Archive of Our Own

I.

The High Elder inspected the nook and cranny of the delicately trimmed edge outlining the piece of armor. The ornate embroidery glistened in coral gold proved the diligence of the artisan upon crafting this relic, yet merely scrutinizing the pair of objects in the case failed to dispel his unease; even if they looked as though having been placed on the velvet cloth with deliberate care. There was no room for even the slightest mistake, not one. Dan Feng held himself back from so much as touching it for fear of scraping the precious leather. 

It had been made exceptionally clear that these garments be made out of nothing short of the most exquisite borisin skin found in the Luofu and handcrafted by the most adept of craftsmen; even the flawless handiwork was the result of numerous reforging procedures. He himself had also, on an embarrassing number of occasions, sneaked out to ensure that the work in process was infallible. The High Elder scolded himself for abandoning his duties for personal matters several times — but always came back regardless, there had still been certain priorities kept. 

Foxian ears perked up from behind, aurora borealis eyes peered through his shoulder in a curious manner, “Have you got it? You’re taking rather long… Ooh~” 

Baiheng’s words slices his vigorous train of thoughts, prompting the Vidyadhara to flinch the arm holding the box with a jolt. The contents were hardly dispositioned, but it didn’t bring him any more comfort. 

“No.” Dan Feng returned a hardened look, clearly not endeavouring to sugar-coat his frustration at her disruption. Thankfully, the navigator did not take exception towards his bluntness and attempted to suppress a giggle—to no avail— sincerely admiring the pair. 

“Not done? What are you so worried about? As far as I know, you commissioned them years prior. That's a dozenfold the time necessary for an ordinary pair.” 

She was not wrong, of course, Baiheng never is in her reassurance. No stones could have been left unturned on his watch. In fact, Dan Feng has already gone as far as to delaying his duties just to make timed visits to the commissioner. 

“I would not call that a remarkable length,” dismisses Dan Feng modestly; meekly, even — how impossibly amusing to see!

“Ah, yes, because you’re a long-life species.” She pointed out, “But he isn’t. From a short-life’s perspective, I’d be quite flattered.” 

Baiheng arched a brow at the unimpressed sigh she was given as a response. “What? Am I wrong? Maybe he’s too tremendously conceited to be flattered, but my point stands.” 

“What if he doesn’t like it?” 

It sounded like a childish concern, and Dan Feng knew that despite himself, the craftsman would never look a gift horse in the mouth, much less remark on it. So much so that, in fact, Yingxing would go far as assuring him otherwise; but his eyes speak volumes – Vidyadharas are good at reading into them – and it would only make Dan Feng feel worse. 

“Why wouldn’t he?” Quizzical, the foxian’s ears twitched. Yingxing hardly looks like someone with high aesthetic standards, should that be what Dan Feng looks so worried about.

“Well, since he’s such an old hand.” A meek snicker. “Heaven only knows how degrading it might be to offer the renowned Furnace Master something so mediocre.”

His companion stared back with incredulous boredom. He made a mental note not to think out loud again. Then she shrugged and accompanied it with a Baiheng-trademarked smile that instantly reassured anyone as they saw it, winking. “Should it happen that he does not like it, rest assured that he still likes you.”

“... Right.” Dan Feng stifled a sigh, finally closing the box, albeit not quite convinced. 

On their way back, only the sound of Baiheng’s laughter blended with the hustle and bustle of the markets lining the streets of the starskiff… 

The bracers had been sitting on the shelf in Dan Feng’s room for a week. 

Of course, a week paled in comparison to the years taken for these bracers to be perfected. Leather was by no means even slightly worn out nor had the dust been given time to collect. Dan Feng did not forget about them (as if he could), but had left one untouched since retrieval, and only used half of the pair. He made no mention of the other to Yingxing, either; whereas the latter had quite adamantly commented on the Vidyadhara’s own fondly, frequently accompanied by the question on where the other bracer was — to which Dan Feng did not grace him with an answer. 

Today, it disappeared. 

The Luofu High Elder returned from the Divine Foresight with an extremely splitting headache from having to deal with excessive frivolous problems, and an even heavier chest upon the unfamiliar absence of a royally crimson box on his shelf. It was a week’s worth of familiarity, but Dan Feng would look at it so often that he immediately noticed the missing piece when he came back. 

Dread came crashing into him like tidal waves. The High Elder had to double check the shelves to make sure his clouded mind wasn’t fooling him and much as he wished it was, the shelves were without a trace. 

Dan Feng went back and forth across his chamber before whatever initially caused his headache was replaced with dread. He could not afford to fear that this relic has been stolen, which mortal would have the audacity to enter his chamber unsanctioned? Much less able to bypass his guards without alert? It’s going to be a long day.

…

“You’re distracted,” Dan Feng grimaced as his piece was caught in checkmate, his third consecutive defeat that afternoon. Jing Yuan calmly takes a sip of his tea, as if his comment wasn’t a conscious attempt to probe an answer, he pushes further, “Your moves are not usually this sloppy.” 

The High Elder sighs, half-heartedly lifting his own cup, which had remained undrunk since their first match. The tea had already run cold when it touched his parched lips. Dan Feng’s expression falls.

“A penny for your thoughts, High Elder?” 

“Just the usual affairs,” He lies adequately.

“That so?” Jing Yuan absently rearranges the deck once more, and Dan Feng is still sharp enough to notice the way he is slyly sliding certain cards atop each other. He is, however, far too preoccupied to call out on this cheat.  “I heard a certain someone had a whole crew of cloudknights on patrol, what could possibly trouble you so?”

Dan Feng considers calling him out on poking his nose into other’s business, but he has already had enough irritation to suffice living through the day. 

“What’d you think..?”

“Hm,”  Jing Yuan fake ponders, then his cheek draws into a smile, rather like a big puppy trying to make Dan Feng pour his heart out to him, “Difficult to imagine if it gets somebody like you worked up.”

A self-deprecating chuckle is what answers him, Dan Feng lowers his cup before he can drink it, once more, staring into his reflection. “Enough to disgrace my own intentions.”

“Which is?” And Dan Feng swears that man’s lips quirks into a number three. Has this man hung out with that “cat” of his so often he’s slowly turning into one? Then again.

Why was he entertaining this pointless talk?

Dan Feng clutched on his cup, takes one decisive sip and forcefully slam it on the table, eyes determinedly fixated on the board, when——

“Yinyue,”

Although the voice is barely softer than morning brew, Dan Feng still startles. His body stiffens unwillingly, and all focus he had gathered so far dwindles in an instant. Jing Yuan, the wretch that he is, is smiling amusedly out of the corner of his eyes. 

“Yingxing’s eyes crinkle just a tad bit when the High Elder turns. Dan Feng cannot escape them even if he tries.

Dan Feng could feel Jing Yuan’s narrowed, suggesting gaze analyzing them. It takes a hell lot of self restraint…

“Ah, it seems like you found it,” Dan Feng threw him a glare. Jing Yuan faked obliviousness, but promptly rose. “I’d better take my leave.”

Dan Feng mutters something rather hostile under his breath as Jing Yuan excuses himself. 

“He came in good faith,” Yingxing assures with a chuckle that never fails to soften Dan Feng’s heart, his eyes wavered just slightly when he returned to look at the other man. Only then did he realize that Yingxing had already stood several steps closer before him. Under different circumstances, the High Elder would’ve been unfazed, but in light of a relatively recent revelation…

“Yingxing,” Dan Feng’s voice is even, concealing the agitation lurking underneath. “Do you need me?”

The High Elder couldn’t read the smile that tugs on the other man’s face, it makes him feel a bit unnerved.

“Ah,” Yingxing taps on his lips once, innocently, then unveils the hand hiding behind his back. 

“I hear you were looking for this?”

Dan Feng recogizes it immediately: A beautiful, familiar bracer lays around Yingxing’s arm, an exact match with the one he is wearing.

“Wh… you were the one who stole it?” Dan Feng’s expression is conflicted, but nowhere near enough to look mad. If anything, the feeling is closer to ease.

“Stole it?” Yingxing’s smile becomes smug, he raises a brow, “I went all the way to your room, and now all you have to give me is such a brazen accusation? Not really stealing if it’s supposed to be mine, no?”

“That’s—” Not wrong. But it isn’t right. And it’s just about time that Dan Feng remembers that he had entrusted Yingxing the second key to his chamber a while ago. A permission handed out so naturally he hardly acknowledged it.  

“... It’s supposed to be a gift,” The Vidyadhara sighs halfheartedly, though he was partly relieved to see the armor rests finely on Yingxing’s hand, wrapping steadily around it a color of crimson that goes with the rest of the outfit nicely. “I was meant to give it to you.”

“At your pace, aren’t you afraid it’s going to collect dust on that shelf?” Yingxing teases, a little too gleefully to embarrass him. 

Dan Feng’s lips part, but no rebuttal comes. At that, Yingxing assures him gently, “You’re overthinking again, I’ll cherish anything given by your hand.”

With the way Yingxing’s looking at him, Dan Feng can only soften. “You’re talking too much.”

“And you, High Elder, worry too much. What’s this to you, then, a proposal?” he continues as he admires the bracer, “I know you’re eager, but can’t you court me first?” 

Dan Feng gives him a look, but all Yingxing sees is the way the High Elder’s pale face flushed a new shade of pink. 

In truth, Dan Feng, too, has asked himself that several times. The first few times, the answer didn’t seem to matter; yet, the more attention he gave to this gift being crafted out as perfectly as possible, coupled with a few of Baiheng’s remarks on his unusual uptightness on the matter, Dan Feng stopped being so sure. Unfortunately, he doesn’t want to be so direct about his intentions that he didn’t know existed, Dan Feng likewise settles on the most comfortable, convincing explanation. 

“It’s a symbol of camaraderie,” His expression is calm, but if this relic truly is one of a kind, then Yingxing would’ve known what the heat that surges up his wrist indicates—a lie. 

Yingxing doesn’t call him out on it, it would feel unfair if he does, but he makes no effort to look oblivious, either. A pair of bracers with a telepathic connection, transmitting their body temperature to one another, surely Dan Feng must be aware of the irony reeking from his words. 

But Yingxing can get used to this kind of affection, and so he smiles nonetheless. “I shall keep it by my side, then.”

II.

Sometimes, boredom creeps into Dan Feng’s day very subtly. Mostly because Dan Feng tells himself he doesn’t get bored, his schedule is already packed as it is to afford space for boredom. 

He spends a few of those days in the company of books, for the most part, it is much easier to get immersed when you will yourself to read than when stumped with scrolls thick enough that they fall off your own knees. Dan Feng was perfectly content with the arrangement, until someone told him that boredom will still seek him out in the space of his own room this way, and suggested visiting the ship for a change. 

Though he enjoys the tranquility only the Scalelorge Waterscape can offer, Dan Feng finds that the hustle and bustle of the markets is not nearly as irritating as he made it out to be. They fill the empty spaces when his thoughts become too loud inside his own mind. Soon he would be found routinely taking strolls by Aurum Alley, whether it is the scented air breezing down these streets or the presence of people he’s never talked to—boredom begone. 

Often, and though he tends to avoid this, his feet bring him to the Furnace. 

Dan Feng hovers helplessly over the oak red door as his fingers curl together. He lets out a somewhat self-pitying exhale, but his whole body didn’t even think about moving to save him his dignity. It’s not as though it is his first time here. Although, he usually came prepared with reasonings, never spontaneous and empty handed as he stands now (not that he thinks Yingxing has believed any of his previous ones, anyway.)

Deciding lingering here would make him appear even less inconspicuous than the second before, Dan Feng exhales and pushes his way in.

It is then that he realizes he forgot to knock.

He only knew this because the sight that graced him the moment he steps through the threshold into the burning air of the forging fire... is a Yingxing wholly unclad, hammering away at the forging table. 

Dan Feng’s determination falls completely, and he is standing frozen at the door when he realizes he has to say something. Otherwise he would be intruding. Yes. 

Unfortunately, he doesn’t find his voice before Yingxing does. 

“Dan Feng?”

Dan Feng curses himself when he notices the way Yingxing’s breath ragged as he greets him, making the name fall off his tongue in a husky rumble. 

“Yingxing.” He reciprocates evenly, though it takes several seconds to find his movements again, “You’re occupied,” 

“For you, not at all,” 

The craftsman lifts his hammer as though it weighs air and hurls it decisively onto the anvil. Once he made sure it was evenly hammered, Yingxing brought the weapon—something Dan Feng made out to be a spear, but has otherwise been eclipsed by his shoulder blades—and rested it inside the forge. Yingxing dusts off his hands and turns, and good heavens.

Dan Feng’s lips clasped tightly together and he tries very hard not to swallow. Yingxing is making it horribly difficult.

Dan Feng attempts to avert his gaze, but they eventually drift back on the other man’s body anyway. Under the low hanging light, his muscles almost seem more pronounced, or perhaps they simply weren’t hidden under awful layers of garments. Just how many hours had he spent here that his arm is made of sweat-soaked skin. And how come is his chest so— 

“High Elder?” Yingxing’s voice pulls Dan Feng out of his trance in an instant. His eyes clumsily find the other’s, and Yingxing is looking at him with an unreadable smile. “You’re here to see me?”

“I’m unoccupied.” Dan Feng’s response is stiff, as he tries to look around the interior of the Furnace instead of fixing his eyes on— he fails. Spectacularly.

“So you came to see me.”

“Am I not allowed to observe the Furnace Master handcrafts his relics?”

Dan Feng hadn’t intended to sound so accusatory. But oh well, it’s entirely Yingxing’s fault that he’s wearing far too little for comfort and turns the heat of this already-burning chamber a hundred times hotter.

Without warning, Yingxing wraps both hands around Dan Feng’s waist—they closed in perfectly — and picks him up, sitting him down on the countertop in one swift motion

“What are you doing?” Dan Feng demands breathlessly. 

“Shifting your focus,” Two audacious hands placed on either side, trapping Dan Feng firmly atop his desk. Back slightly arched, Yingxing leans up with a smirk, “Now we’re at eye level.” 

“We were at eye level.” 

Yingxing quirks a brow. “I don’t recall my eyes being on my chest.” 

“I—” Dan Feng flushes fiercely, as though he was being accused of a crime, and turns his face away, Yingxing gaze follows him anyway. “... wasn’t...”

“Mhm,” 

It is already scorching inside the Furnace, yet Dan Feng’s body temperature somehow manages to be so distinct Yingxing can feel it under his bracer, anyway.

“Don’t lie to me now.” His face is pushed so close against Dan Feng’s that their nose nearly touches.

“It’s indecent.” Dan Feng fidgets, inching away. 

“Really?” Closer.

“Indeed.” Further.

“Aren’t you indecent for groping your eyes at me?” 

Dan Feng’s head meets the wall, and with the way he can practically feel Yingxing’s breath hotly grazing his skin. He swallows, and the air feels more stagnant than before 

“....... Your sword is going to burn.” In the midst of his panic, Dan Feng says the only thought that forms inside his mind, and he realized how stupid it sounds the moment it leaves his mouth. His lips pursed together as though stopping him from cringing at his own words. 

Laughter spills from Yingxing’s throat, and the sound worsens every time Yingxing tries to stop himself, “I—” Again. “A-Feng, you—” Again. “That’s not…” He laughs again, Dan Feng considers hitting him this time. 

Fortunately, Yingxing catches his breaths before Dan Feng gets the chance to act on these thoughts. “I’m forging a sword, High Elder,” he wipes a tear from his eye, “Not baking cakes.”

Even if that was how the furnace works, which Dan Feng is painfully aware it isn’t, then Yingxing hadn’t left his ‘swords’ unattended long enough to ‘burn’. 

And Dan Feng—

He kicks him. 

“Ow,” Yingxing winces, but the smile hardly makes Dan Feng convinced that he was in any real pain. Fortunately, his grip on the counter softens, drawing the Vidyadhara an easier escape. 

Dan Feng exhales as he stands a few steps away, putting enough distance between him and Yingxing, just to cancel out the proximity (or lack of thereof) between them just now. Relief breezes across his whole body that he almost forgot he was still in the furnace.

“Next time,” The High Elder has his back turned awkwardly away, “... wear something properly.”

“But I thought you liked it?” Yingxing coaxes in a silky tone. 

Dan Feng doesn’t deny it. “... It’s improper to be so showy to outsiders.” He pauses, picking at his words, “You may be so at ease with me, but you’re going to appear arrogant to other people this way…” 

“High Elder,” Yingxing’s smiles spread wider, “That has to be the most roundabout way I’ve seen anyone tell me to strip only when they’re around.”

Ah, there it is, Heat flares up his wrist again. Except, instead of tripping into a fluster of nonsensical words—what Dan Feng says is:

“Someone has told you that?” And the determined look in his eyes, almost like he’s interrogating him. How adorable his High Elder could get. Turns out they were as shameless as one another... 

III.

Yingxing wakes in cold sweat.

His body, hell, if it still belongs to him at all, had already stripped several garments throughout the night, it isn’t enough. His body, mostly his wrist, burns relentlessly. Yingxing wipes the sweats that have already used time to form along his temple, and pulls his hair into a tail, pushing himself out of bed. 

The heat emerging in his body is not his. In fact, had it been his, perhaps it wouldn’t rake him through the night as it is. Especially for a furnace master who has spent most of his mortal days next to the scorching heat of the forging fire, this kind of temperature is nowhere near enough to faze him. Yet, if he can feel it this clearly, it means the 

Dan Feng’s bedchamber is not far from his. It takes much convincing for Yingxing not to think the high elder has deliberately arranged it when he lets Yingxing take residence here at the divine foresight. Similarly, it is this distance that makes their temperature even more closely felt. 

He makes his way through the dark hallsYingxing halts half a step before pushing in. 

“Dan Feng?” He tries, knocking on the oak dark entrance. Once, then twice. 

A beat passes when Yingxing feels heat flare up under his flesh again. He sighs, muttering an apology under his breath, then allows himself in. 

Dan Feng lays still on his bed, expressionless but softer. Such that Yingxing almost caught himself short, almost daring to think that he was simply imagining the discomfort. 

For a fraction of a moment, his High Elder seems perfectly at peace, utterly undisturbed in his slumber. Then again, Yingxing has known this man for far too long for brief glances to fool him. He puts a ginger hand on Dan Feng’s shoulder, his body recoils.. His breathing is uneven and his eyes shut too tightly for comfort, there are sweats (tears? Yingxing prays that they are not) forming along his skin. A nightmare? Since when has Dan Feng ever got one of those? 

“High Elder,” Yingxing shakes his shoulder, too gently to have any effect. Unfortunately, perhaps for both of them in this situation, Yingxing does not know how to tighten his grip right now. For all that heavy lifting at the Furnace, he finds it rather absurd, if not downright pathetic. 

The craftsman tries his name again, this time with more force — at least, as much as his body would allow. Dan Feng’s brows furrowed uncomfortably, and his lips pressed together into a tight frown. His lashes tremble, fighting to part. 

“Dan Feng!” Dan Feng snaps his eyes open with a gasp, his face is drained of all colors as he catches his ragged breath. Heavens, his scales are standing, he might as well be shaking if the High Elder wasn’t so versed at restraining himself. 

“...Yingxing?” Dan Feng’s sight is still hazy with dew, but he recognizes the trail of Yingxing’s figure be it in the dark or blind.

He hears Yingxing heave a sigh (of relief?), and it takes another second to register that his arm is being held— no, gripped, as though the other man has forgotten to let go, or he has not the mind to. 

 “Why are you…”

“I was hot.” Yingxing answers.

“Excuse me?” Dan Feng squints his eyes incredulously. Is this man petty enough to enter another’s room because his temperature was high?

Yingxing coughs, his eyes flicker towards the bracer he didn’t take off for his night garments. Dan Feng’s languid eyes widened for a second long enough to see a rare glimpse of what is unmistakably embarrassment. 

“My apologies,” He murmurs regretfully, and before Yingxing could tell him there was nothing to be sorry about, Dan Feng turns to interrogate him, “How did you even get in?” 

“Have you forgotten?” Dan Feng blinks. “You handed me the key.” 

“Oh.”

Yes, oh. 

But Dan Feng does not spare him another glance as he lays down again, pulling the mattress over where it has been ruffled.

“... If so, please lock the door for me when you leave, you have my gratitude.” Were his last words, annoyingly prim and proper, before his final waking breaths sink into the pillow.

Yingxing raised a brow at Dan Feng’s blunt evasiveness. He does not leave as ordered. As many times as he has brushed off things concerning his own sentimentality (professionalism, he calls it), it is the one instance Yingxing stubbornly defies. Dan Feng knows this, Yingxing is a bit disappointed he still bothered to try. Perhaps he has gotten ahead of himself to think they are long past the walls of professionalism. 

“High Elder,” His voice engulfs the silence, ghosting so closely over Dan Feng’s skin that it is nigh impossible to ignore.  “Are you truly asleep?”

“... I am,”

Yingxing wonders which part of that night made Dan Feng thinks lying was his forte; because regardless of how still his body lays, his tail was curled in alert, and his complexion has regained the edge that indicates he was awake; and his horns — Yingxing knows this because his gaze has tarried to them more times he can count — is a deeper turquoise than usual. 

Still keeping his eyes tightly shut, Dan Feng hears a faint shuffling of sheets and, when it finally grinds to a halt—Yingxing should be gone by now—he peeks an eye open.

Yingxing is lying next to him. 

“Yingxing.” Dan Feng says firmly, brows knitting together, his eyes quickly abandoned the feigned sleepiness. Yingxing could practically feel the bed sheet wrinkles under Dan Feng’s grip.

“Hm?” To feign his innocence further, Yingxing has his eyes shut. “I need to sleep,” 

“As do I,” With more emphasis, he adds, “… alone.”

“It’s so late, High Elder, you’re not so cruel to force me back to my own chamber, are you?” 

Dan Feng shoots him a very implicit glare, mumbling something under his breaths along the lines of ‘Then you shouldn’t be here in the first place…’. Yingxing pretends not to hear him.

Seeing the other man shamelessly unmoved, Dan Feng speaks again, exasperation suppressed at the edge of his voice, “If you’re worried about me—”

“I am,” 

“... then don’t bother.” An exhale, it seems to do less than give him more fatigue. 

Yingxing hums. “Yes, I’ve heard that.”

Dan Feng seems persistent on evicting him, though, albeit not putting in any real efforts to be believable.

“High Elder,” Yingxing coos again, genuine despite how softly it echoes in the night.

Dan Feng does not turn, emerald eyes fixed upon the dim candlelight perching on the olden nightstand, though he does not know what, in particular, he is looking for. His mind is a whirlpool of everything and nothing at all. 

The nightmare that haunted him has stripped him of any more sleep that night, and dan feng thinks he would lay awake with more composure, if not for the fact that there is another, specific person, he is painfully aware of beside him. Someone who demands him answer; nearly a confrontation, of all things, despite how much Yingxing tries to not make it seem like one.

The silence became overbearing at one point into the night, but he is sure Yingxing is awake, because his breathing has not evened out when he inches closer behind the high elder; they are strained, but there nonetheless.

“Yinyue…”

Yingxing calls again, voice misty with drowsiness, a breath away from slipping into slumber, but yingxing would stifle it. It tugs at Dan Feng’s heart string as he feels the words vibrate into his hair. He tries to swallow the guilt that eats at his heart.

His own temperature has cooled down since their bodies collided; perhaps it already has when Yingxing’s presence consumes his senses whole. Dan Feng exhales, and gingerly rolls over with such little movement that it looks like he was staying at the same spot. 

Yingxing’s eyes are close, and perhaps between the two of them, he is the one cut out for acting. Dan Feng softens nonetheless, but it doesn’t last long because the next thing his eyes land on, under the glint of the candlelight, the folds over Yingxing’s skin. Seven, he has unwillfully counted not long ago, each wrinkle a more apparent indicator for his age. Dan Feng’s chest twists once more. This is just a prelude to his nightmare, isn’t it. 

“My heart,” Dan Feng breathes, even if Yingxing has fallen asleep at this point. 

(He has not, the rise and fall of his chest is far too controlled to be so. Dan Feng knows this, too, it is why he chooses to talk)

“Your heart,” Yingxing echoes patiently. Had it been someone else, they would not have noticed the desperation that tinged from how lightly those words were said. 

Dan Feng recoils into his own body, opening his eyes in search of light again, anything to make sure an image of a lifeless Yingxing in his arms will not emerge from in the pitch darkness when he closes his eyes again. It makes him nauseous to just imagine a glimpse. “... It was gone, I lost it, I lost it to—” 

Words drained from his throat as soon as Yingxing presses him in, Dan Feng shakily inhales the scent of the other man’s chest, searing his eyes shut. Yingxing does not push him, merely humming wordlessly between the crown of his horns – hushing him without much words. Dan Feng does not allow himself to succumb to the comfort of it, no matter how warm this human skin is, and how he can hear the beating of a heart that is still a mortal one. 

He has been thinking, and the more he does the more he hates himself, that he has become unreasonable in ways that would’ve been unimaginable just decades ago. Burdening Yingxing this way and perhaps several more waysHad he finished the words, he would be as selfish as to burden Yingxing with his own desires. His mortality has no say in the other man’s: Yingxing is holding him now and Yingxing will die, everything is strung under the cruel hands that wove their fate. Dan Feng needs no master divinator to determine if his vision has been a false one, he would know it in his heart as long as it is still his. 

The knowledge does not offer him any semblance of reassurance, ignorance is ever bliss. But at the moment, Yingxing is still flesh and blood and his arms are still strong enough that the weight of Dan Feng’s shoulders do not break their embrace. And then, even in temporary relief, snuggled inside Yingxing’s arms, his body is slipping back into dormancy. 

The night candle is a flicker away from extinguishing by the time Yingxing lets out an exhale, a heavy chest relieved in a breath soft enough so as not to stir the other man awake. He hopes the hours have not drifted too close to morning; but if Dan Feng remains this asleep by the time he is supposed to wake, Yingxing will simply make the night last longer for him. Dan Feng would probably scold him for it afterwards, but it is ultimately worth it in the end.

Dan Feng isn’t at rest entirely. Though they’re slowly getting rough round the edges, Yingxing’s eyes are sharp enough to trace over the rim of his High Elder’s eyes, swollen and crimson. Was it sweat damping his cheeks or just residual tears? 

Yingxing knows, just about well enough, that there was nothing to confide in. Between them, Dan Feng owes him no such explanation—to behold the softness of the High Elder that would never see the light of day, on its own is his answer.

Nonetheless, the dragon heart is still beating rhythmically against his ribcage, it is all the reassurance Yingxing ever needs. It lulls him into slumber.

IV.

They say, the Imbibitor Lunae does not drink under moonless skies. He who reigns over the waters would drift deep into peaceful slumber alongside the moon, never unveiled in the dark. It is but one of the plethora of myths Yingxing has had the interest to listen to when he passes along storytellers lining the streets of Aurum Alley. And similar tales are always told in the same fashion, sometimes varying degrees of exaggeration; invariably proud and convoluted nonetheless. As though he is one with the Preceptors, they paint him a statue as cold as ice. High and mighty and untouchable, he is out of touch and of mind all the same.

Yingxing often wonders as he watches him, hand fiddling with the locks that waterfalls down Dan Feng’s spine while he is desperately trying to maintain concentration, how these tales, riddled with an absurd amount of mistakes, even came to be. 

Dan Feng, in all that he is, is none of the things those self-entitled poets make him to be, Yingxing himself would become one to change that if his hands had not only ever been fit for forging sharp blades rather than decorating flowery proses. The pen would fumble inside his grasp, and Dan Feng would be written in the wrong words and clumsily spilled ink, in which case, Yingxing might detests himself forever. Some people can’t really be encapsulated in words alone, no matter how poetic they are. And so, Yingxing does not try; but he knows it, nonetheless, because here he is sitting, on a night wholly devoid of moons, in front of a tipsy High Elder.

Time has blurred into distance somewhere into the night, the only semblance Yingxing has left of it is that it has been some hours since their friends have said their goodbyes, and a couple more since they are meant to part. But they have stayed in this position for hours, only the heavens know how far gone they are from such intentions.

“Holding up, High Elder?” Yingxing says as Dan Feng stubbornly pours into his cup a glass of wine, another one full to the rim, “I hope I’m not keeping you up.”

“Impossible,” Dan Feng dismisses with a wave of his hand, slurring and betraying his own words. The High Elder, and it’s hard to call him so with his current state, pays it no heed, gulping the glass and wiping residue that hangs loosely from his lips. 

In turn, Yingxing calmly takes a full sip of his own, stubbornly unfazed as he puts down his cup. Dan Feng squints his eyes incredulously as he watches Yingxing’s face twist into a smirk. Impossible, he thinks hazily, lips pursed into an unconvinced pout, that would be his dozenth shot tonight, if alcohol hasn’t completely dulled his mind. If anything, Yingxing’s mind should be the one dulled first between the two of them. The man gets drunk on spring water, for god’s sake! 

“Really, now? You seem to be slipping,” Yingxing’s voice is mild, but not unsimilar to poking a finger into fire.

Yingxing has felt the heat rise inside his wrist from just Dan Feng’s 

“I’m fine,” Unlike you, Dan Feng wishes to add, but he needs a better attempt than that if he wants to lie, because in comparison to him, Yingxing looks perfectly, stubbornly, suspiciously… sober.

The craftsman hums, another leisure sip reaches his lips, “I’m glad, would be rather demeaning for the High Elder to back out from his own challenge, I’d imagine.”

Provoked, Dan Feng lets the spicy wine linger bitterly on his tongue before he swallows. 

Infuriatingly enough, Yingxing isn’t wrong, not in his provocations nor his praises. It is in his words that Dan Feng realizes it, always picked and pruned and just about enough to be annoyingly true. Dan Feng thinks that if he drops the sword to pick up a pen for once, his poetry would be much acclaimed. He prays the man wouldn’t, his ego is already big enough as is. And so, regardless of how conspicuous it was, Dan Feng doesn’t fail to rise to the bait, he has somewhat been the drive to their predicament

Just hours ago, Baiheng has been carelessly insistent about opening another bottle, after the five of them have downed more than necessary to keep them just about vaguely sober. Yingxing has told the navigator she wouldn’t be able to handle it well, which elicited a snort from Dan Feng, who says that the other man should start taking his own advice. Yingxing was determinedly offended at that, and it somehow leads to a drinking challenge between the two. 

Dan Feng has only accepted because he had been absolutely certain of victory, Yingxing has never been known for his tolerance. The fact remains true no matter how much experience he gains with each bottle, that man can hardly last one. 

At least, that was how easily the competition was meant to pass. Yet it wasn’t long before their friends’ anticipation dwindled into restlessness, and by then both of them were still vigorously taking turns with each cup. The final to leave had been Baiheng, who looks both entertained and guilty to have stirred up this back-and-forth; though by the suggestive smirk on her face Dan Feng thinks the entertained part is more dominant. 

“Still time to back out, High Elder,” Yingxing coaxes, “You won’t win.”

“Bullshit,”

Seems like alcohol has rendered him this vulgar. No matter. If he ends up with a hangover by the morning, it will be worth taking Yingxing down a peg or, if he is lucky, even two.

“Eh…” Dan Feng’s face pulls together into a frown, jogging an empty bottle down to his winecup, “I have no more, give me yours, Yingxing,”

“Hey, wait—”

But Dan Feng has already had his fingers around Yingxing’s bottle, obliviously downs it again. 

There is a long crescendo, enduring for all the shades of realization to fall onto Dan Feng’s face.

“Yingxing,” He begins slowly, cheeks shedding an even deeper crimson than he thinks is possible. Not out of the wine, what he had just drunk had been purely spring water, after all, “Have you been cheating?”

Initially, the craftsman has had several lies lined up in case this Viyadhara still retains some grain of sense to figure it out. A notable one had been that the other had consumed too much wine that night to differentiate water. (Being a water dragon, it would certainly wound him.) Right now, though, witnessing how absurdly adorable Dan Feng appears while trying desperately to make his brows furrowed in anger, he has positively forgotten all of them. 

“Yes?” Yingxing couldn’t suppress his smile, which he thinks only made the viyadhara angrier, but the only physical indication of that is Dan Feng’s already-plumped lips pokes out even further...

The hour has waned his patience so thin the craftsman might crumble if he doesn’t give in right now. And tonight in particular, Dan Feng has been terribly destructive to his practiced restraint. So this time he allows himself to tilt his chin slightly, landing his lips where Dan Feng is pouting indignantly. The Vidyadhara jolts, whimpering disrupted complaints that hurriedly dissolved into breathlessness. And yet, other than his hollow words, everything else is betraying them, Dan Feng’s tail recoils below their garments, scales spiking against the craftsman’s flesh. Yingxing lets them dig deeper, ignoring the blood that seeps out, as his tongue glides over Dan Feng’s wet lips.

Dan Feng gasps, before summoning whatever left of his pride to forcibly withdraw away from the other man, even when his whole body trembles to strip off the contact. “I’m still mad at you,”

“Mhm,” Yingxing licks his lips fondly, not even trying to seem apologetic with the way his eyes still linger eagerly on the other man, “I’m sorry.”

It’s not convincing, but neither were Dan Feng’s words, forced and betrayed by the lack of sharpness in his eyes, and the deep flush that seems to have permanently settled itself in on his face tonight.

“Competition’s not over, High Elder,” Yingxing reminds him roughly, “Unless you’re distracted and conceding, I’m happy to win.”

“No,”

Yingxing raises a brow. An audacious, shameless one that can only belong to a man so arrogant he does not know his own bounds.

Dan Feng exhales incredulously, “You’re still expecting to win after cheating with spring water. Do you take me for being stupid drunk?” 

“I’m getting drunk on you,” It’s evasive, and a blatant attempt at distracting him, this man must only stoop lower with each word he spews tonight. It is also somehow the only excuse his stone-cold sober mind conjures. 

“I expect compensation,” 

“Compensation?” Yingxing blinks, and lets out a chuckle that comes out too fond for Dan Feng to take exception to. “You’re too petty, Yinyue,”

Dan Feng ignores him, and suddenly rises to his feet. The alcohol must have worn his limbs down to dizzy weight and lifts the air off his chest by now. Despite it, the Vidyadhara moves effortlessly over to the other man, swift and unmistakable, as though his body has been dying to be there. Yingxing wasn’t given time to conjure a poor flirtation when the other man firmly took his place on his lap, eyes boring determinedly into his. His gaze, though squinted for lack of clarity, holds Yingxing’s surprisingly well for someone who is this intoxicated. It almost makes him think that Dan Feng has been cheating, too.

He lets the other man push him backwards, shoulders pinned onto the railing. Dan Feng straddled both legs around Yingxing’s waist, as his fingers slid up the nape of the other man’s neck, tangled inside the sweat-soaked locks. Then his lips clumsily find Yingxing’s. 

“... This is the compensation you speak of…” Yingxing murmurs hoarsely, before stumbling further on his back against the railing. His eyes didn’t yield to the sensation, not yet; letting time as they feast themselves – raking adoringly over Dan Feng’s face; his lashes trembling at their own hunger, and beautiful eyes shut so tightly as though to prove a point. 

Only when Yingxing has drunk every intoxicated breath tangled with his that he realizes, in the midst of ceaseless pleasure, that this imprudent dragon is playing him; settling the score by making him drunk on his taste—bitter and spicy mingled with his saliva. 

In any case, this is the only wine he’s been saving to get drunk on tonight. It’s fine if he loses. He would gladly lose to this any day. 

Yingxing doesn’t make Dan Feng search for his tongue, he guides him to it. Dan Feng takes liberties of his entrance, roaming the taste.

By the time Dan Feng’s knee stumbles awkwardly between Yingxing’s legs and, instead of fitting into a more comfortable position, rolls further into his thighs, that Yingxing was sure this man is drunk. 

Slowly, Dan Feng’s fingers move from his chest up to Yingxing’s face, carefully tracing the line of his cheeks.

“… Yingxing,” He whispers dazedly, hovering close enough for the hot breath to mess with Yingxing’s mind more than it already has. “… I really want to touch you,”

Not enough to be impatient, enough to seem like he’s trying not to be. 

Heavens. To hell with becoming a poet, every poem his mind has made of Dan Feng should only be locked inside his mind, never unraveled to the eyes of those who don’t half deserve to witness them. 

“You’re drunk,” His voice is strained. Out of self-restraint and breathlessness all the same. 

“Mhm,” Dan Feng whines, “Make it up to me then.”

And, gods, why was Yingxing even trying to talk him out of it? 

Yingxing lets him take the lead first, but Dan Feng was still intoxicated and would fumble the buttons of his shirt. He grunts softly, hopelessly, knee grinding over his crotch. But Yingxing is far, far too impatient for the night to pass like this.

“Don’t be such a coward, A-Feng,” The craftsman growls gruffly. Several empty wine cups shake violently as he pushes the other man hard against the table. Dan Feng’s hands desperately reach down for anything to claw on. None at his mercy. So his tail finds its only anchor, groping hopelessly around Yingxing’s thigh. 

The moonlight wilts above them, Yingxing catches his lips again and lets his hand travel down to undo his robe. Properly, this time. Finally.

Heavens, I want to stay drunk forever.

V.

He opened his eyes to rain. 

It takes several moments to gather the stinging as he gasped awake, droplets of water crashing violently into his vision. What he feels first, when he finds his body still intact, sprawled on the cold hard ground, is an all-consuming numbness—as though every organ inside this corpse has been sucked dry. He has hardly attempted to prop himself uơ when his body collapses onto the ground again. Fuck, his chest burns.

He clutches at his torn garment, but even his hands are too powerless to save him.

The man does not remember even his name nor the life he is robbed of, as if they never once existed at all. When he closes his eyes, he sees a woman with hair white as snow and eyes piercingly bloodshot, a broken sword laid mercilessly inside her hand. He has lost count of how many times it pierced through this borrowed heart, but each gash on his skin burns in all the possible ways. 

Who she is, the unnamed do not seek to know, all that haunts him is her voice, bouncing back and forth inside the walls trapping his sanity. A companion, at first—’Of five people, three must pay a price’–but a companion does not haunt your every breath. A companion is not inescapable, and they do not consume your mind so that all one could feel is bottomless hatred. Her words are no companion, rather, the reaper that follows him till the end of time – till he repents and the bottle of vengeance has been drunk empty. 

It is the only thing human he can cling to in this tapestry of hatred, a. Someday, at the end of repentance, he shall be granted death in its fullest. 

But right now, as he lies on the ground bane and beaten, all he can do is throw curses at the moon that shines mockingly overhead.

The unnamed reaches up, eclipsing the moonlight with his palm.

Yinyue-jun.

He tries, the word cracks like dirty blood off his tongue.

Yinyue-jun. Yinyue-jun. Yinyue-jun.

How could you have cursed me this way?

His arm collapsed once more, unable to bear the pressure. 

Turning his head numbly, he notices that there’s also blood pouring from his limb. The storm has blurred the entire surroundings in gray, dull enough that it was impossible not to see the deep crimson. He only notices then, with little urgency for someone in such a situation, that rainwater is seeping into the open gashes, coalescing with his blood.

It hurts. It should hurt more, yet the pain is dampened by the visions flashing restlessly inside his head. Eyes akin to emerald shards, a spear made by his own two hands glinting in all shades of green.

Aeons, his chest burns.

Whichever part is left of him to feel, it is burning him whole.

With much strength, the unnamed lifts himself up. Luckily, he finds a decimated wall that belonged to some abandoned, ramshackle house to lean against before his body collapses down. 

Upon sitting, he nearly choked on the jade pendant laying on his tongue, soaked in spits and blood. Gross and metallic. Its origin, like the unnamed himself, is forgotten. But it should be of some importance, any semblance of his past life is a trace back. Atleast, if this life is unimportant, why would a past one be any less so?

His mind is dulled into blind hatred, his body is a weight of his own sin, his hands, oh, his hands…

He clenched the broken fingers together, listlessly watching the flesh burst from its own grip, these same pair of hardened hands rendered into ruin of its own making. He gets the feeling it hurts there more than everywhere at all. Then again, he has no real evidence. 

He supposes, leaving no room to reconsider, that this is all a sinner like him was deserving of feeling before death…

… If only it ever comes at all.

…

An orange sky flashes in his mind. 

There is laughter, loud and lifeless, like the bell that tolls too late into midday. A laughter that is not returned.

“I’m serious, Yingxing,” A voice, not his, firm yet dying at the edges. He gets the impression that the speaker has gotten tired of saying it once too many times.

The laughter gradually cracks into a hollow crackle, and dying away, a little like this memory—resurfacing for a second before it sinks into loss.

Perhaps it is why the memory was this vague, afternoon cracks in the color of yolk, and he makes out nothing in the scenery—for his eyes are focused only on this person in front of him.

“You’re so pent up, Yinyue,” He finds himself saying. Rather, says Yingxing, as a final attempt at evasion. Who is to blame him when it falls flat? 

The sun should have dipped long into the horizon by now, but for once it lets the day stretch longer. Like the conversation is inevitable, no matter how many times they skirt around its edges when night falls-and no meaningful words were even exchanged. 

Yingxing’s eyes lower, watching the way his reflection ripples away inside the winecup.

“Please,” Dan Feng pauses, and his hand curls on his lap. He isn’t looking at Yingxing. It’s a bit ironic, the way he acts, considering this was the first time the craftsman has stopped shying away from this conversation.

Dan Feng summons a shaky breath, “Join me in conquest.”

Yingxing offers him no answer.

“Dan Feng…” he whispers helplessly, shaking his head.

“I have a plan, Yingxing,” His words run together in a chokehold, Yingxing can’t even remember when he last saw him so inarticulate, “The Transmutation Arcanum, there is a way. But I can’t do it alone.”

“You’re grieving,” He interrupts. 

“Aren’t you?” 

“I am,” Yingxing’s voice is tight, devastated, enough to prove what he says. “But this,” he runs a hand through his hair and they fall in all the wrong directions, “this isn’t how we go about it.”

Yingxing is not a stranger to grief, he has known the feeling when the flesh of his hands are still too ripe to hold a sword up straight. For a long period of his life it is the only feeling he has known, blinded by grief and thirst for revenge until he is picked up from his own shambles. He learns to craft swords and forge weapons because if he had drowned in grief he would not have mourned two lives but three. 

At the same time, he has forced himself to be divorced from the feeling, buried under several desperate layers of steel and forging fires. 

But grief, he has realized that moment in the battlefield—as the arrow pierces through her heart and drowns Baiheng in a familiar shade of blood red he could barely see through the mist, is a scab and not a scar. Once you find just the right spot to scratch, the gash will open anew, Yingxing has never escaped his grief. He is forever skirting the edges of it. 

At this moment, Dan Feng is as overcome by grief as he is, even if he is famously adept at putting up a front. The thing grief has done to him, Yingxing despairs silently, his heart breaks a little further every time he sees the sack under Dan Feng’s eyes deepen from restlessness, sore around the lashes. The gloom has settled back onto his life, too—a Jing Yuan with a smile far too jolly and appears too briefly to be authentic, and Jingliu, Jingliu... He hasn’t seen her shadow once since then, when her arms are too frostbitten to even hold Baiheng’s body right and everyone else sustained too many injuries to mourn her properly. 

And neither of them remembered how they had managed to leave that battlefield alive and sane, and the days that followed her death had been all but a blur of colors. They were told of her funeral, something dismissed as paperwork. Yingxing thinks he has lashed out when the closest sentiment received had been a ‘She shall be remembered.’, but even his reaction is fuzzy. 

It is a moment trapped in amber, vividly haunting every of their waking thoughts. The sun has simply not risen since that day. 

“It’s inevitable,” And it’s cruel, Yingxing knows it and he still tells him this way. “Stripping someone of death is a disgrace to their life.”

“I know.” The words practically choked out from his throat. “But Baiheng, it came to her so unfairly, she doesn’t—” 

“Had it been me,” He snaps harshly, even if it isn’t worth the hurt that flashes over Dan Feng’s face, “Would you have done the same?”

Dan Feng falters immediately. 

No, Yingxing prays, A-Feng, please tell me the answer is no. 

“... I won’t.” There is no determination in his voice, and devastation isn’t enough comfort.

Dan Feng must understand—needs to understand— that Yingxing, more than anyone, knows what it means to live knowing your death is always impending. ‘I’d rather leave this world in a blaze than live until the end of time.’ The words he spoke so often that it has become an inside joke. Yingxing had been glad they were now held with less weight than the silence that fell when he first said it. Still, they remain true. Even in this life and the next, Yingxing would choose to be a mortal again, even if it means hurting the one person he would loathe himself to ever hurt. At least that loathing dies with him. To have lived and have loved the life he had, the bonds he formed; and loved Dan Feng, all of Dan Feng, he was at peace.

He only wishes — a selfish, insignificant wish of a dying mortal, something he has resigned to never come true — that time would be softer on Dan Feng. It would spare them both this conversation, and it would spare him grief, so deeply intertwined with his loves.

In some way, perhaps loss is an even closer friend to Dan Feng than it is to Yingxing. No, friend is the wrong word. He has only seen it lurk below the creases of his brows, when he digs his fingers into a fist and lips pressed to a thin line because the only thing that would spill are helpless sobs. 

So many times Yingxing has seen Dan Feng keep himself to that rigid posture, does not dare to waver even slightly at the news of another sacrifice, another death, another massacre. A curt nod becomes the only response he confined himself to, and coldness is the only thing people can see, and then the only label they have for him. 

Throughout the year he holds it even firmer, so much so that even Yingxing is no longer able to catch the way his lashes flutter; as though the movements are an unreluctant, natural response.

Sometimes, in the middle of the night, Yingxing lays awake and fears, terrified at the possibility that the losses will ultimately render Dan Feng unfeeling one day, maybe it already has. The mere thought taunts him until he drifts and lingers until he wakes.

Then again, all the same, he cannot count on his own fingers just how many times he has seen Dan Feng standing over the graves of the fallen, even on days crashing with rain. He lingered long enough for the rain to soak him despite his umbrella, but so briefly that Yingxing couldn’t glimpse a second time on the same day. The Preceptors only mistake had been to imprison a heart too big to be caged. For if he sin, let it be known that he sinned in the name of love. 

Dan Feng has always been this way, grieving people before they die, just so he can spare himself the cumulative feeling. It is the one sole thing Yingxing has always hated for him, he hadn’t missed the way Dan Feng looks at him these days: longing for something right at his fingertips, as though the man he is beholding is already a dead corpse. Yingxing is only dying, and the fear must have manifested inside the High Elder’s mind when his hair becomes more silver than it is dark. Baiheng’s departure is the one that came crashing in like waves when he was already mourning another life. It is all too cruel to him. 

“This is sedition, A-Feng.” He murmurs, but all defense has shattered already.  

“I know.” Dan Feng smiles sorrowfully, “But is it truly unfair if she was robbed so early of her life?” 

It would be a lie to say Yingxing has not wondered the same.

Dan Feng is pretty when he cries, he is pretty regardless, if only he wasn’t crying for him. But for once Yingxing does not reach for him, his hand has laid stuck by his side for forever,not even to wipe the tears that spilled from his eyes. There is no warmth in the touch of a dead man. 

Slender, shaky hands are the ones to come up to cup his face. Dan Feng kisses him gently, not because he intended to, but because his lips are trembling far too much to hold Yingxing’s properly. Yingxing helps him in the only way he knows, pressing closer in. It feels painful and cathartic all at once. It wouldn’t be the last time, they both know it — but it feels a lot like that. 

Dan Feng does not even stop for him to catch his breath and oh, Yingxing realizes, he can die this way, too. Died suffocating on Dan Feng’s breaths and at the sweet aftertaste of his lips. It would be more poetic than laying lifeless in his arms. Then again, he is no poet, this life has been too short for that one. 

“I’ll join you,” He says at last, barely audible against the softness of the High Elder’s lips. 

…

The unnamed wakes a while after, carrying a torturous heartache he cannot pinpoint, and freezing coldness under the armor on his wrist. 

VI.

It hadn’t been how Dan Heng had meant to part with him. He has thought it to be someplace that blurs the limits of Planarcadia’s canvas, far away from the world of imagnae, at the very edge of the world where Blade was truly destined to fall to his end; and Dan Heng would stay by his side until then—till the abyss swallow him whole. After all, Dan Heng is not one to go against his promises. Instead, they find themselves back in Dovebrook District, where the building lies a bit gloomy under the ecstatic neon lighting, a familiar glow of the moon shines down upon them. Dan Heng has always associated this place closer with meetings than partings, mostly due to the fact that this street had been where they reunited again ever since the ending they left unfinished. And so, it all took him by surprise. 

Blade’s steps slow so smoothly Dan Heng didn’t realize that they had stopped, and they are still standing in the middle of the street when Blade turns around.

“What is it?” Dan Heng asks, genuinely confused and unable to read anything from Blade’s unchanging expression.

“I’ll take it by myself from now,” Blade gives him a curt nod, something Dan Heng has learned should be taken as a ‘thank you’. 

Seeing the puzzled response Dan Heng gives him, the Hunter adds, “Your duty with me is over, your companions are waiting for you.” 

Dan Heng’s face twists even further, it makes Blade reevaluate whether the words he spoke sounded offensive in any way—like he was shooing him away rather than making a refusal. Blade is mulling over a few softer alternatives — and it isn’t very hard to anymore, something like ‘I appreciate your company but I’d like to go this alone’ would work, considering how much their dynamic has shifted — when Dan Heng speaks again. 

“I’m willing to come with you.” 

Turns out he hadn’t taken the words for offense after all.

“There is no need.” Blade dismisses lightheartedly, “I do not intend to drag other people into this. General Yao Guang and I have both decided upon this.” 

“... It’s not a burden,” Dan Heng insists, and realizing he has got ahead of himself, he adds, “You and I were both involved in this, it should end with us.”

“You’ve fulfilled your part,” Blade shakes his head still, “This road is mine to take, just as you have yours.”

“… And the mara?” Dan Heng seems to have forgotten himself, “Without me, you might be…” 

“Even so, I need to take it alone, though I…” He hesitates, testing the word on his tongue, “... Thank you.”

And Dan Heng almost laughs, half at how final his decision sounds that his heart aches, half at the way Blade lowers his head, almost shy, at rejecting him this way. Gods, they are so bad at this. Deep inside, he suppresses a small, indignant part that wishes he still had some position in Blade’s life to have a say in the matter—simply so accompanying him feels more like a need than a want. But perhaps, until now, maybe it had only been Dan Feng’s presence that was worthy of it. 

“You still have it,” Blade asserts, and it takes a few moments for Dan Heng to understand that he is referring to the bracer on his arm.

“It’s always been with me,” Dan Heng replies, because it is a much easier answer than pondering the context of it. Reminded of it now, again, Dan Heng remembers the conversation he shares with his past life.

“He said it was a symbol of camaraderie," The word doesn’t sound right even when it’s Dan Heng who says them. He silently wonders what could possibly make Dan Feng still lie to him back then, telepathic body temperature bracers and ‘camraderie’, his ass. Could this man still be so jealous after seven long centuries? 

The answer doesn’t seem to convince Blade either, and he hums.

“Then what’s it to you?”

“Sorry?” 

“To you,” The hunter repeats patiently, “I’m asking what you feel, not him.”

Dan Heng stalls.

He has considered it once upon a time, a precious relic that belongs to a past life but a simple craftsman’s handiwork in this one. Such a sentiment sounds too rehearsed to be true. 

Years ago, when his life was still spent chained to the shackles of the Shackling Prison, trapped in the perpetual coldness behind the bars that imprisoned him, this bracer had been his only source of warmth. So much so that it burns sometimes, leaving a sore mark on his wrist, but it has kept him sane nonetheless. He still remembers the gratitude he had then, whispering thanks like a gospel to a person he has never known, falling asleep to the warmth of a body he has never touched. His body is more familiar with their temperature than his own. Dan Heng has even sworn to himself once, a childish desire made on a gloomy day, just so he had something to look forward to after he’s finally free, to find this person one day.

Turns out, it’s Blade who finds him first. It sounds quite silly, but Dan Heng was so disenchanted that he sulked for a couple days, even taking the handpiece off before scurrying to it a few nights later when a rainstorm crashed in.

Ever since, Dan Heng stops dwelling on it in such a way, making peace with the fact that this bracer holds no real importance to the other wearer, who had been expecting a telepathic connection with someone Dan Heng no longer is. To feel this temperature is Dan Feng’s privilege and not his. 

So, when asked, Dan Heng is rendered all but speechless. A response on behalf of Dan Feng tickles at his tongue, but it is not what Blade is asking for. It will be a long time before Dan Heng realizes that it has never been Dan Feng who he asks for an answer to anything. As though they have a mind of their own, his hands answer for him. Sliding the bracer from his own wrist, Dan Heng lifts Blade’s hand, who was surprisingly unquestioning and lets him. And when he finally lets himself think about what he’s doing, Dan Heng is already holding Blade’s hand, thumb resting over his knuckles. 

He freezes, and makes it out to be a bad idea, but Blade isn’t denying him this, for once, and Dan Heng lets himself close the bracer around the other man’s bandaged wrist. 

“A promise,” is his answer.

— If you wish, I’ll accompany you till the end.

Back then, it had been a promise made out of guilt and desperation to forsake a past life’s sin. He hadn’t considered whether Blade remembers it at all; but at this moment he means it more than ever.

“Dan Heng,” A low chuckle rumbles from his throat, foreign enough that it makes Dan Heng pause, “You go this far and still insist that you’re following through on a promise?” 

“It’s different this time,” Dan Heng admits, and it is the most honest he has seen himself,  “Had I not made that promise, I would still be willing to stay by your side.” 

Dan Heng is silent for a moment, then shakes his head.

“You have been so insistent on chasing after me for so long, and the one time I want to go with you, you refuse?”

“You’re only deciding to pursue me now? A bit too late, don’t you think?” 

And Dan Heng has already come up with a retort when he notices the smug look on Blade’s face, clearly making him reread the words. 

“… Don’t say things like that,” He mumbles, face dusting pink.

“I’m only teasing,” Blade chuckles again. If only he had enough time to memorize the sound. 

Blade chafes the bracer on against wrist, a faint warmth travels up his skin, his lips curve into a small smile. “I’ll keep your promise, A-Heng.” 

And then, Vermillion eyes flick down towards his lips, lingering long enough that he could simply lean in. Dan Heng’s breath hitched slightly, and he thought that if Blade dared to just inch a fraction closer–then he would gladly close that gap. And he waits, but Blade does not. The hunter withdraws his gaze as swiftly as he lands it. 

Dan Heng’s heart crashes onto his ribs, and he cannot be so selfish to label it disappointment. At the final hour, you must not let anything be owed. He recovered accordingly, and the two of them tacitly agreed to ignore that moment, so fleeting it might have just been their imagination. 

“When you get back, return it,” Return to me. Although the please is not pronounced it is clear enough by the expression on his face.

“I’ll make sure it is.” Blade nods, and Dan Heng can read the word that underlies it; you’ll get it back, be it by my hands or somebody else’s. 

This is how they part. On a mundane night with nothing to return to, sharing a lackluster farewell with too few words to encapsulate eight-hundred long years spent waiting, on a visceral urge to pull him into a final embrace—an urge that is resisted, just like all the ones before. They cannot do that to themselves, and they cannot do so to each other.

I’ll be waiting. lays unspoken, too cruel to be said aloud.

Then again, as long as he still feels this temperature, nestled firmly at the flesh of his wrist, under a bracer made out of a promise, Dan Heng’s warmth will follow him till the end. 

fin.