Chapter Text
Jiang Yanli’s whole body hurts.
She can’t remember how she is supposed to breathe. Her lungs don’t want to open and take in air. She tries to think about frogs and how their whole chest expands to breathe in, yet her lungs don’t want to follow the memory. Nothing is working like it is supposed to. It almost feels as if fire is coursing through the strike she had received on her back. Her thoughts don’t want to stray on how that same strike had gone straight through her body and out her chest too.
Yet, her throat still works.
“A-Xian, A-Xian. I need to get to A-Xian.” Tears continue to fall from her face, solemn drops landing on the arms of her youngest brother. Her white mourning robes are filthy, covered in blood, dirt and tears. She can’t see very well, but she can imagine that Jiang Cheng has never aimed this particular look of worry at her before. Only at Wei Wuxian. Her eyes close, unable to see her brother like this. “He is just scared. He needs me. I need to protect him. Please.”
“Don’t talk Jie, I need to get you out of here. You… you’re hurt, you need medical assistance. Just stay still, stop moving–”
“No, I need to see A-Xian. I need, I need to–” Jiang Yanli’s words get interrupted by a cough, one so brutal that it wracks through her whole body and leaves her completely unable to move from the pain.
“Shijie!”
Jiang Yanli goes limp from relief in the arms of Jiang Cheng as she hears that scared voice. She tries to yell her brother's name, yet the subtlest whisper of A-Xian crosses her lips.
A hand touches her arm, its icy chill still managing to reach her from the thin layers of her mourning robes. Another hand touches her face, cupping it and then wiping at the blood that she can feel is still warm on her face.
“Shijie, why, why did you come here?! Why? You shouldn’t be here. You should be far away from here!” Jiang Yanli can almost hear what Wei Wuxian actually wants to say, what his trembling hands and voice communicate all on their own. You should be far away from me. You should hate me. Resent me.
In reality, Wei Wuxian is the one who should hate and resent her. For deciding that the best she could do was show him a wedding dress instead of inviting him to her wedding. For deciding to invite him to her baby Jin Ling’s 100 day celebration without thinking that others would spring a trap upon him. How could she be so blind?
At the same time, she has dark, ugly feelings welling up within her. This is the person who killed her husband. Her child would now be raised without a father. Such a cruel outcome came from the hands of her own baby brother. Yet, hateful words don’t seem to want to come out of her mouth. Because this was all her fault.
How could she be such a horrible sister? How could she fail her brother like this? She reaches for his face but his hand meets hers halfway. His grip is gentle, so heartbreakingly gentle. Delicate, like the finest of glass strewn in the shape of a rolling wave. Hands that can hold back the string of a bow are now able to pluck a single petal of a flower without bruising it or causing other petals to fall.
Suddenly, she shifts in Jiang Cheng's arms as he throws a punch at Wei Wuxian’s face, the impact causing him to stagger in place and drop her hand.
“Shut up Wei Wuxian! Don’t pretend as if you don’t have anything to do with why she is here! Look at all of this bullshit! If Jiejie d– if something happens to Jiejie, it will all be your fault!” The arms holding her tighten, the grip managing to bring back sensation to her arms. “Didn’t you say you could control it? Didn’t you say there was no problem?!”
She tries to speak, to scold Jiang Cheng for punching Wei Wuxian but finds that the little strength she had in her body is leaving alarmingly fast. Like rice being sifted into and out of a bag.
Wei Wuxian slumps to the ground, his energy seemingly leaving him too. His eyes are glazed over, unable to comprehend the sight before him. “I know, just, just– I don’t know what happened. It, I can’t control it. I can’t…”
“You better! Control your freaks, damn it!”
Hearing those notes of despair in both of her brother's voices, she jerks in place, trying to move towards Wei Wuxian.
“Jiejie! It’s okay, it’s okay. Don’t move. Fortunately, it was just one gash. Fortunately. One. A single–” Jiang Cheng couldn’t stop rambling, the hope in his voice at his sister's movements causing him to speak incoherently. “Let’s leave, I’ll help you get out…”
No. She couldn’t leave like this. Who knew when the next time she would see Wei Wuxian would be?
“A-Xian.”
She hears his shuddered response to his name before slowly opening her eyes again, her dark gaze falling on her brother who looks away instantly. Shame litters his appearance. The way his skinny arms are wrapped around himself. How he can’t bring himself to look at her. It reminds Yanli of when he first came to Lotus Pier, all those years ago. How far he has come. How little can change.
“...A-Xian.” Her voice is brittle, full of spindly threads that a spider hasn't connected into a web yet due to harsh winds. Yet, she perseveres. She sees that look of wonder in Wei Wuxian’s eyes. That attentiveness whenever she speaks. She feels Jiang Cheng tightening his arms around her, probably from how she has started to shake from exertion. It now hurts to speak.
“You ran away so fast… last time… I didn't even get a chance to take a look at you, or say a single word to you…” She thinks about how wretched she must have looked next to Jin Zixuan's casket. How her baby cried in her arms and would quiet only when she would stop shaking from the tears that couldn’t seem to stop rolling down her cheeks. Such an ugly appearance, how could her brother have seen that from an older sister he had almost never seen cry?
“I… came here to tell you…” Jiang Yanli whispered, yet she couldn’t decide what exactly to say. Many different feelings warred within her heart. Love for the brother she had grown up with, the one she had raised and supported. Anger for the person who had killed the love of her life. Pity for the things he had gone through. Happiness, because even now not a single scratch littered his body.
She had just wanted to see her little brother. She needed to come see him. She had to come.
But first, she needed to make sure that the events of this night stopped. That nobody else would die or get hurt. She sighed, feeling more blood warm the length of her back. “A-Xian, stop… you have to stop first. Don’t… Don’t…”
Don’t continue hurting yourself by doing this.
“Okay,” he rapidly replied, “I’ll stop.”
And he tried. But the steps of someone running rapidly toward them filled Jiang Yanli with an energy she had never felt before. An adrenaline that poured liquid gold into her veins, little sparks flowing throughout her whole body.
She rose… and pushed.
When had Wei Wuxian's back become so thin that she could feel his shoulder blades shifting as she pushed him away? When had she stopped noticing what plagued her little brother?
Before she could ask, pain erupted from her throat and she knew no more.
*****
A silent scream leaves Jiang Yanli’s mouth as she suddenly rises up, both hands reaching out in front of her. The shape of her mouth forms the name A-Xian, yet nothing leaves her throat.
Harsh gasps leave her whole body, huge inhales coming to her lungs easier than they had before. Each puff of air passing through her throat feels as if it is being squeezed within someone’s grasp. She brings up one hand, trying to understand why it feels as if her throat is being burned from the inside out.
Smooth skin meets the end of her fingers.
Why, why does her throat hurt so much?
She remembers being stabbed in the back, Jiang Cheng holding her in his arms, Wei Wuxian… Wei Wuxian trying to calm down the resentful spirits, but–
Oh! She remembers hearing someone trying to sneak up on Wei Wuxian. She had pushed him… Jiang Yanli opens her eyes and looks at her hand, still feeling the sensation of her brother's bony back as she pushed him away from the sword aimed at him. Then she had felt a horrible pain in her throat.
She rubs at the skin of her neck, still feeling that burning sensation within causing every simple breath to feel as if someone is mercilessly squeezing it. At times, it almost feels as if something is stuck there until she takes a huge breath. She tries coughing, yet a particularly brutal cough causes her to gag and feel something almost inch itself closer to the top of her esophagus. This scares her so much that she stops trying to cough.
“Yanli, what is wrong with you? Stop with that nonsense.”
Jiang Yanli freezes. That voice.
That voice!
Jiang Yanli quickly raises her head and sees that across from her is her mother, the same one that she had buried along with her father years ago. She hadn’t noticed in her desperation but she is in a carriage, this mirage of her mother sitting across from her and staring at her with a face full of disgust. The slightest hint of concern can be seen if Jiang Yanli focuses well enough, yet her mind is still stuck on the fact that her mother is alive and breathing.
A-Niang, she tries to say, yet her voice never manages to exit her throat. A croak is all that sounds before her eyes tear up. Her mother, chest moving up and down, not covered in blood and as still as the stagnant waters of a pond.
Something in her mothers form loosens. The slope of her shoulders curve down a bit, the rigidness softening. Yet, her frown becomes more severe. “Silly child, did you have a nightmare? This softness is the reason why you are lacking as a child of the Yunmeng Jiang and Meishan Yu clans.”
Although harsh, the words don’t manage to reach her. Jiang Yanli reaches out, to determine if this is an elaborate dream or illusion, before her hand is slapped away. The pain, it felt so real. So achingly familiar.
“Child, what is wrong with you! And why aren’t you speaking? Use your words!”
Jiang Yanli tries, opens her mouth to reassure her mother, yet pain erupts in her throat and pained coughs escape her lips. The frown slips from her mothers face, something else slipping through.
“Yanli?”
Before long, the coughing turns into gags that then release something almost sharp from her mouth that had scratched her throat, the thing landing on her hand. Jiang Yanli feels something warm escape the corner of her mouth. She stares at the thing that had come out of her mouth.
A blood covered peony, she thinks deliriously as she hears her name once more before passing out.