in which he xuan ‘accidentally’ stumbles across a feverish shi qingxuan.
(their friendship has been ground to dust — unsalvageable in he xuan’s eyes. but this, he thinks, this is something he can fix.)
post-canon. beware of endgame spoilers!
a/n: happy lunar new year @purinsan !! it is i, your black market red packet dealer *dabs*
i hope you like this!! i shed enough tears to fill an ocean while i was writing it :’)
—
mortals are terribly fragile beings.
this is a fact he xuan knows very well, something ingrained into his very soul — a reminder of cold, hungry nights and the bone-deep exhaustion one feels after days of walking without rest. his final days as a mortal had not been happy ones. those days have long since passed, but he still cannot help the ice-cold rage that blossoms in his chest as he skulks around the dingy alley.
he’s heard things, about how shi qingxuan had refused assistance and offers to heal his crippled limbs, instead opting for a crude amputation to prevent infection and further complications. he watches from the shadows as the wind master hobbles around in the shadiest of alleys, giving away whatever food and clothing he’s managed to procure from begging on the streets to a group of street children.
something settles in his stomach, bitter and sour like the taste of rotten meat, as he fiddles with the gold hanging from his ears — a gift, another reminder of him.
—
“ming-xiong!” shi qingxuan skips towards him, pausing to shove a gaudily wrapped package towards him, “you won’t tell me your birthday, but it’s been a year since we’ve met so it has to have been sometime in-between,” he rambles, “anyway! here’s your gift!”
“... earrings?”
“aren’t they cute? i found them while i was walking around in one of the cities in the mortal world — look, mine are silver, so we match!”
in his dreams, shi qingxuan smiles, but not at him.
you’re calling the wrong name.
—
“ming-xiong…”
now, as he takes in the gaunt figure slumped in a corner of the battered hut, with nothing but a thin cotton blanket to shield him from the merciless drafts of air that slip in through the cracks in the wall, he xuan cannot bring himself to respond. or rather, he does not know how, when the person who is suffering because of him (for him) is still calling his name in his sleep.
out of the corner of his eye, he spots a small piece of wood tucked into the folds of the pitiful excuse shi qingxuan calls robes. on closer inspection, he realises that it is the battered pieces of a fan.
he closes his eyes — looking at the broken fan of the wind master sickens him to the point of disgust (at himself? at the wind master? at their situation? who knows). shi qingxuan mutters something and turns over in his sleep, reaching for something — someone — who is no longer there. his face is flushed and his breaths are uneven. a fever, he xuan realises.
their friendship has been ground to dust — unsalvageable in he xuan’s eyes. but this, he thinks, this is something he can fix. so he dons the skin of a middle-aged woman — in another life, he thinks, shi qingxuan would have found this hilarious. he approaches the fallen god, crouching before him and easing him upright.
“easy there,” his voice, although feminine, is low and soothing, “i’m a passing physician. you’re ill, let me help you.”
shi qingxuan is barely conscious, but he still musters the strength to attempt to refuse assistance. it makes something snap within he xuan — anger mixed with frustration and something else he refuses to put a name to bubbling to the surface as he forgets to stick with the script he had planned out.
“you are ill,” he hisses, glaring at him with cold fury, “and yet you refuse food or medicine. are you trying to get yourself killed?!”
(they both know the answer to that.)
shi qingxuan says nothing as he is eased into a more comfortable position, watching with blank, fever-glazed eyes as he xuan starts a small fire and begins preparing a bowl of medicine.
“ming-xiong,” shi qingxuan says again. it’s just the fever, he xuan tells himself, he’s not in his right mind. there’s no way he’d know. still, he makes a low sound of acknowledgement, meticulously spooning the medicine into his mouth, while checking to make sure that the cold compresses he had laid out were still effective.
i’m here, he wants to whisper. he doesn’t. instead, he shifts his attention to the broken fan carefully tucked within torn robes. he reaches for it, intending to shift it out of the way to give himself better access.
“don’t!” shi qingxuan’s outburst startles him, and he very nearly drops the wet cloth, “don’t,” he says again, softer this time, “don’t take it away, please.”
“what is it?” he finds himself asking (he already knows — he remembers the same fan fluttering daintily in the breeze as its owner chattered on about some interesting trinket he found in the mortal realm).
shi qingxuan’s smile — soft and fond, yet tinged with regret, is breathtaking. his gaze is distant as he stares ahead at nothing, and it takes every ounce of self-control he xuan possesses to look away.
“a reminder, of sorts,” he says, (why won’t he stop smiling), “it was a gift, from a friend.”
he xuan cannot say anything to that. “sorry,” he says instead, “i won’t touch it then,” he soothes as he adjusts the cold compress into a position where it won’t touch the broken fan. he wants to run his fingers through those tangled locks, wants to berate the other for his lack of self-preservation, wants to—
there is no use thinking about what he wants, or what could have been. he focuses on the present, slipping back into the quiet reassurances of a concerned physician.
it does not take long for shi qingxuan to fall asleep, and he xuan watches the rise and fall of his chest, the silence between them no longer punctuated by shallow breathing or muffled noises of discomfort. he stays for as long as he dares, only dragging himself away when the sun begins to peak out from the horizon.
as dawn breaks, passers-by would walk by the alley to find a crippled beggar slumbering in a corner, an empty bowl of medicine beside him. unknown to them, a once-broken fan — now whole, lies tucked above his heart.
(“ming-xiong,” shi qingxuan whispers, barely audible, staring at the retreating back of the physician as she disappears into the fog that lines the streets in the early morning.
After discovering, reading and falling in love with the wonderful novel Tian Guan Ci Fu ♥
I became practically obsessed with looking for anything related to them.
And that’s how I discovered @tgcfevents ’s blog and of course I couldn’t resist from joining.
I’m really happy I had the opportunity to be part of this amazing community and I thank so much @xielians for all the support and the assistance on this little journey.
This drawing is my gift for @kitshunette
She’s is my version of the wonderful Ling Wen, with dark clothes and golden decorations and of course the inevitable rolls in her hands!
I really hope you like her! (≧◡≦)
