Chapter Text
Often, Lan Wangji wonders what it would be like to express himself clearly as the others do. To speak without tripping over his own uncertainty, the constant awareness of the rules of conduct, of a shut door, of cold seeping through his robes as he knelt in the snow, uncertain of which rule he had broken.
He wonders what it would be like to speak with the warmth his mother had, like warm waters over stone, like there was always something wonderful to share, and all he had to do was ask—like it was always a good day, just for having him in it.
But he balks at the idea of a soulmate, of having his thoughts and insecurities and every single failing open to a stranger. He finds that, after so many years of adhering to the rules so strictly, there is not a good deal of warmth for others to find in him.
So he patrols alone, and tries not to think about it too much.
He enjoys the sound of the waterfalls in the distance, of owls and nightjars crying in the woods. And then there is a scrabbling sound, a grunt of effort, and a red ribbon. He watches as an errant disciple clambers over the wall, two pale jars of Emperor’s Smile in hand, and allows himself to be impatient.
He demands that the curfew-breaker climb back down, and finds himself unprepared for the excitement in those silver eyes, or the wickedness of that grin.
“It’s not that late, is it?”
“Yes.” Wangji answers. “It is.”
“Well, I am new to Cloud Recesses. Can’t you let it slide, just this once?”
Once again, Wangji remembers cold, and his shoulders stiffen. “No. …What is in your hand?”
“Oh!” The boy holds up two damning jars with that same reckless energy, unheeding as they clatter together on the cord. “It’s Emperor’s Smile! If I share a jar with you, will you pretend that you never saw me?”
Several thoughts race through Wangji’s mind. He frowns. “Alcohol is forbidden in the Cloud Recesses.”
The other boy heaves a sigh, as if Wangji is being somehow unreasonable, and says, “I’m trying to think of how to get out of this.”
And then freezes, visibly unsettled, before looking at Wangji with dawning horror.
Wangji shifts, unsettled by the change in demeanor—he has known this boy for mere moments, but part of him knows that uncertainty and discomfort are foreign things to him. Still, the rules are clear, and also written directly onto the cliff face.
You genuinely cannot miss them.
So he says, “You are the most beautiful person I have ever seen, but I am required to punish you.”
And then realizes exactly what it is that seems to have gone wrong.
-
Or right, when you consider the cosmic implications of running into your soulmate at sixteen years old and immediately threatening to have them spanked for breaking the rules.
-
Wei Wuxian slams into the guest dorms like a distraught elephant and hurls himself at Jiang Cheng’s bed with such force that both of them fall immediately out of it.
“Jiang Cheng!” He wails. “I’m having a crisis!”
“You are a crisis! What the hell?!”
“I met him! I met my—he’s a him, and he’s beautiful, and he thinks I’m beautiful, but he still wants to hit me!”
Jiang Cheng blinks at him through sleep-clouded eyes, trapped in a disastrous cocoon of sheets. This is a familiar look for him, really, but right now XianXian is three, and he’s having difficulties.
“Why are you like this?”
He means, of course, why do you insist on behaving like a detriment to society in general, but especially at two in the morning, but what Wei Wuxian hears is, yes, dear brother, continue shrieking about whatever troubles you at this very moment.
Because Wei Wuxian is a dramatic shithead, and Jiang Cheng should have known a peaceful night before their 5 o’clock wakeup call was too much to ask for. (You shit.)
“I met my soulmate.”
“No you didn’t. Go to bed.”
“Okay,” Wei Wuxian says, then takes a handful of deep breaths. “Okay, I know that I’m full of shit most of the time, but it doesn’t work with him.”
“Maybe you were just intimidated. Lans are intimidating.”
“I told him I was trying to talk my way out of punishment, and he told me ‘that’s too bad, you’re still getting spanked.’”
“He did not!” Jiang Cheng growls. “Lans don’t talk that way. They don’t even really emote. They just sort of—” He smooths out his features in what is probably an offensive parody of the Lan Dignity. “You’re panicking. Calm down and tell me exactly what was said.”
And so he does. He sits down on the floor, knees to knees with his brother, and recalls the event, vivid and perfect, to his mind’s eye:
“He caught me coming over the wall—”
“Because you were breaking curfew.”
“Right. With two jars of Emperor’s Smile—”
“Which you weren’t supposed to have.”
“Again, he noticed.”
“And then he threatened to spank you.”
“Ah, well, I was trying to think of what to say, maybe bribe him or something—”
“Which would have been stupid.”
Wei Wuxian pouts. “But instead I opened my mouth, and out comes, ‘I’m trying to think of how to get out of this.’”
Jiang Cheng blinks at him, face suddenly vacant in the way it only truly is before outright panic. “Uh.”
“And he said, ‘You are the most beautiful person I have ever seen, but I am required to punish you.’”
“Oh shit.” Jiang Cheng whispers. “Your soulmate is blind.”
And Wei Ying endeavors to break the Prohibition on Fratricide with a pillow.
-
In the quiet of the Hanshi, Lan Xichen wakes to the feeling of his bed dipping under a heavy weight, and blinks his eyes open to find his younger brother crawling in beside him for the first time since he was seven.
This is probably not good.
“Wangji?” He asks. “What’s wrong?”
“He’s beautiful.”
There’s a moment of silence as Xichen’s mind struggles to catch up with current events beyond the warm embrace of sleep. His brother’s bony elbow nudges his ribs, and he is decidedly awake.
He blinks at his brother in the dark. “Who is beautiful, Wangji? One of the guest disciples?”
“Mm.”
“You are at the age to start thinking so.”
“Xiongzhang, I told him so.”
He sounds terribly embarrassed.
Xichen frowns. You told him you’ve gone through puberty?
Scolds himself.
“Ah, well, I’m sure he appreciated the thought.” He says, gently. “Did you meet him while…wait. You were on patrol tonight, weren’t you? Was he breaking the rules?”
His tone is light, teasing, the way their mother’s was when she was proud of them, but still wanted to watch their little ears turn red. Wangji has always been especially cute when he is embarrassed, and Xichen has yet to give up on doting when he can.
But now, Wangji looks at him as if a spirit has grasped his ankle. As if ill omens surround them. As if everything has gone irreparably wrong.
This is a very bad thing to still be waking up to.
And then Wangji says, “He admitted it. He said he was trying to avoid punishment.”
Xichen sighs. “I imagine that did not go over well.”
“I told him that he would have to face punishment, but that…but that he is the most beautiful person I have ever seen.”
Xichen coughs. “That certainly is a compliment, Wangji. He must be a lovely young man, indeed.”
“No.” Wangji says. “The most beautiful, xiongzhang. I couldn’t lie.”
“I know you couldn’t, Wangji. You’ve always been…oh.”
He does not say shit. Wangji is his brother, not his soulmate, so he gets to keep that to himself.
-
To be fair, this is supposed to be a good thing.
-
The next morning marks the start of lectures, which will include their orientation and the Salutation Ceremony, both of which mean that everyone will be in the same room, and there will be no way for Wei Wuxian to escape.
He’s hyperventilating about this when Nie Huaisang comes to join them on the way to the lecture hall.
“Jiang-xiong, is he dying?”
“We could only be so lucky.”
Wei Wuxian makes a noise that Jiang Cheng should probably scold him for, as the sect heir and foremost representative of their clan, but he’s actually worried now. For nearly ten years, Wei Wuxian has been the very picture of self-confidence. He’s flirted with everyone, young and old, but now that there’s someone who can cut straight through his crap, he’s losing his mind.
Loudly.
“He met his soulmate last night.”
For a moment—just a split second, Jiang Cheng catches Huaisang frowning before his features smooth out to his usual pleasant half-smile. “And that’s bad?”
“He met his soulmate, who was on patrol, while breaking curfew.”
“Oh.” Huaisang sounds genuinely troubled. “They don’t appreciate that here.”
“Especially not when you try to bribe them with liquor.”
The Nie sect heir snaps his fan open, eyes wide with alarm, but his tone ready for every ounce of gossip. “He didn’t.”
Both Jiang boys stop dead in their tracks to stare at him, their heads canted in eerie synchronization. Is he new?
Huaisang closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “All right, he did. Do we know who it was?”
And that’s something they can both appreciate—their acquaintance has been limited up to this point, but Nie Huaisang has quickly thrown his lot in with theirs. It’s a sort of reckless stupidity that one finds often among the Yunmeng Jiang.
Attempt the impossible, and then run like hell.
“He’s beautiful and he thinks I’m beautiful, which is—I don’t know? It’s—”
“Not actually an identifiable feature, Wei Wuxian.” Jiang Cheng sighs. “All Lans are beautiful.”
“Be nice to him,” Huaisang giggles. “He’s lovestruck.”
“He’s not lovestruck, he’s panicking.”
“I’m sure it will be okay, Wei-xiong.” More giggling. “As long as it’s not Lan Wangji. There’s no one in the whole jianghu more devoted to justice, and so he’d never let you get away with it. Ah, Wei-xiong, you’d die.”
Wei Wuxian tries to wail again, but Jiang Cheng covers his mouth, nearly knocking them both into a bush. “Do not. Can you at least tell us what he looked like, so we can figure out who it was?”
The overgrown child groans, the sound muffled by his brother’s palm before it is removed. “He’s a little shorter than me, but not by much. His eyes are light—gold, I think—and his headband was different.”
“‘Different?’” Jiang Cheng frowns.
“There was a metal piece, right here.” He taps his forehead. “And he seemed kind of sad?”
Huaisang stops walking, tapping his fan to his forehead, face lowered. “Wei-xiong, Wei-xiong, your luck is the worst! That was Lan Wangji.”
“You understand that I’m praying you’re wrong.”
“The metal insignia on the headband marks a member of the main clan. There’s four of those: Lan Cenrong, who’s been in seclusion for years, Lan Qiren, who is a teacher and does not patrol, Lan Xichen, who probably would have laughed and sent you on your way, and Lan Wangji, who is…right…there.”
And he is: the man of Wei Wuxian’s actual, literal dreams stands before them on the path, hands behind his back in a show of perfect posture. Nie Huaisang and Jiang Cheng both bow in greeting, while Wei Ying stands frozen.
“You’re even prettier in daylight.” He says, and then makes a high, ragged squeaking noise. “I am in so much trouble.”
And then the Second Jade, Pride of Cloud Recesses, Notorious Disciplinarian, takes a shy step forward and says, “Not in trouble. Xiongzhang says that it is best to be lenient in…in cases like this.”
Jiang Cheng snorts, glancing sidelong at his walking disaster of a sibling. He’d have imagined a lot of things for Wei Ying—adventure, fame, glory, but not a soulbond with a walking, talking rulebook.
“Oh.” Wei Ying shifts from foot to foot, like he’s torn between taking a step toward Lan Wangji and running for the hills. “But you’ll get tired of me eventually. I can never seem to do what people want me to. I’m, ah, afraid of that.”
He sounds empty when he says it, and in a quiet corner of his heart, Jiang Cheng hates his mother just a little bit.
But Nie Huaisang places a steady hand on Wei Ying’s shoulder when Jiang Cheng forgets to, and he appreciates the other boy for that.
Especially when Lan Wangji opens his mouth and says, “I will never be tired of you. I am afraid you will run away again, and I will never find you. Will you allow me to hold your hand?”
Wei Ying doesn’t laugh, or joke, or posture.
He reaches out and does as he is asked.
-
Lan Xichen enters the classroom before uncle, eager to take his position and search the crowd, looking for signs of Wangji’s most precious person, and finds himself almost effervescently happy to find the point moot.
Because Wangji is already present, seated at his desk with another young man with a red hair ribbon and a shy but irrepressible smile pressed close to his side. Their fingers are woven together.
The students meander in, grumbling at the early hour, only to whisper amongst themselves at the sight of the pair, practically in each other’s laps and speaking softly.
Telling the truth to each other. Back and forth.
Xichen smiles to himself as Uncle comes to the head of the class, resting for a moment upon his laurels, in the respectful hush that awaits him, only to be brought up short by the sight of Wangji sharing his desk.
“Young man,” He frowns. “Return to your seat.”
And to his credit, the boy does make an attempt.
It’s just that Lan Wangji grabs a fistful of his robes and says, “No.”
There should be a punishment. Technically, Lan Wangji is being disobedient.
But Lan Wangji has never been disobedient before, and Uncle is uncertain of what, exactly, is happening here.
Xichen cannot keep his voice from trembling with laughter when he says, “Uncle, perhaps it would be wise to grant an exception. Just this once?”
Lan Qiren still spits blood.
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