Chapter Text
The waters are unusually warm, ripples on the surface playfully filtering light, and Lan Zhan dodges the intermingling shadows of passing fish and ocean life as he swims enthusiastically behind his Niang toward whatever secret location she had in mind.
It’s their one day a month to spend time together, on their own, and Madame Lan has perfected the art of knowing what her boys want to do. His brother, Lan Huan, likes to spend his one day with her creating things- art, music, shelled jewelry. They sing and play, filling the opalescent walls of her home- what she called the ‘Gentian House’- with joy, sound and light as he regales her with stories of the new things that he’s learned during their training.
Lan Zhan is a little different; he’s always been quieter, shyer, yet more curious- he struggles to put it into words, not that he uses those very often. He adores cuddling into her side as he listens to his Niang’s stories, so many exuberant tales of myths, and his secret favorite- the ones that involve the humans. She’s not supposed to tell him these, but after the first time she slipped, he promised that he wouldn’t tell on her- and he meant it; Lans don’t lie, and Lan Zhan even less so.
Today, she’d given him a strange look, before grasping his hands in her own, perched in front of him on her padded bedding. He noticed that her long, black hair was missing its usual silver adornments; only the blue forehead ribbon remained.
“A-Zhan. Niang has an idea. There’s somewhere that I’d like to go, and I’d like to take you with me- if you can promise not to tell Shufu or anyone else about it.”
“Not even Xiongzhang?”
“Not even A-Huan.”
(Madame Lan’s eyes were wild, though she tried to contain her excitement- if she couldn’t trust Lan Zhan, then this could all go wrong…)
“It has to do with the secret stories- remember those?”
Lan Zhan nodded fervently, intrigued. “I’ll be quiet. I want to go with Niang.”
Cradling his cheek, Madame Lan affectionately pulls their foreheads together before speedily swimming to a side wall where she moved aside a large mirror. Lan Zhan remained obediently silent as she pulled away a secret coral sheet from the wall, exposing the green seaweed floating in the currents. Grabbing her little woven pouch, and a smaller one for him, she grabbed his hand and quickly swam from opening to opening. Lan Zhan follows curiously as she slips them past the Lan Mer guard with ease, already familiar with their movements. Soon, they’ve slipped out of the back wards of the Cloud Recesses, the pristine coral and stone of their home now left behind in lieu of vast white sands and open sea.
“Do you know why your home is called the Cloud Recesses?” she asks him. He ponders for a moment.
“The corals that make up all our homes are white, like the clouds.” It’s a perfectly succinct answer; Shufu would be proud of him.
“Good job! And do you know where the Lan discovered the word for ‘cloud’?”
Lan Zhan shakes his head, and Madame Lan smiles.
“Lan An overheard humans discussing the large, billowing things we see when we leave the water. ‘Clouds’. He thought that his home looked so much like these ‘clouds’ that he named it after them.”
Shufu never taught him that!
“So as much as the Lan want to distance themselves from humanity, there are some beautiful things about it that are entwined with the Mer even now.” She pauses, seeming to think on something as she looks back at their hands.
“A-Zhan, let Niang tell you a new story,” she comments, eyes far off as she swims them toward the shore. “I’ve told you about the humans, yes?” Lan Zhan nods. “There once was a young woman, a human woman. This woman was in love with the sea- was so in love with the idea of a place beautiful like the Cloud Recesses existing, of swimming amongst the currents, of freedom. But humans can’t live under the sea. They can’t breathe, and they have legs, not tails like us.”
Lan Zhan could only barely imagine ‘legs’; in his mind, they were simply split fins, the same color as his- powder blue, scales sparkling in the light.
“Still, this woman sailed the sea, getting as close as she could to the world she longed to be a part of. Little did she know, someone had been following her- it was one of the Mer that she longed to be so much, who himself longed for something else- he longed for the human woman’s love.”
That’s not allowed, Lan Zhan thought. It was one of the GusuLan Mer’s most important rules- not to become involved with humans. This Mer, he was disobeying!
But Niang is not allowed to leave either. Is this also bad? Lan Zhan frowned as the story took a darker turn. The human woman ended up in an altercation with some of the Mer, resulting in the death of the Mer man’s teacher. Instead of allowing her to drown in the sea, the way it ought to have been, the man did something different- he used a forbidden form of cultivation magic to turn the woman into a Mer!
“It was her biggest dream,” she continued, forlorn, “bastardized into something she never could have imagined. Instead of the freedom of the seas she longed for, she was trapped- trapped with a man she did not love, in a world that hated her, only because she was from somewhere different.”
The darkness in her golden eyes weighs them both down as she slows, and Lan Zhan can’t help but whimper. He doesn’t like this story, and by the pressure of his tiny hand on her finger, she realizes it.
“Oh, I’m sorry, A-Zhan. That’s a sad story. Perhaps you were too young to hear it. Don’t dwell on it any further- we’re almost to the next part of our adventure!”
The large swathes of sand and seaweed patches are left behind as they approach shallower waters, more colorful types of corals and shells decorating the seabed. The anemone float in the waves, the different types of fish weaving in and out and all around. His temporary sadness is long forgotten as Lan Zhan takes in the sight- this is a different sort of beauty than his home. Where the Cloud Recesses is ethereal, imperial in the bright blues, whites and grays, this space is filled with all the colors of the rainbow, and he can hardly tell where to start.
“Go ahead, A-Zhan. Feel free to explore. But remember- you can’t take everything back- they’ll ask where you got it. Use discretion, choose what means the most to you.”
While Lan Zhan explores, her story still lingers in the back of his mind. Shufu would be furious if he knew they were out here, especially since they’d discussed humans. Humanity is forbidden from being discussed amongst the GusuLan Mer, who had a unanimous disdain for their ‘disgusting, passionate, untamed emotions’. Still, he can’t help but question it- Niang questions it, and she was the one that he trusted most. Why would she lie?
A small tide pool is filled to the brim with water, soft moss, and seaweed, and he curls onto the comfortable springiness, ready to select which shells he’s going to keep and which ones he’ll leave. They’re all out and in order, when a shadow makes him lift his gaze, and he freezes in horror.
Someone is staring at him.
They can’t be any older than he is, silver-grey eyes wide as he peers into the still water. The child holds a necklace made of green beads, a funny shaped pendant at the end of it, and his purple sleeved arm is out as if he intended to drop it when he saw Lan Zhan sitting in the water. A smile stretches on his face at the same time terror spreads on Lan Zhan’s, and he flinches when the boy seems ready to point him out.
The shout of excitement, the exposure - it never comes.
Instead, something pokes Lan Zhan in the side of the head. He opens his hand to allow the necklace to fall into it. A peace offering. The child winks down at him, his finger coming to his lips- I won’t say anything.
Is this human child… protecting him?
“Wei Ying!” another voice calls, muffled by the water. ‘Wei Ying’ moves away, turning to the voice.
“I’m gifting something to the sea, Jiang Cheng! You’re going to chase away the magic! Stay away!”
‘Jiang Cheng’ must stop- if he were to see Lan Zhan –
-but, he never approaches.
“But you can’t gift Jiejie’s beads to the sea! Especially not the one with her lotus pendant! You jump back in there and get it, or I’m telling her you threw them away!”
Wei Ying puts his hands on his hips indignantly. “She’s the one who told me about the magic! I’m making it so our adventures are always lucky- don’t be a bad luck charm, Jiang Cheng, you fall in the water too much for that!”
“You-”
Before a bewildered Lan Zhan can react, he’s yanked back into the seaweed. Colors flash by his eyes too quickly to focus on, and he’s disoriented as Madame Lan swims away with a death grip at full speed. They are far from the coast when she stops, quickly spinning him around to check for any injuries.
“A-Zhan! A-Zhan are you okay?”
He nods- Wei Ying did not hurt him.
Once she’s ascertained that he’s safe, her concern morphs into fury.
“A-Zhan. What is that in your hand?”
It’s the necklace, with the ‘lotus’ pendant, and it’s his. Pouting, Lan Zhan tries to turn away, pulling from her hands as she tries to take it.
“Lan Zhan. I need you to understand me. You cannot be seen by humans anymore, nor can you be seen with their things so openly. It’s dangerous. The Lan elders have decreed it for generations, and you will be punished!” This is the first time his Niang has ever yelled at him, even if it is out of concern for his welfare, and his golden eyes water.
He doesn’t want to give up the pendant. He doesn’t want to give up his memory of the boy. It’s special- why can’t he have something special? Madame Lan sees his distress, his eyes becoming puffy and his ears reddening, and she sighs fondly, hugging him tightly.
“You have too much of me in you, and I love you so much for it. Listen, A-Zhan. Don’t show Shufu, and make sure you follow all the rules from now on, okay? You must be a good boy, to make up for today.” So no one knows.
Sniffling, Lan Zhan nods. He can accept this- to be a good boy, in return for keep his pendant. Tucking it safely in his bag, he holds Madame Lan’s hand as she swims them back to the Cloud Recesses. He knows just where he’ll put it too- it can be his special memory of Niang, and of Wei Ying.