Chapter Text
“Why?” Lan Wangji asks as his uncle walks him back into the Jingshi. His face still feels cold, his eyes burn and his stomach and throat ache, and his nose is still swimming with the scent of gentians and snow.
Uncle sighs. He sounds tired, and it immediately makes Lan Wangji feel guilty at causing trouble; Uncle has been so busy ever since Father went into seclusion, and it’s usually his brother that comes pick him up from the house, so he never expected-
“Because I’ve told you not to go there, Wangji,” Uncle says. “You’re breaking the rules.”
“I’m not,” Lan Wangji whispers. “Once a month, I can go.”
“Wangji, she’s not there anymore. You know this,” Uncle shakes his head. “You won’t find her.”
Lan Wangji looks down at the floor, his sight blurring as his eyes fill with tears. “Fuqin should find her.”
Uncle laughs. It’s an ugly, hurt sound Lan Wangji has never heard him make before. “That’s what started all these problems in the first place.”
Lan Wangji flinches, and Uncle recoils like he just realized what he said. He sighs again and runs a tired hand down his face, and Lan Wangji bites down on his bottom lip to hold back the burning in his eyes.
“Sorry,” he says, quietly. His brother always says he could never be a bother, but Uncle doesn’t lie either. Which one is wrong? “For being trouble.”
He can feel Uncle’s eyes on him, and he forces himself not to shake- Uncle dislikes crying children, and always praises him for being quiet. It’s the least he can do after making him go all the way to the gentians house to get him back.
“It’s not-“Uncle starts to speak, then stops like he doesn’t know what he really wanted to say. The silence goes on for a long time; Uncle doesn’t move, and Lan Wangji doesn’t dare speaking again.
After a while he takes a step towards the corner of the Jinghshi, and that’s what gets Uncle moving, like he just woke up from a dream.
“Where are you going?” Uncle asks, following him.
Lan Wangji shrugs, facing the wall.
“Punishment,” he explains. He goes to plant his hands on the floor, when Uncle’s larger one wraps around his wrist and pulls him back up. “Shufu?”
Uncle crouches before him, and his hands move to Lan Wangji’s shoulders.
“My nephews are… the only good thing to come out of a lot of bad,” he says slowly, like it hurts. “You’re never trouble, Wangji.”
Lan Wangji blinks, confused.
“…But Shufu said-“
“Shufu spoke impulsively,” Uncle says firmly. “And caused harm with words he did not think properly. No one is ever done learning, not even this uncle."
Lan Wangji scowls. He's never known Uncle to be wrong before, he didn't think it was possible, but… if he really was mistaken, then it’s wise of him to admit it, no?.
“No punishment then?” he asks.
“I’m afraid Wangji still broke the rule I gave him.” Uncle shakes his head. “I can’t have Xichen skipping lessons to go looking for you when you go missing. With your father as he is… your brother needs to be well prepared. Come on, get the ink and the paper.”
Lan Wangji nods quietly. “Yes, Shufu.”
Under his uncle’s careful watch, Lan Wangji grinds some ink and spreads a sheet of paper on the floor.
“Be strict with yourself, stop the bad habits, do not disregard laws and rules,” Uncle lists, and Lan Wangji nods along to each of the rules he’ll be copying. “Fifty times each.”
“Yes, S-“ Lan Wangji stops speaking, watching in shock as his uncle spreads a second sheet of paper next to his, and pulls a brush from his sleeve. “Shufu?”
“Get going, Wangji,” Uncle says simply. Then, much to Lan Wangji’s continued shock, he plants his hands on the floor and kicks up, his pose ramrod straight before he grabs his brush and dips the tip in the ink. “We must be done before dinner.”
Be easy on others, says his uncle’s paper. Respect the filial ones. Do not use harmful words.
“…Yes, Shufu,” Lan Wangji nods, wipes his eyes, and goes to stand on his hands.
🐇🐇🐇
It’s just been a couple of days after the attack when they finally gather themselves enough to send a couple disciples down to Caiyi town to check on the civilians, and Liang Mengyi comes back holding a scroll in shaky hands.
It was left nailed to the lower gates with a knife, she explains as she offers the roll of paper sporting the bright red sun with the summons to Nightless City.
“You’re injured,” Uncle says that evening at his pavilion, looking down at Lan Wangji’s broken leg with sorrowful eyes. He looks exhausted, far older than he is and still pale and weak from the wounds he himself sustained during the attack. “You cannot go like this.”
“We don’t know where Xiongzhang is,” Lan Wangji says quietly, trying to ignore the pressing knot of urgency in his stomach at the mere thought of his brother’s unknown whereabouts. “I’m the only one that can go.”
Uncle sighs. “I shouldn’t have let you go out.”
It’s a moot point- Lan Wangji was never going to stay in the cave and hear his sect siblings be murdered in cold blood, and they both know it.
“I would not have let Shufu stop me,” he says in the end. “Now, too.”
Uncle rubs a hand down his face. “I promised your father I would look after the two of you. Keep you safe.”
Lan Wangji notes with muted interest that his uncle, as usual, doesn’t address his father as his brother. He expected this would change after his death, but it seems some wounds just don’t scab over.
“Shufu has, to the best of his extent,” Lan Wangji nods. “This one is grateful.”
“I have not,” Uncle shakes his head slowly. “Wangji?”
“Hm?”
“I don’t know if that child will be there,” Uncle says, and Lan Wangji averts his eyes. “I expect you to act wisely- you’re the future of our sect.”
“Wei Ying is not the heir to the Yunmeng Jiang,” he says quietly. Whatever happens, he will be safe at least.
Uncle watches him carefully, almost as though he can see the thoughts he’s not voicing.
“These things ought to be treated with care, nephew. I expect you to know that, with our family's history,” Uncle says, his face carefully expressionless. “Sometimes one must make hard choices.”
Lan Wangji feels his shoulders stiffen and his hand tighten around Bichen’s sheath. How could he not know? Isn’t he already doing enough by staying away from the man he can feel his soul clamoring for? What else does he want?
“This one knows,” he says quietly, eyeing his uncle’s tense posture and downward curved lips and finding it an uncomfortable mirror of his own, and he remembers his brother’s words from so long ago, when Lan Wangji’s soulmark first appeared. Maybe the curse didn’t skip his uncle after all. “With Shufu’s approval, I’ll leave for Nightless City today.”
His uncle’s eyes look pained, but there’s nothing either of them can do. Lan Xichen is still missing, half the Cloud Recesses burned, and the Wen will come back and burn the rest if they don’t comply with the mandate.
“Take care of yourself, nephew. Seeing you come to any more harm would bring me great distress.”
“Please recover soon, Shufu. May you be healthy by the time Xiongzhang comes back.”
His uncle seems to age another ten years at the mention of his brother, but Lan Wangji isn’t too worried. He will go to Nightless City to appease the Qishan Wen, and if Lan Xichen hasn’t returned by the time he's back, he will find his brother himself, broken leg or not.
“We both have our tasks,” Uncle sighs. “Go swiftly then, Hanguang-jun.”
🐇🐇🐇
Wei Ying is dying.
The resentful energy’s eating him from the inside even as Lan Wangji frantically forces spiritual power into his meridians to try and heal the injuries he sustained in the battle, but it’s just too much. Wei Ying is delirious with pain and grief, holding on to Lan Wangji’s sleeve like it’s his only tether to consciousness, and as a bloodied tear clears a trail across a dirt-smeared cheek, the reality of the situation washes over him like freezing cold rain.
His fated is going to die, and he never even-
“Wei Ying,” he speaks, his voice harsh with urgency. “Wei Ying, can you hear me?”
He has to tell him, he- he’s not selfish enough to think their fractured, ignored bond will be enough to tether Wei Ying to life after losing his sister, but maybe it will bring him some peace. Maybe it will be enough to soothe the resentment burning him alive-
“Wei Ying, please-“
“Get… get lost,” Wei Ying’s voice is quiet and defeated, so unlike anything he’s ever heard him sound before. The fire roaring at his core has burned itself out, and now there’s only ashes left. “Go away.”
“No. Wei Ying, you’re injured-“
“Go away!” Wei Ying snarls, his eyes flashing red at his outburst. “Go away before- just go.”
“Please-“
“Get lost!”
“I think he’s made his stance very clear,” Uncle speaks by the entrance of the cave, and Lan Wangji freezes. They found them so quickly- did his brother ask Nie Mingjue to send a tracking talisman? Is he here too? “Wangji, step away.”
He doesn’t turn to face his uncle and whoever else he brought with him. It doesn’t matter, none of them do. The only one that matters is Wei Ying, who’s still bleeding and muttering at him to go away but hasn’t let go of his sleeve. Lan Wangji uses the hand he’s channeling spiritual power with to cup Wei Ying’s face and realizes he’s afraid. He’s always been so afraid of the intensity of his feelings for this man, but that fear now pales in comparison to the slowly dawning horror of understanding he will have to live in a world without Wei Ying, because he didn’t stand by his side in time.
“Wangji, I said-“
“No,” he says before he can even register the word. He channels a last burst of spiritual energy into Wei Ying and turns to face his uncle, and finds him surrounded by the elders of the Cloud Recesses, looking down at him with his lips pursed tight and his eyes wide in anger.
“He murdered hundreds of people back at Nightless City,” Uncle says, shaking his head in disbelief. “His own sister.”
Wei Ying lets out a quiet sigh behind him, and Lan Wangji feels his resolve solidify. He’s not under any false impression of why the elders are here, but he can’t- he won’t let them take him, if it’s the last thing he does.
Under the elders’ shocked, indignant stares, he lifts Bichen and widens his stance to stand more firmly before his fated. His uncle, however, merely seems to deflate at the sight of him, his shoulders falling as he gives a little shake of his head.
“Nephew…” he says quietly, both a warning and a plea. “This is not worth it.”
Lan Wangji feels his blood boil- what right does his uncle have to dismiss all that is Wei Ying as worthless? When neither him, nor- nor anyone spoke in his defense, bothered to hear his side of the story. This is not just Lan Wangji’s fated, he’s also a good man, and under the rules of his clan he should have been protected instead of abandoned.
“Sometimes one must make hard choices,” Lan Wangji says. It sounds a little like an accusation, but this is the choice he’s made, the one he should’ve made long ago.
Uncle shakes his head again, and unsheathes his own sword.
🐇🐇🐇
The door to the Jingshi slides open all of a sudden, and Lan Wangji shoots a hand out for his sword, feeling the barely-scabbed over wounds on his back reopening yet again.
His uncle stands at his threshold, profiled by the cool autumn rain and staring at him in shock. He wasn't expecting to see him- he hasn't been by ever since he received his punishment.
Behind him, A-Yuan coughs again, squirming uncomfortably on Lan Wangji’s bed.
“It’s true,” Uncle says, his voice faint. “Your brother told me, but I thought-“
“Xiongzhang doesn’t lie,” Lan Wangji says simply, lowering Bichen to the floor again. “If Shufu wants me gone, I will do so as soon as A-Yuan’s fever has broken.”
His brother had assured him it wouldn’t be the case, but the last thing he wants is to cause him trouble with their uncle. He should’ve left the Cloud Recesses a long time ago, anyways.
“A-Yuan- Wangji, that is a Wen child,” Uncle says in a quiet hiss.
“A-Yuan is my fated’s child,” Lan Wangji says. The rush of feelings that floods his chest at the words is nigh indescribable, a mix of pain and pride and challenge as he straightens up as best he can with his wounded back to look at his uncle in the eye. “My child.”
Uncle shakes his head in disbelief, coming into the room with careful steps, as though he expects Lan Wangji will attack him like he did at the cave in Yiling. “You’ve lost your mind. If they discover him, you’ll be accused of treason.”
“Mn,” Lan Wangji nods. This and so many other thoughts crossed his mind in the time it took to fly over from the Burial Mounds, and none of them was able to convince him to drop A-Yuan off at a temple or orphanage, or any of the minor sects that weren’t involved in the war. “As I said, we will go.”
“I hope Wangji’s not planning on taking my nephew anywhere before he’s recovered,” Lan Xichen’s voice joins the conversation as his brother appears on the threshold as well, and Lan Wangji feels his entire body relaxing, letting go of a tension he wasn’t even aware he was carrying. “I brought warm congee from the kitchens, and tea for a stubborn brother that won’t rest. Would Shufu like a cup as well?”
“You approv- Xichen, I expected better from you. Does neither of you understand the danger this is placing the sect in?” Uncle insists as Lan Xichen sets up the tea and food on a table by the bed, then moves to rest a hand on A-Yuan’s forehead to pour some soothing spiritual energy into his burning body. “This is unreasonable and selfish, from both of you.”
“A-Yuan did not burn Lotus Pier, or siege the Cloud Recesses. He did not use the Yin Iron or control fierce corpses,” Lan Wangji says quietly. Even after so long and despite his brother’s support, it still feels off to go against his uncle so openly. “This is about Wei Ying.”
“Well, of course it is about Wei Wuxian!” Uncle snaps. Lan Wangji feels his shoulders tensing again, and his brother laying a calming hand on his arm. “He-“
“Shufu never held Muqin’s actions against either of us,” Lan Wangji continues, and his uncle recoils like he’s been slapped. “Why is A-Yuan different?”
It may be petty, but Lan Wangji finds himself satisfied when Uncle has nothing to say to that, or for a few long moments as the three of them sit in a tense standoff. Regardless of what his brother says, Lan Wangji knows he’s not the only stubborn one here, and he’s never known Uncle to change his mind; he’s more than ready to pack his bags and go, as soon as-
“And why is he even sick?” Uncle grunts. “Whatever was Wei Wuxian doing?”
‘Being dead,’ Lan Wangji thinks, but he has the good sense to keep it to himself.
“A-Yuan spent several days hiding in the Burial Mounds by himself,” he says in the end. “I don’t know what he ate or drank, but without Wei Ying’s protections-”
“Hm. Well, feed him already,” Uncle cuts him off with another grumble. Out of the corner of his eye, Lan Wangji sees his brother’s lips twitch. “That porridge is getting cold.”
Lan Wangji moves slow to not aggravate his wounds even more, and wordlessly grabs the warm bowl from the table.
“Jin Guangshan will demand that he be killed if anyone finds out,” Uncle says after another moment, when Lan Wangji’s moving towards the bed to nudge A-Yuan awake. "He cannot leave Gusu."
Lan Wangji nods. "I understand the necessity."
"And you need to give him another name. A courtesy name at least," Uncle adds. "Have you thought of something?"
Lan Wangji nods again, feeling his ears warm up.
"Lan Sizhui," he says, quietly.
Off to the side, his brother smiles, amused and fond. "It's a beautiful name. Doesn't Shufu think so too?"
Uncle sighs. "It's truthful, at least."
🐇🐇🐇
Wei Ying is fidgeting where he sits by Lan Wangji’s side under Uncle’s cold, unamused stare.
“And you expect me to give you my blessing?” Uncle says at last, after what feels like an eternity.
Wei Ying clears his throat. “Uh- I know it would mean a lot to Lan Zhan if you gave it, laoshi.”
“I don’t presume you care much if I don’t,” Uncle arches an eyebrow.
“Aiya- it’s- uh-“ Wei Ying fidgets some more- it’s an amusing enough sight, Lan Wangji thinks; his fated rubs elbows with fierce corpses and has butted heads with some of the cultivation world’s most powerful men -including Uncle- before, but now that he’s asking for this particular favor, it’s as though all his cheeky bravado has left him. It goes to show he really does understand how much this means to Lan Wangji, even if he misunderstands his own importance in the matter. “Of course this one cares, la-“
“I was not talking to you, Wei Wuxian,” Uncle interrupts. His voice is firm, but not overtly mean or angered.
Lan Wangji bows his head. “Shufu taught me that sometimes one must make hard choices,” he says. “I do not wish to dishonor Shufu’s teachings or be ungrateful.”
“But?” Uncle asks. His voice is bitter, as though he already knows the answer to his question.
“But thirteen years ago, I made my choice too late,” he says, reaching out to take one of Wei Ying’s hands in his own. “Not this time.”
“There’s- ah- Lan Zhan, it wasn’t your fault,” Wei Ying scowls, squeezing his hand back. “I was trying to- I thought it would be better for you if you stayed away from me. It would’ve caused you too much trouble.”
“You were always regrettably smart, for someone as undisciplined as you.” Uncle huffs a bitter chuckle, then shakes his head weakly. “Why ask this of me now, Wangji? With how Xichen is right now?”
Lan Wangji feels himself tensing even further at the reminder of his brother’s state- he barely comes out of his house most days, and even when he does it’s like he’s far away, his eyes glazed over and pointed towards Yunmeng, where his husbands are sealed.
It’s a very uncomfortable reminder of the months after Wei Ying’s death.
“Xiongzhang is why,” he says. Thirteen years ago, his brother made sure to keep him human, to be there for him and Sizhui until Lan Wangji could endure living in the present again. Wei Ying squeezes his hand again, and he squares his shoulders and looks his uncle in the eye, determined. His brother is the reason. “I plan on staying at the Cloud Recesses permanently until he recovers.”
“Hm? No going where chaos is, for the righteous Hanguang-jun?” Uncle asks. It’s not necessarily hostile, but from the bitterness in his words Lan Wangji can guess his uncle is sensing what point he’s getting at.
“Mn. Unless no one else can help,” he says. “Until Xiongzhang is better.”
“A very wise and selfless decision,” Uncle sighs, rubbing a tired hand down his face. “And I presume your condition is…”
“The Gusu Lan did not collapse when Xiongzhang married two unorthodox cultivators,” Lan Wangji says simply. Be it sentient resentful swords or another follower of Wei Ying’s ghost path, it’s the truth. “I trust it can endure me marrying one.”
Out of the corner of his eye he can see Wei Ying burying his reddened face in his free hand, like he does whenever Lan Wangji whispers words of love into his ear when they lay together. It’s- he can’t afford to be distracted by such thoughts at the moment, so he focuses on his uncle, who looks like he aged twenty years in twenty seconds.
“Wangji…”
“Uh- Lan-laoshi has done a great job keeping Lan Zhan safe and happy his entire life,” Wei Ying speaks up suddenly, his face still red but his grey eyes determined. “With his permission… it’s this one’s turn now.”
“Hm.” Uncle’s eyes narrow for a moment, before he shakes his head, turning to look at Lan Wangji again. “And you won’t stay if he doesn’t?
“Wei Ying may come and go as he pleases,” Lan Wangji says calmly. “I will wait for him, always.”
Uncle remains silent for another long moment, but in the end he merely gives another, longer sigh, sounding exhausted this time.
“I trust your mother would be very satisfied with this situation,” he says, giving Wei Ying a sullen, unamused glare. “I expect you to abide by the precepts while you’re here.”
Wei Ying’s face illuminates like a calm spring under the rising dawn, the sight just as enthralling to Lan Wangji.
“This one will do his best, Lan-shufu!”
“Don’t.”