemplating how he had ended up in the wilderness with Wei Wuxian.

–

He doubted he would ever forget that morning.

Wangji had not arrived at his office, which was not entirely unheard of since he had brought Wei Wuxian into the Cloud Recesses. That little beast in the Jingshi tempted him into uncouth acts early, and Wangji sometimes came there later than he should have. But, he had never been late to a meeting.

Never had he flat out been missing from a scheduled meeting with anyone.

Lan Qiren frowned, bowed his head in frustration and tucked his arms behind his back. If those two insisted upon breeding like rabbits, disrupting legitimate sect business with their melee of illicit acts, then Lan Qiren’s schedule would not be bothered. He kept his pace as steady as he could, breathing as even as he could as he made his way through the peaceful grounds of Gusu to his nephew’s home.

He wondered if he could convince the elders to add another rule to the wall, if they could have anyone who made the Sect Leader late to a meeting, confined to their home. Maybe then Wei Wuxian would be tucked away, hidden in the Jingshi, where only Wangji would have access to him.

(No, that would be worse. Wangji might never come out.)

His peaceful, unhurried walk was marred when the Jingshi came within his sight, and he heard it.

Echoes of horrible loud cries drifted down the path, and he almost pulled away in vexation thinking of what such noises could be caused by.

“Shameless!” He bit out, and his hurried pace quickened, marching up to the door to the Jingshi, and knocking on it in rage.

“Wangji!” He said, rapping on the doors.

The cries inside didn’t stop, and he tapped on the door again, louder.

“Wangji!”

Louder. Still the cries persisted, and for a moment he just listened, Wei Wuxian’s cries. They were not of elation or of release, but pained, sorrowful.

Was—

It was not his business what his nephew and the little beast got up to in their home. But, it was his business that they disrupted the peace of the Cloud Recesses of which he was grandmaster. This was his home, and he would put a stop to this nonsense that instant.

He pushed Wangji’s doors open and stepped through looking around the room. It had been awhile since he had walked in that place, long enough that he did not recognize the walls and the placement of the furniture. When his brain arranged everything, and his sight started to understand what it had seen, he found himself uncomfortable at seeing what was there. It wasn’t what he had initially thought to find. Instead, he found a curious other sight. Wei Wuxian was fully clothed, in a red sleep robe, and he was curled over Lan Wangji’s sleeping form, laying over him, and he was weeping. He had his hands clutched in Wangji’s own sleep robes.

There was no evidence of coitus, no images belonging to some springbook.

“What is the meaning of this?” Lan Qiren said, stepping further into the room. “Do you not know propriety? Are you truly shameless? This is a peaceful place, we do not need your senseless noise filling the air!”

Wei Wuxian let out a moan of distress, and Lan Qiren was taken aback at the response.

He brought himself forward, more tentative as his anger faded, his curiosity and worry rising.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren said.

“I can’t do it,” Wei Wuxian sobbed, his head popping up, turning to look at Lan Qiren with wild eyes, unsteady pupils, red sclera. “I won’t do it.”

Now that his head was up, Lan Qiren could see Wangji. His face was pale, blue in its hue. His face was utterly still, and his chest didn’t rise and fall as it should have. There was no movement to his body, no spirit in his frame.

(He remembered a little boy, with golden eyes, full cheeks, and a perpetual pout, clutching at his xiongzhang’s hand. There was always life there. There should have been forever, for as long as Lan Qiren lived, there should be pink in his cheeks and breath in his lungs.)

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian said, turning back sniffling. “I don’t like this dream, please, I don’t want to do this anymore. This isn’t funny. Why are you so cold? I need—”

Lan Qiren acted far longer before his thoughts. He moved, gripping Wei Wuxian’s thin wrist, and he dragged him off of Wangji, pulling him off of the corpse. It was easier than he expected, Wei Wuxian weaker than he should be.

“Get your vile hands off of him,” Lan Qiren snarled. “Would you turn him into a thrall? Into a servant?”

He would not see Wangji as some half-alive monster as the Ghost General, he would not see Wangji touted around like a mindless drone as Wei Wuxian went insane. He had to get Wei Wuxian away from the body, so he pulled him bodily out of the house, slapping one hand over Wei Wuxian’s lips, and using his superior core to force the beast out of the Jingshi.

—

Wangji’s body had already been taken for preparation by the time Wei Wuxian was dealt with, and Lan Qiren stared blankly at the healer.

“Poison?” Lan Qiren asked again, shocked that such a thing should take Wangji from the world. “Would not his core have burned through it?”

“A working theory,” Lan-daifu said softly, lips stern as the Gusu Lan’s lips often twisted. “One a novice healer suggested actually. We suspect what killed him was Gu, a poison infused with the resentment and venom of a yao.”

Lan Qiren sat back in stunned silence.

He had heard of such a thing. It involved the finding or creation of a yao snake, a venomous creature.

He had not suspected poison, although he had not seen blood.

“I have taken the liberty of investigating,” Lan-daifu said. “The poison was located in his tea leaves, which upon further investigation, we found that the tea leaves were not obtained from the kitchen. Rather, they appear to have been a spousal gift.”

Was it that easy?

Surely, Wei Wuxian possessed more cunning than that.

“There is another thing about Gu,” Lan-daifu said, his voice hesitating but he still looked at Lan Qiren steadily. “Some poisoners slip the barest amount into their victim, at the right dose, Gu is not deadly, but it will act in the body to make the victim more…suggestable. Perhaps to things they would not otherwise be susceptible to. Perhaps we are looking at an accidental murder, a misdosing.”

He understood what the healer was implying.

He was not sure he believed it.

—

Sizhui was not convinced by the theory either.

“You must know it’s not true!” Sizhui said, sitting across from him at the table he used to sit across Wangji from.

Was it odd that the stubbornness in the boy was all Wangji’s, the sweet bite all Wei Wuxian’s. It was an odd thought that he put up to grief.

“He would neve—“ He choked off. “Wei-qianbei loves him more than anything! More than himself! He would rather kill himself than hurt a-die.”

Again goes unstated.

The tea had long been cold on the table, and Lan Qiren felt like a hand was pushing on his chest so harshly that all the air was forced out. He wondered if Wangji had felt it when he died, or if he had just slept and never woken. If he had curled his arm around Wei Wuxian, and then slowly, unwittingly unfurled it. Or had he clutched his waist even in death, clawing for that creature that had haunted him for thirteen years.

“People do terrible things to the ones they love,” Lan Qiren said. “This would not be out of the ordinary for Wei Wuxian.”

Lan Qiren could name them all. Trace the line of people who knew him and died for the simple act of attaching their life to his. One yet survived, a man, a shell, a violent angry beast in purple that spit like a viper, and slashed at anyone who dared to come near, and who wouldn’t after having trusted someone like Wei Wuxian.

Sizhui sat back in betrayed silence and stared at him, his eyes looking horrified.

He recalled distinctly his brother and his wife, the two of them so deeply misunderstood. The clan, their own children, outsiders, they all took guesses. They had no idea the love two people could have for one another when they were on the opposite sides of a mountain, sharing just one night a month together, no one knew.

Lan Qiren had acted as escort, uniting two criminals for one night.

(Who could blame him if he wanted to quash a bug that was a criminal that was going to die? Who could blame him? Who? The flowers. The earth. The sky.)

His brother’s stern golden eyes had peered at him from Wangji’s face sometimes.

“Xiansheng,” Sizhui said, drawing Lan Qiren’s attention back. “I know that Wei-qianbei has done things in the past, but he had no need to poison Huanguang-jun, there was no need to make him give Wei-qianbei everything he wanted. Huanguang-jun would already do that.”

There was a boy, who was on the cusp of manhood once, who had taken thirty-three lashes for the transgressions he performed on behalf of the little beast. Xichen had always been better at fathoming Wangji, always better at reading his mind. Lan Qiren couldn’t understand it.

Of course, he understood on a physical level that Wei Wuxian was singular in his looks. The face of Wei Changze, the eyes of Cangse Sanren. It would have been absurd not to find Wei Wuxian alluring, and Mo Xuanyu’s form was in some ways more pretty than that. And yet, Lan Qiren had always understood that Wangji had wanted more from Wei Wuxian than a pretty face. Wangji wanted to take care of him, he wanted Wei Wuxian to rest, to be pampered while he did everything for him. He wanted Wei Wuxian to have everything he could provide and more. Sizhui was right in that regard. Wei Wuxian had no true reason to give Wangji any poison to make him more suggestible.

“Regardless,” Lan Qiren said stiffly, resuming the mantle of sect leader, shrugging that robe back on his shoulders as though it never left. “Wei Wuxian must be tried, there is substantial evidence that points in his direction, and the elder’s council has already had him placed under arrest and imprisonment.”

Sizhui frowned, and tears welled up in his eyes, but he held them back. He had never been able to be as stoic as Wangji, though he had tried, finding more of his way as he emulated Xichen in some things. But, his emotions sometimes showed on his face in such a heartrending way. Like now.

“Wei-qianbei would never do this!” Sizhui said, sitting up. “And the council already believes he did it, you already believe he did it. That’s not a fair trial!”

“Sizhui,” Lan Qiren reprimanded. “This behavior is unbecoming of a sect heir!”

Sizhui flinched.

They had always known, of course, that at some point Sizhui would become the heir if neither Xichen nor Wangji had any children. He was adopted, brought into the family, and he was Wangji’s ward. He would inherit the leadership of the Gusu Lan, he was given expectations, which he had exceeded in every regard. Sizhui had just that day become sect heir, Wangji’s death had elevated him to that position.

The boy bowed his head in deference, “This one has spoken ill of his elders. He will complete whatever punishment xiansheng asks.”

He was due a punishment over his words, and any other day, Lan Qiren might have issued one. But, then Lan Qiren remembered the day his own father had died. (His xiongzhang had ripped his ribbon off and fled into the back hills, and Lan Qiren had followed. Was there a greater grief a man could have than losing his father? Yes, yes, his xiongzhang had told him, there was a worse grief. Losing her.)

“You should rest,” Lan Qiren said instead, letting his voice soften. “Go see your a-die when the healers have finished preparing him.”

Sizhui’s face wobbled, then it straightened, and he bowed in salute to Lan Qiren before leaving the office.

He would have to start introducing the boy to sect work before too long now. Wangji had been in charge of the boy’s instruction up until today, and Wangji was thorough. He doubted he would have to teach him too much.

Lan Qiren mused about such things. He had another person to meet with soon, and he did not want to carry too much grief into that room. (He remembered the death of his xiongzheng, he wondered what it would feel like to lose a didi.) Xichen did not know yet. Lan Qiren was the only one who could rectify that by breaking the seclusion.

He rubbed a hand on his ribbon and sighed.

Was it just yesterday that he could hold Wangji in his arms? He was such a precious thing. Both of the Twin Jades had been big infants, coming out of the womb with dark heads of hair, and weighing as much as a bag of rice. Lan Furen had suffered in her labors, but had successfully birthed each boy. Wangji had round cheeks at birth, and they had stayed even into his early adulthood, only fading after the death of Wei Wuxian and his subsequent seclusion and suffering.

(Just another thing Wei Wuxian ruined.)

“Xiansheng!” A knock at the door disturbed him, and he rose up from his seated position, coming to the intrusion.

He opened the door to see a disciple in a slightly more haggard state than was typical of a disciple.

“Xiansheng, this humble one hopes he will be pardoned for his intrusion,” the disciple said. “This one was tasked with guarding the Yiling Laozu in his confinement.”

He needed no further introduction before he started walking to the place they had confined Wei Wuxian, it was not one of their nicer places of imprisonment, a blank room, but it was not a dungeon. Wei Wuxian had been in there for just three shichen and already he had caused trouble.

“Xiansheng, this humble one must warn you, he is—”

“Wei Wuxian will learn his place,” Lan Qiren said, stepping towards the room. It was a place not far from the offices of the sect leader, close enough that trouble could be subdued.

The door to the room was wide open, and a group of healers trailed outside of it.

“What happened?” Lan Qiren asked, looking at the disciple.

“He tried to—”

Lan-daifu stepped out of the room, a grim expression on his face, and Lan Qiren came forward to look on in puzzlement.

“He’s alive,” Lan-daifu said. “We stabilized him, but he will need to be restrained for the time being.”

Lan Qiren finally saw what everyone was peering in at. The Yiling Patriarch was laying on the ground, there was blood on the floor beneath him, long painful strips running up his arms covered by bandages. His gaze was off to the side of the room, staring blankly at the wall.

—

He made the solemn walk to Xichen’s home, the Hanshi, and he deepened his breath before he made to intrude on his nephew’s quiet isolation.

The knock he performed was docile, the waiting, and listening to the other side of the door as his nephew must have questioned the intrusion. He loathed breaking the man from his isolation. He had observed a strict seclusion for the past three years, and Lan Qiren had seen him twice in that time. His primary visitor was Wangji, who observed a monthly visit.

“Xichen,” he said to the door.

Moments later it slid open, and his nephew opened, his grey eyes alighting on him.

“Shufu,” he greeted tentatively.

“Xichen,” Lan Qiren started again, remembering a boy with soft grey eyes holding a boy with sharp golden eyes, tying a forehead band, kissing his round cheeks. “This shufu has dreadful news.”

–

His day was the worst it had ever been, and at last, it was ending.

Hai shi was upon him, he had meditated, bathed, and he was back again at his meditation, trying to will away the sorrow of seeing Xichen pull of his forehead ribbon and weep, the heavy feeling of seeing a bloody Wei Wuxian lay listlessly in his cell awaiting judgment by the elder’s council, who he had no doubt would have him whipped to death (the punishment for killing a sect heir however accidental), and of Sizhui who had lost his a-die and his beloved Wei-qianbei all in the same day. (He remembered Wangji and Xichen who lost their mother young, their father just as absent. Neither of them had deserved to be raised by their stiff Uncle, who was less parent and more martial instructor. He wished he had been better.)

Lan Qiren contemplated Wei Wuxian as he went to sleep last night, the boy looking at the blank wall of his confinement with bloody wrists. They had shackled his wrists, and at the beckoning of the elders, bound his mouth, lest he use his wicked magic to raise a corpse to save him. He had left with the image of Wei Wuxian bound and quiet and docile, tears leaking out of his eyes.

–

The next day was the order that followed the chaos. He met with the council of elders, the true government of the Gusu Lan sect. The sect leader held sway, could overrule certain things, and they could overrule a sect leader’s decisions just the same. But, it was rare the two were at odds with one another. Wangji had made it a habit to disagree with them, particularly regarding that little beast. For many years, Lan Qiren had been a member. Now, he was an outsider, sitting in their midst as acting sect leader once more.

“We will shackle him with an energy blocker,” one of them announced the decision. “So he may not make use of his resentful energy and his golden core. Wei Ying will not escape retribution for his crimes.”

Lan Qiren found himself frowning.

Sizhui’s words rang in his ears: And the council already believes he did it, you already believe he did it. That’s not a fair trial!

“I was not aware Wei Wuxian had been tried yet,” Lan Qiren said, cocking his head to the side. “To award him any punishment particularly the one fitting for this crime, he must be found guilty.”

The elders all looked at each other, then at Lan Qiren, and his otherness hit him. He was the odd man out. He was the exception.

“If we do not shackle him,” the same elder said. “He will escape before he is even tried. We read Lan-daifu’s report of yesterday.”

The one of Wangji’s death or the one regarding Wei Wuxian’s attempt to kill himself.

“Our sect has stood for centuries,” the elder said. “If we let this blight survive, it will corrupt the whole crop. Have we not heard how our children seek him out? And what now, with all evidence pointing to him as the murderer of Hanguang-jun, who he supposedly loved. This council finds taking any risks with Wei Ying to be a dreadful mistake.”

Lan Qiren said nothing in protest, sitting in the midst of people he had worked with and respected all his life.

“We will shackle him,” the elder repeated. “The trial will be expedient, one week from the murder, we will try him.”

“Very well,” Lan Qiren said.

(He thought of Wangji’s ripped pieces of skin, flaps of flayed flesh, his back a bleeding, hulking mess. If not for all the spiritual cleansing performed on sect disciples, his nephew would be alive as the fiercest of all corpses to rip this council to shreds for what they had once done to him, for what they intended to do to his beloved.)

–

A week passed. Lan Qiren had slept none of the nights, no teas, no sleep aids, nothing could keep his mind from turning in dread.

Why does Shufu care what happens to Wei Ying?

Wangji was his ghost, Wangji accused him all night, Wangji was beating him over the head with it.

They’ll kill him, we will be together again.

“But what if he is innocent?” Lan Qiren asked, that was the thing haunting Lan Qiren.

Could their sect really claim righteousness as their motto if they put to death an innocent man without truly going through the motions? He was under no illusions. He had been part of that council for many years, he knew that they were willing to cut corners when it came to him. They were willing to jump to conclusions they would not normally jump to.

Wei Ying doesn’t want to live without Wangji anyway.

“That is besides the point, how can our council say it is committed to doing righteousness if it condemns an innocent man to be tortured to death?” Lan Qiren said.

Wei Ying is many things, innocent is not one of them.

Lan Qiren could shriek.

“Then why did you stand by him,” Lan Qiren asked. “Why that foul little beast?”

I love him.

Love was a precarious word in his life. Love was what ripped his xiongzheng and his wife apart, love was what left his nephews as orphans, love was what tore Wangji to pieces, drove Xichen into the silence.

And what about Wei Wuxian deserved to be loved by Wangji?

He thought of the boy in his first life, with sweat curled hair, an easily distractible mind, but he had elegant, talented hands. He had a wit and a way to him. There was something delicate about the way his neck met his ear and the way his hair fell down his back. He had always been beautiful.

I love him.

Wei Wuxian was guilty of many things, but could Lan Qiren say with total honesty he believed the man sobbing over Wangji’s body without knowing anyone could hear him was a murderer? Could he honestly say that Wei Wuxian had killed Wangji?

No, and he knew that when tomorrow came, he would watch the man be flayed alive by a discipline whip for it.

He flung himself from his bed and dressed, pulling on the regalia he was supposed to wear, his guan, his robes, his blade. He needed to speak to Wei Wuxian before the trial tomorrow, before he was convicted to death by whipping, what a damn blood bath that would be.

Lan Qiren left his home later than was appropriate, but he had to speak with him. There would be no time the next day, they would pull Wei Wuxian from his cell at the earliest time, and chain him in front of the council who would deliberate for not nearly long enough, and who would convict someone who had not committed the crime.

He came to Wei Wuxian’s cell and dismissed the curious disciple keeping guard, then he entered.

Wei Wuxian was laid out on the ground, bruising around his eyes and blood on a laceration on his head. The healers had round the clock reports about Wei Wuxian’s behavior. They had been called many times to the cell over the past week, each time for some new bout of self-flaggelation. The little beast was shirtless, shackled, blood at the corners of his lips where the bind had cut off his ability to whistle. His ribs jutted out, his stomach hollow. A plate of untouched food in the corner. He was awake, or some semblance of it, but his eyes were fixed on the wall.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren called. “This sect leader would speak with you.”

Wei Wuxian didn’t answer. His eyes didn’t look up.

He knelt down next to him, and he realized Wei Wuxian was not quite mentally aware. He was in a state of catatonia, and Lan Qiren picked up the little beast’s hand and dropped it, watching it flop to the ground. Then he rubbed his fist in the center of Wei Wuxian’s chest, and the creature provided no reaction.

He pulled the bit out of the beast’s mouth, drool and spit pooled around it and slipped out of the corner of his mouth with a little blood.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren said, placing a palm on his cheek, patting it lightly to try and revive him. “Tomorrow you will stand trial for murdering Wangji, and while I am unsure if you are the culprit, others are already convinced. Wei Wuxian, if you have an ounce of self-preservation answer me. They will have you whipped to death. They will think this mental state a lie, and they will have you stand trial like this.”

Wei Wuxian’s body was still except for his breathing, a gentle up and down motion of his chest.

Lan Qiren, not knowing what to do, sent for Sizhui, who arrived barely awake but still worried maybe a quarter of shichen later.

“Xiansheng?” Sizhui inquired, coming to stand in the cell.

“Try and rouse him,” Lan Qiren commanded. “He has not responded to my urgings.”

Sizhui knelt next to Wei Wuxian, and with a wary glance at Lan Qiren, he looked down at the little beast.

“Gege,” Sizhui said, voice just above a whisper. “You have to wake up now. Your a-Yuan needs you.”

There must have been something mystical about the boy because Wei Wuxian’s blank face alighted with faint emotion, and his trembling, shackled hand touched Sizhui’s face.

“A-Yuan,” Wei Wuxian croaked, looking up at him with barely any recognition, just a sweet distractedness that didn’t quite fit.

“Gege, you must speak with xiansheng,” Sizhui said. “He is here for you.”

“Anything for a-Yuan,” Wei Wuxian said, voice rough, touching dirty fingertips to Sizhui’s soft cheek, who caught the hand and held it in his own.

Sizhui moved slightly out of the way but was still within reach to hold Wei Wuxian’s hand.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren said, kneeling beside the man. “Do not lie to me. Tell me what happened the morning Wangji was found dead.”

Wei Wuxian’s face fluttered in distress, his full lips coming into a pout, delicate brows curling in distress.

“He can’t have died,” Wei Wuxian said. “It's not possible. Lan Zhan’s not dead.”

“He is,” Lan Qiren confirmed without hesitation. “I need you to tell me what happened that morning, Wei Wuxian.”

Wei Wuxian reared back, suddenly looking like Lan Qiren had slapped him.

“Xiansheng,” Sizhui said, tentatively.

“No, he must answer,” Lan Qiren said sharply, then looked at Wei Wuxian’s distressed face. “What did you see, what did you hear, smell, taste? Anything that might help me.”

Wei Wuxian’s lips twisted up, and he said, “He was so cold. He’s never cold.”

Lan Qiren frowned, “Continue.”

“I’m always cold, and he warms me,” Wei Wuxian said. “But he was so cold.”

It was all they could get him to say. He kept saying it over and over. Wangji was cold. Lan Qiren wasn’t sure why it struck him as odd.

“Sizhui,” Lan Qiren said, turning to the boy, who was holding Wei Wuxian’s hand in his. “You will stay here. I will return, but make sure they do not take him. No one. Make sure no one comes into this cell other than myself.”

He went to his office nearby, and lit the lanterns in the room, shuffling to the reports on the corner of his desk. There was a report that the head healer had left. It was Wangji’s autopsy report, the report on Gu poison, and he flipped through the pages looking for what was turning his suspicion on. He found the page, and read through it a few times.

Symptoms of Gu Poisoning. Main symptoms of this poisoning are nausea and vomiting, usually leading to difficulty in breathing. The airways may swell, and in fatal cases, the respiratory system will fail. In addition, the heart rhythm will become irregular. Those in mild poisoning will experience dizziness, frequent headaches, confusion, and muscle weakness. Gu poisoning is often confused for wen bing due to its ubiquitous symptom of excessive burning fever.

He looked up from the paper.

He was so cold.

Lan Qiren set the papers aside, and glanced out the window, where he could see the barest shimmer of morning light.

The council was gathering, putting their robes on. They were going to kill an innocent man.

–

Sizhui had shirked off his outer robe to cover Wei Wuxian, and he was brushing Wei Wuxian’s hair with his fingers, humming a tune softly.

“Sizhui,” Lan Qiren said, beckoning the boy up.

Sizhui stood after smoothing the robe over Wei Wuxian’s form, and said, “Xiansheng?”

“You will take yourself back to your quarters,” Lan Qiren said. “If anyone inquires why you were here, you will tell them that I sent for you. If anyone asks why, you will tell them that I wanted you to tell Wei Wuxian goodbye.” Sizhui’s lip wobbled, and he looked down at Wei Wuxian.

“Listen closely,” Lan Qiren said, leaning in. “I will write to you, Sizhui. This man is not guilty, but if he stays here today, he dies. Do you understand what I say to you? Which name can write to you that will arouse no suspicion?”

The boy’s alighted at first with relief, then hope, then determination.

Sizhui said, “Hu Wuhan, he is a silversmith I found during my travels with Wen Ning. He writes to me intermittently of certain pieces of interest. No one would suspect his letters.”

“Keep your eyes open, Sizhui,” Lan Qiren said. “Speak with Xichen if you must, he will admit your entrance as acting sect leader, but do not expect him to solve this for us.”

“Xiansheng?” Sizhui questioned.

“This one would not leave you,” Lan Qiren said, swallowing hard as the thought of Xichen all those years ago. “But this one cannot wear his forehead ribbon and let an innocent man be tortured to death. Now go. I will write.”

He let Sizhui disappear from the cell for a few moments before he curled his arms around Wei Wuxian, lifted the man up, feeling what Wangji surely felt when he picked up his own spouse. He pulled him out into the hallway, and then into the sky on his sword, and he left behind the only place he had ever called home with his nephew’s suspected murderer in his arms.

–

Lan Qiren frowned at the table in the inn. He should never have brought that boy here. He should never have let Wei Wuxian anywhere near other people. For weeks after they had left Gusu, he had been out of his mind with loss, and Lan Qiren had to prevent many acts of self-harm. But it had been months. Months of journeying, months of campfires, and watches, and inn rooms, and disappointed replies from Sizhui, who had employed Lan Jingyi into his investigation, against Lan Qiren’s advice.

Neither of the boys had found anything, and though Sizhui was reticent to discuss his issues as newly instated acting sect leader, Lan Qiren could detect the anguish in the boy’s letters. He was struggling. Lan Qiren imagined Xichen at that age, during the Sunshot Campaign, without a single person to help him. Xichen was such a pleasant person, it was hard to imagine him in any distress.

He had burned the letter this morning after receiving it, and he had been waiting for a whole shichen for his travel companion to stumble down the stairs of the inn.

It was after the initial catatonia had ended and they had gotten out of Gusu when Lan Qiren discovered that Wei Wuxian was not drinking any tea and barely did he consume any water. What he did drink left his breath foul and his eyes glassy and red.

After months of traveling together, it still made Lan Qiren unreasonably angry when Wei Wuxian slept past their agreed upon time in the morning, their rooms in the inn were side by side, but Lan Qiren could not bring himself to push his way into the room, not for hours after the boy had slept in. He waited, fuming at the shamelessness, attempting to breathe out his fury into the steam of hot tea beneath his nose. Other occupants blessedly ignored him as he waited for his companion.

When Wei Wuxian did appear, he made the typical scene such a boy made.

Notably, some of the other patrons leered when Wei Wuxian made his appearance.

His chest was revealed to just below his clavicular notch, his robes haphazardly tied. If Wei Wuxian’s original body had facial hair or chest hair, Mo Xuanyu’s smaller form did not reflect it. His skin was smooth, his hair curling out by his temples, baby wisps of new growth. He was an unreasonably pretty human being, born of Jin Guanshan’s own appeal to the women he preyed upon (whatever that was) and the beautiful woman Mo Xuanyu’s mother undoubtedly had been. The body somehow suited Wei Wuxian, who had been a great beauty in his first life. Wei Wuxian with his father’s face, his mother’s lips and silver irises. Wei Wuxian, who moved like life was just a silly dance, but with all the precision of a hunter, a killer, a trained assassin, hopping through wards in the middle of the night to dance with sect heirs on roofs, stealing their hearts away from their purpose. Wei Wuxian, stumbling across a wooden inn floor, with his robes askew, his hair tangled, drawing the gaze of unscrupulous fellows (and the guilty glances of men trying, begging, hoping to be better than their baser instincts, hoping the bug would flutter to some other petal to land).

Wei Wuxian let out a yawn and slumped down next to him.

Lan Qiren sometimes wished that his companion would return to the blank look, the empty gaze of grief as he ran absent hands through his hair strands.

“Does your situation mean nothing to you?” Lan Qiren hissed, hushing his tone for just the two of them.

Wei Wuxian pouted and rubbed his index finger between his eyebrows as though the pad of his finger might whisk away a headache. A headache that surely must have burned and ached in a way Wei Wuxian was once unfamiliar with but now deeply acquainted with.

His eyes alighted on the boy’s wrist, where the shackle carved with talismans was visible just underneath the robe sleeve. The shackle that ensured Lan Qiren’s place as Wei Wuxian’s protector, it clamped all of the younger man’s power down and the only ones who could remove it were the council members who placed it.

Wei Wuxian trembled slightly, both hands running up to his eyes, and Lan Qiren closed his mouth of whatever harsh phrase he was about to parse out.

Wei Wuxian had not returned to any semblance of himself in the months that followed Wangji’s death. Not that he had a chance, not while they were on the run. He sometimes thought about cutting his losses, returning with Wei Wuxian in tow.

But then, Lan Wangji’s betrayed face had visited him as a ghost every night since, something uncleansable, something inside, a whip slicing his back again and again.

“Xiansheng,” Wei Wuxian began, his voice miserable, his hands falling to his lap to reveal his empty eyes. “After I have one drink, he is still dead. But after I have six, I can at least pretend. Forgive me, I want him back, I want him back so bad.”

His face fell into his hands again, and his shoulders shook almost imperceptibly.

Lan Qiren was uncomfortable. This was the side of Wei Wuxian he had to get used to, the side he was not used to seeing. It was an almost insane grief the younger man experienced. He slipped up sometimes, he spoke to Wangji while they were walking, saying Lan Zhan, look at those flowers. Lan Zhan a bee.

He frowned, and he said, “Then drink, but do not draw attention to yourself.”

As if that were possible.

The man drew people’s eyes wherever he went.

–

Wei Wuxian’s gaze went distant sometimes while they walked, and Lan Qiren would have to steady him if he stumbled.

The boy was not quite as graceful as he had once been, but he supposed that was less Mo Xuanyu’s body, and more Wei Wuxian’s own grief than anything.

“You should watch where you step,” Lan Qiren said to him, attempting to sound gentle after yet another stumble.

He looked at his companion, and he had just enough time to recognize the pale face and haunted eyes before he caught a slumping Wei Wuxian. The beast was deadweight in his arms as Wei Wuxian fell against him.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren inquired, gently lowering him to the ground. “Wei Wuxian.”

He touched the beast’s cheek, slapping lightly to get his attention, but Wei Wuxian only looked around in delirium.

Wangji, he thought desperately. How did you put up with this?

He looked down at Wei Wuxian, studying other parts of him, and he started to take note of the signs. His lips were cracked, his eyes sunken, and Lan Qiren started to understand something he was too slow to put together weeks ago. He had thought Wei Wuxian’s ability to walk and talk an improvement, and although most of the boy’s acts ended up being attempts at ending himself, he had thought the acute fears were over.

He was wrong.

“Wei Wuxian,” Lan Qiren said, slapping his cheek again, this time harder. “I have had food sent to every inn room we have stayed in, please tell me it was not wasted.”

He started to think back. Every meal they had together, Wei Wuxian had found something else to focus on, some other thing to hold his fancy. Lan Qiren had shrugged. Why had he not suspected?

In frustration, and perhaps spite, Lan Qiren gripped the boy's wrist, and he flooded the boy with some of his own spiritual energy.

Moments later, Wei Wuxian sputtered back to life with a groan, and Lan Qiren gripped his face more tightly than he needed to. He looked into Mo Xuanyu’s borrowed eyes, and said, “Wei Wuxian will sit and eat every meal with this one until he no longer stumbles and falls. Is this clear?”

Wei Wuxian’s eyes leaked tears, but he nodded.

–

Several weeks later, Wei Wuxian had returned to a semblance of his former self. He had forced food into the boy, and he had cleaned up when it had been too much. Now, tthey were in another town at a relatively nice inn, a place Lan Qiren could get used to if he truly wanted to. He had even sent Sizhui a letter, intending to stay here longer than a night.

Downstairs, he had left Wei Wuxian to his devices, which his devices entailed harassing people for drinks. Lan Qiren did not fund the habit, and so far, he had no need to. Wei Wuxian was perfectly capable of getting people to fund it for him, sitting beside them with a pleasing laugh, but Lan Qiren could see the tired twinge around his eyes.

Meanwhile, upstairs, Lan Qiren tried to observe the rules of his sect even while he was clothed like a regular man. He tried to blend in, but maintain the righteousness they toted. He went to bed at hai shi after the traditional nightly ablutions. His hair dried by linen and combed, his body relaxed from meditation, although he felt a migraine building behind his eye.

Lan Qiren suspected Wei Wuxian had been promiscuous with some of the inn members but he refused to ask about such things. He held his tongue. If Wei Wuxian wanted to pay for his drinking habits like a common whore, then that was his prerogative, not Lan Qiren’s.

(What if the flower was wrong about the bug? What if the flower wasn’t the only flower? Wei Wuxian had always been a serial harasser, and Lan Qiren had been among those who suspected him of promiscuity. Who would say no to Wei Changze’s beautiful face, to Cangse Sanren’s eyes, to Wei Wuxian’s glittering laugh? Not even Wangji could turn him down, why would anyone else?)

It was why Lan Qiren almost didn’t immediately stir out of his bed when he heard the noise coming from the room next door, from Wei Wuxian’s room.

He was not sure what ripped him bodily from his bed, perhaps it was Wangji’s spirit, gripping him by the lapels of his sleep robes, grabbing his blade from the bedside, and rushing to the room next to his.

The sight he beheld was not pleasant.

There were three men, and Wei Wuxian was on the bed, laughing, laughing, but not in a flirtatious way, not in a demure way that ladies in red used to lure their nightly prey, no he was laughing like he was weeping, like he was crying. (Had Wei Wuxian been weeping the whole time? Everytime he thought he was laughing, running away, was the boy just crying?)

The men had undressed themselves, Wei Wuxian’s robes were torn in such a way the intent was obvious, his lip split and bleeding.

Lan Qiren knew Wangji would have killed them.

He did not. He restrained himself.

He had them surrender, he marched them to the local magistrate, woke him up at an inhumane hour, and he told him in no uncertain terms to deal with them as one does rapists. Something about him must have said cultivator because the magistrate shook in his stockings as he had his staff apprehend the criminals, then Lan Qiren turned and left.

Wei Wuxian was still on the bed when returned, his gaze blank, his lips bloodied.

“I want to die,” Wei Wuxian said, looking, not at Lan Qiren, but elsewhere, maybe Wangji was in the room with them.

“Wangji lived thirteen years,” Lan Qiren said in quiet reprimand.

“I don’t know why,” Wei Wuxian said softly. “If this is how he felt.”

Lan Qiren could not imagine whatever it was Wei Wuxian felt. He had never been violated in such a way before, no one had ever considered him for the role. He looked down at the younger man, the little beast, who had none of his usual flair.

“They broke my leg,” Wei Wuxian said, just as devoid of emotion.

It jolted Lan Qiren, who realized the man had not moved at all from where he had been assaulted. He moved closer, and he inspected the leg, no no no, Wangji had broken leg, fire, burning, death so much death, and he found that the men had brutalized his companion far more than he realized. The bruising on his leg was intense, blood pooling around the break. Ugly purple red all the way up his shin. (There was bruising on his neck too, on his wrists.)

Bruising everywhere as he discovered when he had unwrapped his nephew’s spouse’s torso.

“Animals,” Lan Qiren found himself growling.

“Your nephew was worse,” Wei Wuxian said, expression far away.

He cringed at Wei Wuxian’s curious way of parrying a blow, then gently pulled Wei Wuxian’s clothes off of him, and dipped him in the water to wash off the blood and the imprints of their hands.

“They didn’t rape me,” Wei Wuxian said, lolling his head against the bath rim weakly.

“They wanted to.”

“They didn’t,” Wei Wuxian emphasized.

Wei Wuxian was infuriating.

But, Lan Qiren was gentle and swift as he cleaned off what remained of the assault. He supposed that it was good they had not completed the goal of their attack, but he suspected they had done far more than Wei Wuxian let him know. His travel companion was something of a liar, he noted.

“You should be honest with me,” Lan Qiren said.

“Why?” Wei Wuxian asked. “Would it make anything better if they had or hadn’t and I was honest about it?”

He wondered, briefly, if Wei Wuxian had to deal with this in his past life. If the number of women who giggled and demured under his cheerful gaze, equaled the men who privately wished for his attention. Lan Qiren had been in the conference of many older men, but no one had ever said such things around him. Xichen had exposed that peculiar thinking of some of them to him rather blatantly one afternoon. (Shufu, obviously you have not heard such things, they would not speak it near you because you are so good. Da-ge told me about it. Ah, don’t worry about Wangji, all the lechers know they would lose their fingers if they tried. Honestly, the Head Disciple of the Jiang Sect has it worse. Because his father was a servant. They think they are entitled, and Wei-gongzi is so friendly.) He wondered if Wei Wuxian, drinking at fourteen at the Jiang Sect, had been endangered, but then he recalled the absolute zenith of spiritual energy in the boy, the brilliant light, the power to match Wangji, who was as strong as a young immortal.

No, he decided. They would have been dead before they got the chance.

(Entitled. Entitled to a boy who burned with the heat of the sun, who pulled his Wangji up from the earth he had planted himself in. Entitled to a boy as beautiful as a painting, as handsome as art, as lively as a flowing river.)

Wei Wuxian didn’t cry that night until he thought Lan Qiren was asleep. They laid next to each other, Lan Qiren flat on his back, Wei Wuxian equally as flat with his broken leg splinted by Lan Qiren. He must have been in agony, but he didn’t make any noise about it. He was on the edge of returning to rest despite probably having to wake in another shichen or two. He felt Wei Wuxian before he heard him, a warm body curled next to him, seeking out the warmth of a man that wasn’t there and never would be again.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Wei Wuxian cried, whispered, hot tears leaking onto Lan Qiren’s shoulder.

He didn’t stir.

Wangji forgive me.

—

They slept in the same room after that, and Lan Qiren booked out the inn room until Wei Wuxian’s leg healed. It took several weeks, and Wei Wuxian was restless through it all, not wishing to rest, but ultimately finding Lan Qiren would bring him nowhere. He also cut off the alcohol, and he found Wei Wuxian somewhat…pleasant.

Lan Qiren almost had to remind himself that they were on the run from the Gusu Lan Sect, who Sizhui was sending on wild goose chases to the opposite end of the land, but that didn’t mean there wasn’t danger.

Every night, he thought of Wangji, he thought of his golden eyed nephew, and he kept the imaginary forehead ribbon on. He missed it. Abandoning the symbolic piece had been necessary part of the disguise, but he needed it more than ever then, in that inn room.

Something had changed in his thoughts of Wei Wuxian, something had shifted. He had realized something the night of the assault, but what? Whatever it was, was dangerous.

Lan Qiren had never married. He had too much to do. His nephews to raise, a sect to lead, his brother and his wife to liaison between, elders to appease. Marriage had been an unrealistic dream. His sect forbade promiscuity, and he followed their principles to the letter, inquiring punishment when he fell short.

That self-same ignorance of sensual things made him burn like a virgin on her wedding night each time Wei Wuxian rolled against him at night.

(He went out to the woods every morning, wrote out the precepts from memory while doing handstands, and he begged the heat in him to go away. But he was burned by the sun, it was the sun. Even Wangji had been ripped by his roots, turned his petals to look at him. Who could blame an old virgin?)

Wei Wuxian still cried when he thought Lan Qiren was asleep.

Lan Qiren thought of Wei Changze’s face, he thought of Cangse Sanren’s eyes. Mo Xuanyu’s body was softer than Wei Wuxian’s ever had been, his hair trailing past his small, tidy waist that he had seen Wangji grip in possession shamelessly many times. (What would it feel like under his hand?)

(Stop, stop, old master Lan.)

He spent his nights with a presence between his legs as hot tears burned his shoulder.

Wangji’s eyes burned him even worse.

Then, Wei Wuxian kissed him one night, and Lan Qiren tried to remain as still as possible, in feigned sleep.

(What are you doing, shufu?)

He wanted to scream against the precepts of his sect, his lips felt warm, Wei Wuxian’s salty tears leaked onto his face. He felt like he was in a dream. The elder’s council was a nightmare. How had he shifted? How had he changed?

“Lan Zhan, please.”

He wondered if Wei Wuxian was even fully awake when he did it. If the boy was simply in a quasi-sleep state, doing what he had done with Wangji, but to Lan Qiren instead. He had to put a stop to it.

(He didn’t want it to stop.)

He wanted to pull his nephew’s widower into his arms, kiss the tears away, kiss his lips—

When had it happened, when had he started to feel like this?

If he was lying, it was the night of the broken leg. If he was being honest, it was when he saw Wei Ying’s silver eyes, and his face, and he had thrown him out of his classroom.

(Who could resist? Wangji hadn’t.)

—

They finally left when Wei Wuxian’s leg had healed, his tentative, limping steps concerned Lan Qiren, and he held out his arm for the boy, who clutched it.

“Oh Lan-Laoxiansheng,” Wei Wuxian giggled. “What would I do without you?”

Lan Qiren’s ears burned.

—

The next three towns over, they stopped and rented a room at the inn. Lan Qiren sent a message to Sizhui using their agreed-upon code.

Children playing in the street hailed him as an old man fondly when he handed them sweets.

It made him think of Wei Wuxian, who had once been like one of these children except parentless, alone, and without guidance. They had all heard of the Jiang sect head disciple, the boy who had been lost and feared dead, found by Jiang Fengmian. Lan Qiren had been intrigued, and he had watched from afar. His eyes glanced at cultivation conferences, taking in the cheerful boy, seeing his parents in his features. (How many old men had seen the parentless child and saw easy prey? How many? He wanted to ask. He would never.)

Wei Wuxian ate a full bowl of rice that night. It was progress. His spouse’s death had ruined his appetite, and it was only just returning.

Lan Qiren sipped his tea and ate his food in silence. It was a pleasant sort of camaraderie, it put the nights of burning anguish in a shameful light.

They went up the stairs together, and Lan Qiren almost went about helping Wei Wuxian bathe, a new habit they had made when the other’s leg had been broken. He remembered to refrain though and sat by the bed waiting for his turn.

Wei Wuxian knew his routine, knew he liked to meditate before the bath and after. He wondered if he learned it from Wangji.

It was nearing six months. It had been six months since Wangji had died, been murdered in cold blood, poisoned by his tea. Sizhui had had no luck in finding the culprit, Jingyi even less. Six months of wandering, six months of Wei Wuxian drinking, the assault, the damage, the sleepless nights, the mornings doing handstands to make the blood run down.

“I think he’ll hate me,” Wei Wuxian said, his wet hair long down his back, hitting just where his legs turned into hip, some of it came over his shoulders, dangling down his slender torso and slight waist. He was really beautiful. In both lives, it had been true. For that, Lan Qiren could not fault his nephew.

There was a puff of hair above his cock, which while not at full attention, was interested.

Lan Qiren looked, and for all he was worth, he wanted to rip his imaginary forehead ribbon off, throw it out the inn window and forget about the cultivation world and Gusu Lan, forget about his nephews, forget about duty, and a brother and his wife. He wanted. For himself. He wanted something. He thought of his anger towards Wei Wuxian years ago, the boy who took on demonic cultivation, who spent the Sunshot Campaign as a wraith, and then died a ghost in a place where no person should live. He had never considered possessing such a creature.

Something about seeing him gaze dolefully at the wall waiting for Wangji, something about him crying every night for Wangji, something about him so utterly human and warm and alive and present. His grief, his fear, and suddenly, Lan Qiren saw Wei Wuxian. He saw everything Wei Wuxian had ever been, and ever was, and he now understood what had drawn Wangji across a rooftop.

He stood up from the bed, and he walked across the room to where Wei Wuxian stood, and noticed the slight tremble to his body. Up close, Lan Qiren could see the unshed tears in his eyes, the fear of what? (Rejection, abuse, acceptance, betrayal.)

“I do not think Wangji was capable of hating you,” he said, he studied those steady eyes, full of moisture.

(He remembered his brother’s wife. She was beautiful even when she had tears in her eyes. She had shed them every time he led his brother away.)

“Wei Ying is very beautiful,” Lan Qiren admits. “If he were hoping for this humble one, and not for another, this humble one would gladly remove his forehead ribbon.”

Wei Wuxian’s face fell, the unspent tears coming out.

“I’m sorry,” Wei Wuxian said.

Lan Qiren placed his hand on the soft curve of his cheek, lifted up his head, and kissed his forehead as his father had done to him, as he had done to Xichen and Wangji. Wei Wuxian fell against him, collapsed into him, and he held him like he had the boys when they were small and were still so precious. (Why had Wangji grown up so fast?) He pulled off his outer robe, and he covered Wei Wuxian with it. He brought him to the bed, and he laid him down there, caressing wet hair back, and he laid with Wei Wuxian, held him.

His decision made the heat in his abdomen die, and he could have held Wei Wuxian for three life-times and felt only that he was holding a son, not a potential lover.

“I feel stupid,” Wei Wuxian whispered into his shoulder. “I miss him more than anything, how did he do this xiansheng? How did he live like this?”

Lan Qiren was not sure that what Lan Wangji did after Wei Wuxian’s death could truly be counted as living, more it was a transitional phase between life and death, a limbo where one hoped and had no reason to. It was hard to look Lan Wangji in the eyes afterwards. After Lan Qiren had helped raise a-Yuan, who he knew the origin of, who he had condoned and supported and aided the eradication of his entire clan and his family. He had helped. A-Yuan. He had helped. Wei Wuxian. He had watched. Egged on. Goaded.

(Lan Wangji, he had watched them beat the boy bloody for loving someone too harshly, for supporting someone who was destined to die, for seeing the darkness in their world so clearly, so concisely because he had loved. Stripe after stripe. He couldn’t watch them beat Wei Wuxian to death for the death of Wangji, who he loved more than all things.)

“You are not stupid,” Lan Qiren decided to say. “Wangji performed his own acts of desperation after your death. I do not imagine that for one moment you would consider me if Wangji were still alive and in your arms.”

Wei Wuxian sighed, “He would hate me. I don’t– I–”

It’s not like the man to be so out of words, but he was, and Lan Qiren was witness to it.

He finally gathered his thoughts, and said, “I think Lan Zhan is my one and only. He was my first, he can be my last too.”

The idea struck Lan Qiren. Just another thing he had gotten wrong, another haphazard belief that had tormented him and then he realized he was wrong. So, so wrong, again.

(The boy was the sun, wouldn’t it make sense for all flowers to turn their faces towards him, all trees to shiver under his gaze, for the world to wait with baited breath for his arrival and cheer at his going down. Except the flowers never cheer when the sun goes down.)

“My Lan Zhan, he would have rather died than told anyone else,” Wei Wuxian said, humor in his voice. “But he stole my first kiss on Phoenix Mountain in my first life. I had a blindfold on, you see, to prove I was the best at a night hunt. Ah, I was such an arrogant idiot. I was blindfolded, and lounging, and Lan Zhan kissed me first. But, ahahah, I thought he was a maiden, a really strong maiden. I found him afterwards punching trees, oh, we were so stupid. The both of us.”

Wei Wuxian dissolved into a fit of teary laughter, and Lan Qiren felt the bubble of amusement in his chest. Lan Wangji would rather punch a tree than express himself normally. He was such a stubborn child, Xichen had found it cute when the pout came out, and had cooed at the little brother with stern eyes, but cheeks too chubby and round to take seriously. Lan Qiren had found him difficult.

“I just love him so much,” Wei Wuxian said wetly.

“He loved you beyond what words can say,” Lan Qiren said, thinking back to months ago when he had walked toward the Jingshi after a missed meeting angry about that love.

Wei Wuxian cried for a long time after that, and he held him through it, until the younger man fell asleep.

Instead of hot, he felt heavy, sorrow wrapped around his heart.

–

Sizhui had no good news. No discoveries. No theories. No leads. All he said in his letter was that there was a sect council being held about Wei Wuxian, the Yiling Laozu’s disappearance from his jail cell, and what in the world the Gusu Lan were going to do about it. Especially with Lan Qiren suspect in having broken the Yiling Laozu from his cell.

“Lan Zhan would have had this settled,” Wei Wuxian said admonishingly from where he was stretching out his healed leg tentatively. “Hanguang-jun, Lord of Administrative Competence.”

Lan Qiren tsked, and burned the letter up with spiritual energy.

His nephew would have had an immediate solution to the problem if he were alive, namely that the problem never would have happened in the first place.

“The elders were aiming for your death the moment it happened,” Lan Qiren said dismissively, and he was surprised when Wei Wuxian let out a loud laugh. “I do not think they cared if you were guilty. Sizhui will not be able to assuage them.”

“Oh, poor Sizhui,” Wei Wuxian cooed. “Doesn’t he have your confidence?”

Lan Qiren sighed, and found his hand stroking at his beard.

“Sizhui is young,” Lan Qiren said. “He is more than capable of sect duties, and we raised him as an heir should Wangji perish. I have confidence in him, but he also has Xichen’s appeasing qualities. The same qualities that landed us in our previous political debacle. And, the council is…obstinate.”

Wei Wuxian snorted indelicately, and said, “You don’t say. Were they the same who had my Lan Zhan whipped like that?”

Lan Qiren didn’t answer. There had been few changes in the council since then, the same people who had his nephew whipped bloody now wanted his spouse dead by the same whip.

“I hope our a-Yuan is not overly stressed,” Wei Wuxian said, and his tone was worried. “Poor a-Yuan is too young for this, and they are too mean. It isn’t his fault, they’re so old.”

“They likely will not rest until you are dead,” Lan Qiren said, shaking his head. “Nothing Sizhui does will appease them because you were guilty before my nephew was dead in their eyes.”

The meadow fell silent, and he looked up at Wei Wuxian to see the young man looking at him with his head cocked to the side like a curious bird. Then, Wei Wuxian’s eyes got a contemplative look as he twirled something around in his head. Lan Qiren could only guess at it as the younger man quieted and walked away as though in a dream, walking under the trees and whispering quietly to himself. He caught a word every now and then.

Lan Zhan was one of them.

Lan Qiren found out later that night as they curled by their fire, resting in the open.

“I think we should go to the council,” Wei Wuxian said.

Lan Qiren blinked at him across the fire.

“I stand by my decision,” Lan Qiren said, confusion lacing his tone. “I will protect you.”

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian said. “And for that, I will always love you, Shushu.”

He feels the name wash over him delightfully, only for the second wave to burn him.

“But, I don’t want to be protected anymore,” Wei Wuxian said, his gaze on Lan Qiren. “I want to be with my Lan Zhan, wherever it is we go. I don’t think we were made to be apart if I’m honest. We’ll put an end to this madness, I’ll go in, they’ll put me to death, and you can go back to being Lan-laoxiansheng, and Sizhui can be a young disciple again. Say I poisoned you with that stuff that killed my Lan Zhan. They’ll forgive you, shushu.”

“No,” Lan Qiren shook his head, and said, “Wuxian, I will not stand by and watch the greatest miscarriage of justice my sect has ever perpetrated. Do you have any concept of what being whipped to death would feel like?”

Wei Wuxian’s head cocked to the side, and he said, “Yes. I do. And it will not be their greatest. This, at least, is deserved.”

Lan Qiren paused, and he looked at Wei Wuxian, who had pursed his lips. The boy had died a gruesome death once, not by whipping, but it was bad in its own way. He had done horrendous wrong once upon a time. It was easy to forget in the face of him, such was the overwhelming nature of Wei Wuxian.

“I walked a line and I fell,” Wei Wuxian said. “I believed—

He stared off.

“I don’t know what I believed,” Wei Wuxian said. “I was sick then. But, I made my mistakes, and I can’t–”

He choked, and his gaze settled back on Lan Qiren.

“I can’t take back what I did,” Wei Wuxian said. “I tried to stop it, all that horror. I ended it. But, I can’t undo what has been done, and no amount of deaths I suffer will ever erase the death I have caused. Maybe this is my retribution, to die terribly each time and come back again, hurt the ones I love the most, again, and be ripped to pieces again. Maybe someday it will be enough.”

Lan Qiren stared.

“Sometimes,” Wei Wuxian said, smiled. “I like to imagine that I had gone with him back to Gusu when he asked. I think life would be so much simpler if I had.”

He smiled after that absently, staring in the fire.

It took several days, but Wei Wuxian convinced him to go to the council. Although, convince was a strong word. Lan Qiren had let Wei Wuxian make his own decision, and he had done it in the spirit of his nephew, who had let Wei Wuxian choose. He had even let him choose death last time too.

So be it then.

Lan Qiren felt like Wangji’s fist was gripping his heart.

–

The council reacted as was expected.

Lan Qiren felt the stone beneath his knees. He felt cool air drifting across his hair, playing with the strands. And his gaze was fixed on Wei Wuxian, who was stripped down in front of the council, a discipline whip ready.

Wei Wuxian didn’t look scared, he was smiling at Lan Qiren, a grin on his face, and he mouthed, Thank you.

This is what he had wanted. The whole time.

He wanted to be with his Lan Zhan.

He assumed the crack of the whip falling on Wei Wuxian’s shoulders was like thunder, but Lan Qiren couldn’t hear it. He only had the memory of Wangji’s whipping to go off of, and he had heard that crack in his secret nightmares for many years. But, he couldn’t hear it this time. He heard Sizhui cry, heard Jingyi pull his friend aside, he felt himself drown in blood all over again, and he watched Wei Wuxian, who much like Wangji all those years ago, remained stoic. A grip on his thighs, lips flattened into a line as the pain erupted. It would go like this til he died.

But one strike of the whip in, and something else erupted throughout the council.

A familiar light, a flash of a sword, and Lan Qiren and Wei Wuxian were not the only one’s brought to their knees.

–

“Lan Zhan?” Wei Wuxian gasped, looking at the figure in all white, blood sliding off the slice in his back.

Lan Qiren stared agape at the two as Hanguang-jun in all his glory pulled Wei Wuxian up and into his arms without regard at all to the council around them, without regard to the disciple carrying out the whipping. Wangji’s gaze was stout and angry, his eyebrow pinched, his golden eyes blazing. His nephew’s nostrils were flaring in short intervals as he looked down at the stripe across his husband’s shoulder.

But, Wei Wuxian was just looking up sweetly at him, like he was already dead and had been given the greatest of afterlives.

“Oh, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian said. “You– You’re alive!”

“Wei Ying is hurt,” Lan Wangji stated.

“You were dead, oh you were dead, my Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, hold me, please, just hold me,” Wei Wuxian begged, falling into Lan Wangji’s front, pressing into the white robes as Wangji pulled up the stripped garment and pulled it loosely around the smaller frame.

“What is the meaning of this?” The chief elder said, standing up and bustling into the center. “Hanguang-jun is dead! This must be an imposter.”

“Not so,” a new, familiar voice said, arriving in the hall.

Lan Qiren’s head swiveled, and he saw his other nephew arrive in the room. He was pristine as he ever was, his headband tied, his quan in place, a gentle smile on his face.

“Sect Leader!”

Lan Xichen’s soft gray eyes alighted on him, and something unreadable flashed across his eyes before he turned to observe the council of elders.

“Long has this council stood,” Lan Xichen stated, coming to stand next to Lan Wangji. “And long has it reigned over this sect with righteous intention, but even the greatest of things can fall to corruption if it is not properly checked. Yes, even rivers will lose their banks if the reeds do not break the current.”

“Sect Leader,” the chief elder said, coming to stand near him. “We–”

“You have dealt poorly with my brother and his spouse,” Lan Xichen said. “Hanguang-jun is possessed of a great and powerful core, the poison you placed in cups could only do so much. He fought it long and hard, and now he is returned to us in full health and with all his memory.”

“You have no proof,” the chief elder spat.

“On the contrary,” Lan Xichen said, smiling gently as he pulled a slip of parchment from his robes. “I believe this is your handwriting, is it not?”

Lan Qiren watched in disbelief, still on his knees watching everything he knew to be true turn up on its head, but his gaze fixed on one thing.

Lan Wangji had Wei Wuxian tucked up into his arm, a shameless gesture any other time, and his hands were running down Wei Wuxian’s hair and cheeks, wiping away tears. He watched the two of them slip away, letting Xichen deal with things properly.

—

“You want it removed?” the disciple asked him, and Lan Qiren nodded.

The man with the chisel in his hands frowned, but he rose up on his sword and Lan Qiren watched him scrape off the rule.

Interacting with Wei Wuxian is forbidden.

It was long overdue. It had taken months to reform the council, and it had taken Lan Qiren awhile to focus on any one thing for too long. His life on the road with Wei Wuxian had changed him, and the malicious deceit lingering in his own sect had forever branded a mark on his brain. He wondered if it was how Wangji felt after they whipped him.

“Shufu.”

Lan Qiren didn’t turn, but he acknowledged Wangji’s presence with a nod.

“You strike it from the wall?” Wangji asked.

“I was wrong,” Lan Qiren stated simply, staring at the words disappear, then he looked at Wangji’s confused golden eyes.

His nephew was more gaunt than he had been in past years. After the poisoning, he had been in a coma for several months, then in paralysis. Xichen had feared Wangji would never fully recover, but the ordeal had left his nephew thinner than he had ever been. Those round cheeks were totally gone.

“Wei Ying said…” Wangji frowned.

He did not need words to know what his nephew was referring to. There were a few events it could likely be, but only one Wei Wuxian would tell Wangji about and only out of guilt.

Lan Qiren felt his mouth twist ruefully, then gently, he laid a hand on Wangji’s shoulder, which tensed slightly under his hand. He felt his lip tilt in a way it had not since his xiongzheng first disappeared into seclusion, and he said, “Wei Wuxian would have rather died than live in a world without you, Wangji, and you nearly watched him prove it.”

That made his nephew’s expression deepen, and then Wangji shook his head.

He took a step back, and Wangji saluted him, he straightened up and said, “If Shufu had not been righteous, this one would have lost Wei Ying a second time.”

Lan Qiren jolted at the words. His nephew was not verbose, but when he used words, they meant more somehow.

(The flowers had poked through the earth again, and the bee laid sleepily on its petals. The way it always should have been.)

Lan Qiren bowed, and straightened, looking at Wangji, “If this one had been righteous many years ago, Wangji would have no need to lose him the first time.”