Work Text:
There were three men in the world who could beat Lin Chen in a sword fight. With the little attention he had to spare, he was regretting putting them on a handy list so everybody knew exactly who they were. Professional integrity was a bugger sometimes.
Two of those three swordsmen were standing between Lin Chen and his workbench. Between Lin Chen and the door was the man who had hired them. Lin Chen glared at him with every ounce of ire that he could muster. It didn't have any visible effect.
"I have a question for the Young Master," the visitor said, with a bow so polite as to be verging on the sarcastic.
"Questions," snarled Lin Chen, "can be submitted to Langya Hall, via my disciples, in the usual way. And you can wait for a quote, in the usual way. Edged weapons come with a surcharge." And if you think you're going to get an answer, in the usual way, you can think again, his tone implied. He squinted at the pot on the burner out of the corner of his eye. If that was allowed to boil over now… Vaguely, he became aware that the man in front of him was speaking again.
"It's a perfectly simple question. How many days, and how many hours, can one man work without sleep before he collapses? I don't require the answer in writing."
"Fuck you, Changsu."
"Not in your condition, I don't think. Although if it would get you into bed…"
Lin Chen swayed slightly. He heard one of the swordsmen behind him shift stance, and was humiliatingly aware that he was probably ready to catch him by the elbow if he did fall. He turned the movement into a lunge towards the workbench instead, and was brought up short by the second man stepping in front of him. He dodged. The man dodged with him. It was like playing shadows with Fei Liu, and probably had about as much point.
"At least drink a cup of tea with me," said Mei Changsu, apparently bored with watching the two of them dance round each other. He waved to the innkeeper to bring a tray with tea things through the open door. "It's been a long journey, and I'm thirsty. And at this rate, you'll still be there in an hour's time and ruin whatever it is you're concocting over there and we'll never hear the last of it." He knelt in front of the table and started measuring tea. "Tell Zhen Ping what needs to be done, he'll keep an eye on it."
"One cup," Lin Chen said, giving in and coming to kneel. The tea did smell good.
"One cup," Mei Changsu agreed, reaching for the kettle.
"It needs to simmer. Don't let it boil." Lin Chen watched suspiciously until he was satisfied Zhen Ping wasn't going to ruin anything, then reached for the cup Mei Changsu had placed in front of him. Then he stopped, reached across the table and took the one in front of Mei Changsu instead.
"Do you trust me so little?" his friend asked, leaning over to pick up the rejected cup. Lin Chen regarded the porcelain shell in his hand. "Even less than that," he decided, and swapped them back again.
"So sad," said Mei Changsu mildly, drinking his own tea. He watched carefully over the rim of the cup as Lin Chen did the same. "Tell me what's so important that a man who once spent so long lecturing me on the importance of sleep for healing that I collapsed in sheer self-defence looks like he's spent a month on the battlefield?"
Without entirely meaning to, Lin Chen found himself outlining the entire process in which he had spent the last four days, with heavy emphasis on the technical difficulty, the innovative detail and, by implication, his own brilliance. In the process, he drank another cup of tea, and was halfway through a third before he caught his head sinking towards the table. Changsu had been listening attentively, with almost no rude comments at all, which should have been a warning. He attempted to slur a complaint, and failed.
Mei Changsu neatly removed the cup from between Lin Chen's fingers and shifted the teapot to one side as he slumped forward.
***
He woke to the crackle of a brazier, and the sight of Mei Changsu reading in the chair beside his bed, the lamp flame carefully shaded so the light did not fall in his eyes. As Lin Chen watched, he turned a page, not looking up. It was a tactic Lin Chen had often used himself, and he was not fooled. Any minute now, Mei Changsu would reach for a brush and make a note, to demonstrate exactly how little attention he was paying…
Mei Changsu reached for a brush.
"I know you know I'm awake," Lin Chen said irritably. "How long?"
"Six hours, just as you said, then allowed to dry, crushed to powder, washed, and strained three times. We found your notes," said Mei Changsu, answering the question he had meant, rather than the one he had asked. "Although deciphering them was another matter altogether. Your handwriting's appalling." He leant forward to replace the brush on its stand, and Lin Chen's hand shot out and grasped his wrist.
"How did you do it?" LIn Chen asked, dropping the wrist in disgust a moment later. "I assumed it was in both cups, but you haven't taken anything."
"My physician doesn't approve of self-medication," Mei Changsu said primly. Lin Chen raised an eyebrow.
"Don't give me that. I know exactly how well you listen to me, which is to say only when you feel like it, and not always then."
"I didn't do anything at all." Mei Changsu handed him a cup of water. Lin Chen sniffed it demonstratively before he drank. "Don't look like that. It's not as if you would have tasted it if I had, after three days in that room - you're going to have to pay the landlord double, by the way - but when I saw you, it seemed a waste of a perfectly good sleeping draught. All I had to do was get you to stop long enough for your body to take over. It's got more sense than your brain has. As somebody keeps telling me."
"They sound sensible. You should probably listen to them." Lin Chen swung both legs out of bed and started looking round for his clothes. "Let's see what sort of mess your hired butchers have managed to make of the most delicate chemical operation anyone has carried out in fifteen years."
"Eat first," said Mei Changsu implacably. "We went to a lot of trouble to make Fei Liu leave you some dumplings."
"Fei Liu's here?"
"It's all right. We haven't let him go anywhere near the village. He's been with me, or training with Zhen Ping, the whole time. He only went out when you woke up; I expect he's up on the roof."
"Hmph." Once he got to the table, the dumplings vanished as though he had inhaled them. Halfway through the second bowl, Lin Chen came up for air. "What about you?"
"What about me?"
"Have you eaten? I know you haven't slept."
"I…"
"I'll tell Fei Liu."
"Bully." Mei Changsu accepted the bowl Lin Chen passed him, but Lin Chen noticed the moment where he considered sniffing the broth first, and decided the moral high ground lay in not doing so. He noted the tactic for future use. Changsu was going to regret this later.
What were friends for, after all?