The Occasional Artist

Writing/art blog, current: TGCF, past: Tales of Zestiria. Late 20s, R18. Check me out on AO3 and Twitter (links to the left), and expect if I interact with you, at least half of it will be off my personal blog (@amarietie)

[tmariea]

What If I Told It In My Dreams

Fandom: MDZS/Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation/The Untamed

Pairing: Xiyao

Characters: Lan Xichen, Jin Guangyao

Rating: M (There will be a second chapter of this, and this will Increase at that point)

Summary:

To the best of Lan Xichen's knowledge Jin Guangyao had not been a sleepwalker before the war. Not once while on the run had he woken to see his companion’s slight form - the same one now silhouetted in the faint moonlight from the open door of the Hanshi - wandering about their camps or rooms.

Jin Guangyao sleepwalks his way to the Hanshi, to his er-ge's bed, and straight into a love confession neither of them were expecting out of a mundane visit to the Cloud Recesses.

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This fic is result of meing being possessed by this post, and a very fun back-and-forth brainstorming conversation with @dumbbo-yyy. 'This will be fun and short and sweet!' I said, 'this will be good practice before getting into Xiyao prompts for the gotcha4gaza' I said. Well, most of these things are true, but hope you enjoy 5K words of silly and sweet goo before an eventual smutty chapter 2 to come - rating and tags will be adjusted accordingly at that point, but for now all you'll have to look out for is a flash of Lan Xichen's Horny Thoughts(TM).

When Lan Xichen woke in the middle of the night to the sound of the Hanshi’s door opening, his first reaction was to call Shuoyue to his hand.  He felt this was a reasonable reaction; everyone had been more on edge since the war, and to the best of his knowledge Jin Guangyao had not been a sleepwalker before it either.  Not once while on the run had he woken to see his companion’s slight form - the same one now silhouetted in the faint moonlight from the open door - wandering about their camps or rooms.

“A-Yao?” Xichen asked, his voice rather rougher with sleep and more confused than normal.  He sent Shuoyue back to her stand with a flick of his hand and his qi.  “Is something the matter?”

A-Yao didn’t reply.  Instead he crossed the room to where Xichen was still lying half propped up on one elbow.  He placed a hand on the bed so he could lean closer.  Xichen was very aware of the way the bed dipped to the side of him, the warmth of A-Yao so close, the way he could just barely feel A-Yao’s breath ghost over his face.  He scarcely dared to move.

Xichen was not ashamed to admit to himself, but perhaps he would be ashamed to admit out loud, that he had dreamed of this at least a few times before. A-Yao would seek him out some time in the evening, or even later at night when he should have been asleep.  He would breathe out, “Er-ge,” or if Xichen’s mind was feeling particularly forward, “Huan-ge,” and then climb into his lap or over him in bed and kiss him, every hot and lovely line of him pressed up against Xichen.  Things would inevitably progress from there and Xichen would wake up in desperate need of a good long while in meditation or an early morning dip in the cold springs, all the while reminding himself that the sound of A-Yao crying his name as he finished was not a thing he got to have.  Or sometimes, he would not need either of those things at all…

Despite certain similarities, that did not seem to be what was happening now.  All of his senses were far too sharp, for one, and he really wasn’t sure his mind would make up something quite like A-Yao saying, in a much more light and affectionate voice than usual, “Goodnight kiss for Zewu-jun,” just before kissing him right in the center of his forehead.

“A-Yao, what?” Xichen managed to force out around the sudden and all-consuming squeeze of his heart in his chest.  His skin was tingling where A-Yao had kissed, and a delighted, if also slightly confused, shiver ran down his spine.

Instead of replying, A-Yao said, “Goodnight kiss for er-ge,” and kissed the same spot again.  This time his hands also came up to cradle Xichen’s head, thumbs running back and forth across the place that his forehead ribbon would lay if he were not dressed for sleep.  That plunged Xichen into an entirely different kind of wanting, the kind where his ribbon was A-Yao’s to touch, his to keep.

It already was, but up until this moment Xichen had not been sure it was something A-Yao might even want, for all his own personal longings.

He’d barely had time to catalog, much less actually sort through, any of those feelings, before A-Yao straightened back up and turned to leave without another word. Xichen stood from the bed, feeling as ungainly as when he was young and still learning how to grow into his long limbs, and took a few large strides across the room to catch A-Yao with a hand on his upper arm before he could walk back out the door.  “Please, A-Yao, is something the matter?  You are acting… unlike yourself.”

When A-Yao didn’t turn to look at him, or make any other acknowledgment that he’d even heard, Xichen took his other arm and gently turned him himself.  A-Yao moved without any sort of resistance.  His eyes were open and looking forward, but they did not appear to be seeing.  

For one terrible moment of stomach-dropping terror, Xichen thought that somehow his younger sworn brother, his A-Yao, his heart, had been turned into a puppet.  He yanked at the collar of A-Yao’s under-shirt, pulling it down far enough to see that his neck was still unblemished in the moonlight.  It was impossible anyway, wasn’t it?  There should have been no remnants of Yin Iron anywhere near Gusu to trouble them.

“A-Yao, are you… asleep?” Xichen asked finally, as the last possible option.  This time, he did not expect an answer.  “Let me take you back to your rooms.”  He placed one hand at A-Yao’s back, between his shoulder blades, and took his hand with the other, to guide him down the short set of steps leading up to the Hanshi.  How he had managed to navigate up them without tripping or making noise the first time Xichen was not sure.

By the position of the moon in the sky, the shichen was zi.  Cloud Recesses should be quiet and mostly empty, but Xichen still took them along lesser used pathways behind buildings and through wooded gardens just in case.  A-Yao would not appreciate being seen in this state of undress.  

It did have the unfortunate side effect of giving Xichen plenty of time to think on his suddenly heightened awareness of A-Yao beside him, of every place they touched.  His hand between A-Yao’s shoulder blades, and the way he could either spread out his fingers to cover much of the span of his back, or how he could let it slip lower to rest at the curve of his waist.  The loose hair brushing across the back of his hand, soft and lovely and so tempting to run his fingers through.

A-Yao’s hands, Xichen was more acquainted with.  He had been so bold as to run his thumbs soothingly across them the first time that they met, after all, trying to communicate wordlessly that he deserved far more than the scorn heaped upon him by the young cultivators around him.  And then, when Xichen had been injured and weak with fever on the run from the Wens, those hands had tended his wounds with competence and gentleness.  Since, he had watched A-Yao’s hands on teacups and on swords, held forward to bow, and in controlled, elegant gestures as he explained some brilliant idea. This didn’t mean, though, that Xichen had any tolerance built up against the wanting inspired by A-Yao’s touch.  Right now his hand was limp and relaxed, but Xichen could imagine the sensation of those smaller fingers lacing through his own.  Could dream of A-Yao lifting their hands to his lips to kiss Xichen’s with a secretive smile on his face.  It was for the best for both of them, perhaps, that they were walking uninhabited paths of Cloud Recesses, as Xichen felt his ears flame at the idea.

Reaching the walled courtyard around the guest quarters was a relief from Xichen’s own mind, but did present a new problem: although Cloud Recess was back to it’s old quiet, isolated self, everyone felt more comfortable with an increased watch after the Sunshot Campaign.  The disciple at the gate looked alert for a Lan at this time of night.  Objectively a good thing, although it meant they would require another route in.  How A-Yao himself left without raising notice was a question he suspected he may never get an answer to.

“Apologies, A-Yao,” Xichen said, and hooked an arm beneath his legs to lift him.  The way his relaxed head and neck drooped backwards was too disconcerting, so Xichen arranged the man in his arms so that A-Yao’s head rested against his shoulder, and his arms draped around Xichen’s neck.  Then, he had to take a moment just for himself, to revel in the feeling of A-Yao pressed to his chest, the perfect comfort in that pressure and weight.  Xichen’s precious burden and his feelings secured, he jumped silently over the fence.

They landed alongside A-Yao’s pavilion, in the shadows between it and a tall pine tree.  In the courtyard, no one lingered outside of their rooms, although it seemed a few might still be awake by the diffuse light from behind window screens.  Xichen made sure to step carefully and stick to the shadows along the building, until he could slip through the door to A-Yao’s room.

Inside, he crept through the dark, aware that if he were to kick over a table all his caution would have been for not.  The bed itself, he could see as his eyes adjusted, was well rumpled, as if before A-Yao began his nighttime wanderings he had not been sleeping restfully.  Xichen didn’t have the hands to rearrange the bed neatly again, so on top of the blankets it would have to be.

Except, when he set A-Yao onto the bed and made to stand, he was stopped by the arms around his neck.  It seemed at some point that A-Yao had clasped his hands, and would not be so easily dislodged.

“Please, A-Yao, I need to return,” Xichen murmured to him.

A-Yao made a noise in his sleep, a displeased sounding one.  As if he had heard and understood.

Xichen contemplated his options.  Coaxing A-Yao’s arms away would be easy enough, or he could slip his head out from between them, but the thought was suddenly unconscionable.  A-Yao hadn’t been sleeping well here, and the dark circles beneath his eyes had not gone unnoticed either, so Xichen suspected he was not sleeping well at home either.  He could not bear to disturb him when it seemed, in a mirror of Xichen’s own wishes, A-Yao wanted him to stay.

He could lay down right here next to A-Yao and fall back asleep.  He was sure sleep would come to him very easily, even though it wasn’t his own bed, with the comforting warmth of A-Yao beside him.  But then, what explanation could be given for the sect leader having spent the night in his own guest quarters?  No, it had to be better to bring A-Yao back to the Hanshi after all.  The two of them had taken breakfast together before, or gone for walks in the early morning, on days when A-Yao was awake early enough to keep Lan hours.  Although Xichen now had a suspicion that it may be after nights when he had not slept at all.  That would do - he would just need to wake A-Yao in time in the morning and no one would be the wiser.

Back out through the door they went, then, and over the wall to retrace their steps through the gardens.  This time though, Xichen held A-Yao the whole way.  A-Yao had not released his arms, and so the thought of putting him down had barely even crossed Xichen’s mind before it was gone.  

They made better time that way, as he didn’t have to be as aware of all the hazards that A-Yao could not see and may trip over.  Before long, he was sliding open the door to the Hanshi, and then laying A-Yao down for a second time, on his own bed.  He immediately missed the weight and heat of him.

Xichen sat down beside A-Yao, leaning down so as to not tug on his own neck.  He ran a hand up and down A-Yao’s upper arm soothingly, and said, “I promise I will stay.  Will you let me go?”  A-Yao made another set of sleepy grumbling noises, which Xichen found unbearably cute, but then surprisingly released his grip.  He left his arms stretched out across the empty space of the bed, as if he was reaching for Xichen even still.

Xichen slid into the empty side of the bed, and carefully draped one of A-Yao’s outstretched arms across his own chest before he could get caught in thoughts of what they each would or would not do in the daylight, the lines of propriety he was choosing to cross in the shadowy, unreal time between dusk and dawn.  Some small, unnoticed tension leaked out of Xichen’s body at the weight.  A-Yao, for his part, made another noise and cuddled closer, his head shifting until it nearly touched Xichen’s, and the arm across Xichen’s chest tightening just enough to be holding rather than laying limply.

Xichen let out a shaky breath through the sudden squeeze in his heart, and turned his head so he could kiss A-Yao on the forehead in a mirror of the kiss that began this all.  “Goodnight, A-Yao,” he whispered into the small, warm space between them, such an intimacy that it seemed the words were swallowed by the silence of the house.

He wasn’t sure if he would be able to sleep, through the onslaught of feelings that A-Yao here in his bed like this caused in him, but Xichen was out almost the moment he closed his eyes.

Jin Guangyao startled awake sometime in the small hours before dawn to the sensation, of all things, that he was too warm.  That barely even happened in Lanling’s hot and stifling summers, much less when visiting Cloud Recesses.  Next he realized that he was in the wrong bed, and the source of the extra, unexpected heat was another person in it next to him.  In this moment perhaps more than any others, he was grateful for his body’s instinct to freeze and assess when startled, as he breathed through a jolt of fear.  

This was not the brothel.  

He was many years away from the risk of a patron finding their way to his bed uninvited. 

By the pervasive scent of sandalwood and pine, he was still in Cloud Recesses, and a quick assessment of himself showed he was unbound, uninjured, and still clothed.  His instincts had kept his bedmate from waking as he did - despite the way one of his arms was slung across a broad chest and his knees tucked up between his body and the person’s hip - which would afford Jin Guangyao the chance to carefully draw himself away and see who this person was, and then slip away with them none the wiser.

Even still he had to clench his jaw to help concentrate past the rapid, fearful beat of his heart as he gently leaned back from where their heads rested on the same pillow, only a cun away from Jin Guangyao pressing his forehead to their temple.  The man’s face came into focus, the serene sleeping features of Lan Xichen.

There had been fury waiting in the wings of Jin Guangyao’s heart, hidden behind the fear.  He was grateful to be lying down in the face of his sudden light-headedness as both feelings drained away.  

So then, what had brought him here?  He didn’t feel sick or in pain, at least no more than usual, so this was not a case of a sudden illness in the night and er-ge staying by his side at the healers.  Nor had he fallen asleep in the Hanshi; Jin Guangyao had a distinct memory of walking back to his own guest quarters after taking tea with er-ge last night.

That left one option.  More than once since the war, Jin Guangyao had fallen asleep in his own room and woken sometime later standing in a garden or colonnade or empty hall echoing with the silence of deep night.  He’d taken to locking his door, but had foolishly, hubristically, thought that here in Cloud Recesses he might have less to guard against.  He wasn’t even sure that had been a conscious thought, which was infinitely worse.

And where had that thought brought him?  To er-ge’s bed.  As if his sleeping mind knew what he wanted most, and discarded all of the barriers he put up against it in his waking life to bring him right here.

The last time they had slept like this had been when they were in hiding together.  Single rush mats or hard, small beds; threadbare blankets that left them both shivering horribly, it had only been… sensible to share.  Jin Guangyao didn’t think he’d had as good of a night’s sleep since.  Not in Nightless City under Wen Ruohan’s ever-paranoid eye, or in Jinlintai amongst it’s unique crowd of vipers.  He took all of those questions about the last time he’d felt safe enough to relax and sleep without worry and shoved them to the back of his mind.  He’d always known what it meant to do what was needed, that was no different.

This though, this was not needed.  It would not advance his reputation or his plans, may in fact actively harm them were anyone to find out and decide to gossip.  (He might be safe from the Lans.  Might.  Jin Guangyao knew better than to trust even rigid rules when pitted against human nature.)

And yet.

And yet.  He had shifted the blanket down off of his shoulder without thinking about it, and now he was the perfect temperature.  Warm and sinking into the bed, surprisingly soft for his expectations of the Lan clan.  Er-ge’s breathing was quiet and even, bringing Jin Guangyao’s into pace with it, and stilling much of the storm that was always stirring in his heart or mind.  If he let himself forget for a moment all of the reasons and admonishments, he could let his head fall forward, lean against er-ge’s temple the way it almost was when he woke.  He could linger here, in this quiet, timeless moment suffused with the smell of sandalwood incense and fir trees, and with a wanting so gentle it nearly didn’t hurt.  Just long enough to fill his heart with something that could sustain him for a little while when he needed to leave.  He could do this and still slip away before er-ge and the rest of Could Recesses woke.

He remembered dozing for some time, stretches of peace without thought interspersed with indulgent awareness of comfort, and soft robes beneath his curled hands.  And then, he was waking to the feeling of er-ge rising from bed, and cursing himself for letting his guard down a second time within the same night.

Something made Jin Guangyao stay still and keep his eyes closed.  He let himself lie sleepy and relaxed in er-ge’s bed, as he listened to him move about the room.  The sounds of rustling fabric as he dressed, a comb through his hair, and then his footsteps were returning to the side of the bed.

Lan Xichen leaned over and kissed his forehead, right where he painted his cinnabar dot.  With his lips still close enough to brush Jin Guangyao’s skin as he spoke, he said, “I will be back with breakfast momentarily, love.”

Jin Guangyao had years and years of iron control to draw on.  Years of holding himself still, and smiling, and subservient, or whatever other emotion another person expected of him.  Years of speaking with perfect care, always choosing the words that would show himself as a refined gentleman, that would only enhance his reputation.  All of it deserted him in an instant, as he opened his eyes and reached out to grasp at the sleeve of his er-ge’s robes.  He asked, “Do you mean it?”

Er-ge jerked just the tiniest bit in surprise, and some distant corner of Jin Guangyao’s mind wanted to smile at catching him, always so perfectly upright and graceful, off guard.  “Huh?  A-Yao did I wake you?  I am sorry.”

Jin Guangyao ignored that question in light of repeating his much more pressing one.  “Did you mean it?”

Now er-ge just sounded confused rather that surprised.  “Mean what?  That I will return with breakfast?  It really will just be a moment, but you can sleep longer if you wish.”

Merciful Guanyin, was he going to have to say it?  But no, he had years and years of practice keeping it behind his teeth, all the way back to when his er-ge was only Lan-zongzhu and there had been an impulse in his fingers to sign off every secret letter, “In case I never see you again, I fear I have fallen in love with you.”  It kept him from being able to say it now.  Instead, his hand flexed a little tighter in the fabric of er-ge’s sleeve, and he said, “You know that’s not what I’m talking about.”  He’d intended it to come out a bit tart, a bit teasing, but the slowness of early morning diluted his tone down far too close to pleading.

Er-ge’s eyes softened, and he sat back down on the bed.  Jin Guangyao was hyper-aware of how their hips nearly brushed, the blanket between them pulling tight across his waist as it was caught beneath er-ge.

One of er-ge’s hands reached out, as if to touch Jin Guangyao’s face, but then stopped at the last moment.  Instead he laid it over the hand on his sleeve.  “Does A-Yao want me to mean it?” he asked.  He did a much better job at a teasing tone, but underneath was a steady earnestness, that promised if Jin Guangyao said no, he would step away and get breakfast.  They would eat and drink tea, perhaps walk the paths on the mountain, and the conversation would drift in other directions, never to find its way back again.  If that is what he wanted.

He did not want that vision, not at all.  He wanted his er-ge’s love, wanted to be able to love him in return.  Even if it did nothing to advance his plans, to advance his reputation.  He swallowed hard, and turned that iron control in a different direction, towards making himself speak.  “I want you to mean it.  Please, er-ge.  Please mean it.”

Er-ge’s face lit up, like he’d set off a firework beneath his skin.  “A-Yao, my A-Yao, my love.”

Jin Guangyao felt his cheeks heating, and resisted the nonsensical urge to say ‘you can’t say things like that!’  He was the one who had asked for it after all.  Instead, he ran his hand up from Xichen’s arm to his shoulder, and tugged lightly before ordering.  “Come back here, then, and kiss me.”

The way er-ge’s eyes darkened was very interesting; he cataloged that away for the future.  And then, he didn’t think anymore at all because a pair of soft, warm lips were pressing to his own.  Jin Guangyao let his eyes slip shut and wrapped his other hand around the back of er-ge’s neck.  

It kept him from going very far when he pulled back, and searched Jin Guangyao’s face.  He must have been satisfied with what he saw, because he smiled so brightly, and tipped forward again, this time to rest their foreheads together.  Even more than the kiss, the feeling of the metal cloud piece of er-ge’s ribbon against his skin made him gasp.  “My er-ge.  My Lan Xichen,” he tested out into the bare inches of space between him, his voice curling around the words possessively, and heard er-ge’s breath hitch.

And then er-ge was kissing him again, once, twice, three more times.  Each just that bit firmer than the last, enough to start to bring up the heat in Jin Guangyao’s blood, before he pulled back.  Jin Guangyao was just about to work himself up to a pout when er-ge asked, with a truly incandescent joy in audible in his voice, “Would A-Yao mind if breakfast was delayed?  I did not get the chance to properly appreciate holding you.”

Well, now, how was he supposed to complain about such a sweet request like that?  He found himself shaking his head, while the arms still around er-ge pulled him in closer in answer.

Er-ge planted one knee on the bed, so he was momentarily looming over Jin Guangyao, which he filed away for more exploration later given the swoop in his stomach.  Then er-ge swung his other leg up too, to the other side of Jin Guangyao, and tipped himself in an undignified sprawl onto the empty, opposite side of the bed.  The corners of his mouth were drawn up in delight and amusement, seemingly at his own antics, and his eyes crinkled up.  The near-laughter on his face carried over into his voice as he said, “Come here,” and reached out an arm to drag Jin Guangyao over on top of him, so he was laying with his back to er-ge’s chest.

And, oh.  Jin Guangyao breathed out and felt as if all of his muscles and bones had deserted him with how easily he relaxed into that hold.  He tipped his head back so it was pillowed on er-ge’s shoulder, and his eyes drifted back shut almost without his own accord.  His body reminding him with a vengeance that he’d had an interrupted night of sleep and this was still earlier morning than he preferred, and then throwing in, just for good measure, that he was now warm, comfortable, and safe.

“I’ve dreamed of doing this,” er-ge said, wrapping his arms across Jin Guangyao’s chest and belly, and pressing a kiss against his temple.  “I will be content for as long as you might want to still sleep.”

Jin Guangyao didn’t fully sleep again, but he did let himself drift as the sun slowly crept up over the windowsills and across the floor.  He could feel the rise and fall of er-ge’s breathing against his back, and a hand rubbing gently up and down over his side.  But, he wasn’t accustomed to lazing for particularly long, no matter how blissful the excuse.  Eventually he stretched a little to indicate that he was fully awake again, and reached out to take one of er-ge’s hands and lace their fingers together above his stomach.  He could feel er-ge’s delight in the sharp breath against his back.

“Good morning, A-Yao.”

“Mn, good morning,” Jin Guangyao said, and then asked one of the questions that had been on his mind.  “Er-ge, how did we end up here?”  He lifted his free hand to indicate the bed, the Hanshi, all of it.

“Do you have no memory of it?”

“I have a suspicion about what happened, but will er-ge tell it for me?”  Jin Guangyao hoped that he hadn’t made a fool of himself in some way, but there was a touch of anxiety swirling low in his gut over the answer.

“I am not sure what happened before this, but A-Yao came to the Hanshi last night while you were still asleep-” yes, just as Jin Guangyao had feared “-ostensibly to say goodnight, and to give me a… goodnight kiss.”

Oh dear.  If er-ge was stumbling over his words even after they had exchanged more kisses, he must have behaved egregiously.  He kept his body relaxed against er-ge’s chest with a force of will, and asked in a lighthearted tone, “Hopefully I have been able to provide better kisses while awake?”

Er-ge laughed lightly at himself, and shook his head.  “A-Yao only kissed my forehead.  But it was unexpected.  Before that, I wanted to believe that this is what we meant to each other, but I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t want to show it,” Jin Guangyao whispered.  “It was…”  He thought of promises from sect leaders.  Of tower stairs.  Vicious rumor mills that had said things about him and Nie-zongzhu even when Nie Mingjue had never looked back at him with the same kind of heat he recognized in Lan Xichen’s eyes.  Rumors that were more than happy to look at all his accomplishments, his cultivation, his status and attribute them only to the bedroom at the slightest hint…  The way much of that was still there, would always still be there.  The way that this one wanting had never been meant to grow so large as to put at risk all the others.

“Mn,” er-ge hummed gently, and tightened his arms in a silent acknowledgment.  Jin Guangyao breathed out all the tension from his chest and his muscles at not having to say it out loud.

“So then,” he brought them back to the topic at hand.  “What occurred next?”

“I walked A-Yao back to his rooms, but we had to go over the wall to avoid the guard.”

“That seems like a flaw in your guard rotation, er-ge,” Jin Guangyao interrupted, with a hint of laughter in his voice.

“Ahem, well.”

He turned his head so he could glimpse er-ge’s thoroughly pink ears, and took advantage of the proximity to shift just a bit further and press a quick kiss to his lips.  “I’ll stop, I’ll stop.”  A part of his brain peeled off to consider modifications that could be made from his old Nie rosters to work for the Lan, but that was a concern firmly for later.

Er-ge stole another kiss before he continued, “When I tried to return you to bed, you ah, wouldn’t let go.  I decided it would be easier if I brought you back here.”

“Easier how?”

“We often take breakfast, or morning walks.  It would raise less questions.”

Jin Guangyao could admit that the logic was sound, even if it had given him a moment’s panic in the middle of the night.  Well, full story told it did not seem as if he had behaved too egregiously, and certainly couldn’t complain about the end result.  Even still, he sighed, and said, “Ah, it is as I had feared, then.”

“Does A-Yao find himself sleepwalking often?”

“Sometimes, recently.  More often when I am restless or have something on my mind.”

“And did you sleep well here?”  Xichen sounded just the slightest bit hesitant, and hopeful.  It was sweet, unbearably so.

In revenge for that feeling - or perhaps as a reward, he couldn’t quite decide - Jin Guangyao stretched luxuriously, letting one arm land in such a way that it curled around the back of er-ge’s neck.  “Hm, wonderfully,” he said, letting the words stretch lazily across his tongue.  It was the truth, too.  Even his intermittent dozing had left him feeling more rested than he had in days.

Er-ge nosed against Jin Guangyao’s neck, newly in reach, and said into the hollow behind his ear, “Well then, A-Yao will simply have to share my bed any time he is in Cloud Recesses.”

“Er-ge!”

“I had meant for sleeping, but A-Yao can of course share my bed in other ways if he would like.”

There were still things Jin Guangyao would need to think through - what they would be to each other, what they would appear to be to the world.  How this would fit with his other ambitions, or possibly even rewrite them.  But for now, for now he tilted his head to show more of his neck, flexed his hand against er-ge’s skin, and said, “Yes.”

[tmariea]

You Cut Through All the Noise

Fandom: MDZS/Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation/The Untamed

Pairing: Xiyao

Characters: Lan Xichen, Jin Guangyao

Rating: G

Summary:

There are many things one cannot say to A-Yao. Xichen had tried once, saying, ‘The night is beautiful and I am here with you. That is all I need to celebrate.’ A-Yao had replied with precise and perfect courtesy, exactly as expected from one sect leader to another in response to a compliment. Scripted. Exactly what Xichen did not want him to be. So he said different words now - a holiday, or a successful night hunt, or the completion of a project - and tried to let his face and his actions say all the rest. --- A look into Zewu-jun's and Lianfang-zun's late night talks, featuring gifts, gossip, and quite a lot of yearning.

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This was written as part of the @xiyaogotcha4gaza for @eternal-brainrot's prompt: xiyao spending an evening together at jinlintai or cloud recesses drinking tea, gossiping, etc. just them being able to put down their burdens and perfectly crafted appearances for the evening in a way that they cannot with anyone else and having a silly side of themselves that they arent able to show to anyone else. laughing together!! lxc giggling!!! maybe lxc staying up past lan curfew despite getting sleepy because he wants to make his time with jgy last as long as possible. sleepy lxc being a bit sappy maybe? maybe the other ends up falling asleep in whoever's room they’re in and ending up staying the night there?

Well, tooth-rotting fluff with a side of serious yearning is my bread and butter, so it was a match made in heaven for me! I hope you enjoy!

Title from Bastille's 'The Anchor'

The door to Jin Guangyao’s rooms was unlocked, but his sworn brother was not in sight when Xichen pushed it open one-handed, keeping careful balance on the tray of tea, wine and cups in his other.  The sliding doors to the private garden beyond were open just a crack though, enough to give him hint of where A-Yao could be found, without letting in too much of the cooling night air.

A-Yao was indeed in the garden, settled at a small table beneath the pavilion with his back to Xichen.  He was wrapped in a thick, fur-lined cloak against the late-fall chill— much less severe than in Cloud Recesses, but always still enough to bother A-Yao.  Xichen took a private moment to feel the disappointment at a lost opportunity to ask A-Yao if he was cold and drape his own outer robe around his shoulders.  Then he stepped out of the door, and closed it audibly behind him.  A-Yao turned at the noise, a smile on his face which softened into a much more genuine one as he caught sight of who was at his door.

“Er-ge, good evening,” he said, and beckoned him over.  And then when he noticed the tray, “Oh, you are a guest, you should have allowed me to call for refreshments!”

Xichen stepped down from the porch and walked between the neatly groomed beds of peonies to join A-Yao at the pavilion.  “Gifts from Gusu,” he explained without remorse for his tray, setting it down on the table, and taking a seat at the side adjacent to A-Yao.  He turned the bottle of wine to display the label proclaiming it Emperor’s Smile.  The tea, too, was a blend native to the region.

A-Yao gave him a look which conveyed ‘that was not necessary,’ over the top of a current of genuine pleasure.  They’d had conversations to that end many times, until Xichen had finally offered to stop if it made him uncomfortable, and A-Yao had remained suspiciously silent.  Xichen had just smiled wide and accepted his win.  Even still, A-Yao gave him a demure look of thanks, perhaps for his own peace of mind.

Now, instead of more protests he asked, “What is the occasion?” and reached for the pot and cake of tea to begin brewing.

There are many things one cannot say to A-Yao.  Xichen had tried once, saying, ‘The night is beautiful and I am here with you.  That is all I need to celebrate.’  A-Yao had replied with precise and perfect courtesy, exactly as expected from one sect leader to another in response to a compliment.  Scripted.  Exactly what Xichen did not want him to be.  So he said different words now - a holiday, or a successful night hunt, or the completion of a project - and tried to let his face and actions say all the rest.  He thought he’d gotten better at that with practice.

Today he said, “The success of Jin Ling’s party,” as he peeled back the lid of the wine jar to pour A-Yao a cup.  It wasn’t even breaking a rule to say so - that was the reason he had come to Lanling today after all, and the party a testament to A-Yao’s organizational skills, as every event held here was these days.

“And why would er-ge find Jin Ling’s fourth birthday to be worthy of such celebration?” A-Yao asked with a look that Xichen chose to interpret as ‘I appreciate the sentiment but we both know you are making excuses.’

“It seems the other sect leaders are determined to fawn, why should I not do the same?”

“I find er-ge to be far less likely to travel with a herd, or turn a white fluffy tail and run at the slightest provocation.”

The thought of the other sect leaders bolting from the hall this afternoon as soon as Jin Ling had begun to wind himself up to a tantrum, contrasted with A-Yao’s perfectly serene face as he said it, startled Xichen into a burst of laughter.  

A-Yao’s smile grew until his dimples were showing, and as always, Xichen was consumed with a gripping temptation reach out and trace them with reverent fingertips.  Instead, he contented himself with taking the cup of tea held out to him, letting his fingers linger far longer than necessary against A-Yao’s before bringing the cup to his mouth to drink.

They spent the time while drinking their respective tea and wine talking about the party anyway.  A-Yao had witty things to say about every present Jin Ling had been given, never outright disrespectful, but only because his turns of phrase were so very clever that Xichen doubted the guests would have realized even if A-Yao had said it to their faces.  Oh, how he wished he could watch him say it to their faces.

When the teapot was nearly empty, Xichen set down his cup and said, “I hope A-Yao will forgive the presumption of one more gift.”

“Er-ge is far too generous!” A-Yao said, his voice admonishing but his dimples gave him away.  He shook his head and added, “You should be careful, lest someone take advantage of that nature of yours.  I should say no, if only to keep you on your toes.  What would you do then?”

Xichen hummed, pretending to think on it for a moment.  “I would be disappointed to not get to dote on A-Yao the way he deserves.”  And then, feeling bold in the way he rarely did outside of these nights where it seemed the world shrunk down to only the two of them, added with a confiding smile, “And then I would keep the gift for a different day.  But, I don’t think my A-Yao will refuse, will he?”

A-Yao opened his mouth and then closed it then, in an uncharacteristic lapse of control.  It was hard to tell in the golden lamplight, but Xichen could swear his cheeks colored as his eyes tracked to the side.  “No,” he said, and then cleared his throat.  “Your A-Yao will not.”

This time, it was Xichen’s turn to feel his ears heat as he realized what he had said.  To hopefully distract from that line of conversation - and the fact that he was loathe to take it back, and may even want to say it again immediately, my A-Yao - he reached into his qiankun sleeve and drew out a roll of silk mounted with a wooden frame at top and bottom.  He rolled it out in A-Yao’s direction, for his inspection.

Perhaps this boldness had been simmering in his blood for a while now.  He had painted Cloud Recesses for A-Yao many times before, as expected when it was his most common reference material.  This painting, though, depicted the small garden and stand of pines visible from the back porch of the Hanshi, with the lazy stream trickling between them.  It was not a sight that many people got to see, something only those in Xichen’s greatest confidences would recognize.  

A-Yao knew it immediately.  His eyes softened as they scanned the ink strokes on silk canvas, and then his lips parted just slightly again in surprise for the second time.  Xichen wanted to kiss them with a desire swirling deep in his belly.  Instead he contented himself with watching A-Yao raise a hand and use one elegant finger to trace in the air, never quite touching, the small black shape beneath the trees.  Just a silhouette, barely a curl of ink.

The last time that the two of them had met, they A-Yao had mentioned that he was considering getting a spiritual dog for Jin Ling.  ‘Terribly useful creatures, spiritual dogs,’ he had said, and then added, ‘shame though, I really do prefer cats.’  And so when A-Yao left, Xichen had painted, in almost a haze, his garden and into it placed a black cat.

This was another of the things that one could not say to A-Yao, that he knew the most intimate corners of Xichen’s life, that he belonged there, that his presence left ripples even when he was far away and gone.  So Xichen brought gifts, and painted, and treasured the moments they had together.  

And he thought that he could read some of it back in A-Yao’s clear gaze as he met his eyes unwaveringly and said, “It’s a beautiful work er-ge.  I will hang it in my study.”

“Thank you, A-Yao’s praise means much.”

Xichen felt a little thrill too, to read between the words and see that A-Yao intended to display openly all of the unsaid meanings between them.  And that the world would look, but never see.

If he let himself, he could fall into that gaze, into all of the unsaid words.  He could let it carry him forward, around the scant barrier of the corner of the table between them, until he could taste the unsaid words from A-Yao’s tongue.  He wondered if they would taste like wine.

To keep himself from doing that, he asked instead, “Has A-Yao made a decision on the spiritual dog for your venerable nephew?”

Xichen could feel the moment the tension between them broke, like a summer storm over the mountains, with A-Yao’s bright, surprised laugh at the thought of a venerable four year old.  Xichen tucked that laugh away into a corner of his heart, and let himself breathe out a long, steadying breath.  It wouldn’t do to dwell on the things he might wish from A-Yao, and forget the time they were granted.

“Ah, yes, I do think I will give one to him.  It will be a good exercise in responsibility, and a companion.”

Xichen knew that A-Yao worried about the way the other children in Jinlintai reacted to Jin Ling, influenced by the way their elders would tell them to keep a respectful distance in one breath and then turn around and gossip with the next.  It was a mixture liable to curdle with time.  He didn’t know if it was better in Lotus Pier, but he hoped so.  

“What are Jiang-zongzhu’s thoughts?” he asked, hoping to let A-Yao give voice to his delightfully sharp opinions on Jiang Wanyin’s parenting style, and varied emotional outbursts.

Instead, A-Yao raised his cup to take another sip of his wine, and from behind his sleeve told him coyly, “I haven’t said.”

“A-Yao, you wouldn’t!” Xichen knew he sounded delightfully scandalized.

“Er-ge, I don’t know what you could possibly mean!” A-Yao intoned in his best impression of Nie Huaisang.  “Jiang-zongzhu loves dogs, doesn’t he?  It should be a nice surprise.”

“A-Yao!” Xichen said again, losing the battle against his own laughter and unable to force anything else out.

“Such a nice surprise, in fact,” he continued, the dimples in his face deepening as he obviously fought to keep his voice steady, “that it might even lift his spirits in a trying time.  Perhaps if he were first to learn when we all must attend Yao-zongzhu’s daughter’s wedding next spring.”

“Oh no,” Xichen said faintly.

“It will only just serve as repayment for all the swear words Jiang-zongzhu was so kind as to teach our darling nephew the last time he was in Lotus Pier,” A-Yao said, holding onto his highest dignity, before he dissolved into giggles too.

The giggles were not dignified.  They rose and fell in pitch, interspersed with lower chuckles and higher peals.  Lan Xichen was not sure if another person alive beside himself had ever heard A-Yao laugh like this before, and he was so in love with him that sometimes it felt like his golden core was trying to claw its way out through his heart.  

Or maybe it was just that he couldn’t quite catch his breath without starting to laugh again.

It took a little while for the both of them to calm down well enough to speak normally, but when they did, A-Yao said, “Come, we still have a little time yet.”  He poured himself a final glass of wine, and stood to lead them to another set of cushions laid at the edge of the pavilion’s floor.  He set down his cup and picked up a small book which had been strategically placed next to his cushion, that Xichen hadn’t noticed until now.  “This one had discovered a new book of poetry, if er-ge might be interested in finishing the night with a recitation?” he said, turning the cover so Xichen could see the title.

Xichen looked up at the stars and the moon overhead, framed by the dark silhouettes of trees along the garden wall.  It was getting on towards hai time, but he said anyway, “Please, go ahead.  I do not mind staying awake a while longer.”  He kept behind his teeth the words, ‘I would listen to you read beautiful words every day if I could.  And then I would want it to be your voice that lulls me to sleep each night.’

A-Yao gave him a skeptical look from the corner of his eye, but he opened the book and began to read.  He got through several poems, lovely and indicative of A-Yao’s well-read taste, before Xichen let his eyes drift closed.  Only to concentrate better on A-Yao’s voice against the background of the late night sounds of the garden.

“Tsk, er-ge you are so bad at this!” A-Yao scolded. 

Xichen blinked his eyes open again, and made the argument, “Every sect leader must be acquainted with spending more time on work than his sleeping hours would allow.  It is no hardship to spend the same on pleasure.”

“Oh yes, I am sure.  And how many of those hours has Lan-zongzhu spent by waking early instead?”

The rules said not to lie.  In absence of the waking brain power to come up with anything better, he remained silent.  A-Yao laughed at him, so fondly that Xichen had no choice but to return a rueful smile.

“Here, I’m not about to have you falling off the porch and hitting your head.  Lie down.”  He pulled off his plush, fur-lined robe and folded it into a pillow.  Instead of setting it on the porch beside them, he placed it in his own lap in invitation.

Any pleasantly polite response Xichen could make to that deserted him, and he felt suddenly more alert.  Ears blazing and with the sense that his words were distinctly clumsy on his tongue, he asked, “Will A-Yao not be cold?” in an exact mirror of his earlier desires that was not lost on him. “Here you should take my outer robe.”

A-Yao scowled up in his direction, but Xichen could tell that he wasn’t putting any real heat in it.  “I’m not so fragile as you think.”

No, A-Yao really wasn’t.  He had experienced things that many of the Jianghu, even after being through a war, could only imagine and come through it still steadfast.  Xichen also knew that he frequently worked through pain even now, for all that he so infrequently caught a glimpse of it beyond A-Yao’s perfectly crafted face.  The cold made it worse.  “Won’t you allow your er-ge to make sure you are comfortable, though?  It’s a lovely night out to me, much warmer than Gusu is at this time of year.”

A-Yao didn’t say anything in reply, but the edges of his lips did tilt just the tiniest measure further into a smile.  Xichen took it as permission to pull his arms from his loose outer robe and drape it over A-Yao’s shoulders instead.  It made him look just that much smaller, with his own gold colors still just peeking through but almost subsumed by swirling white and blue.  Xichen was absolutely going to do something embarrassing if he kept looking at the sight, like lick his lips.  Instead, he turned away and stretched himself out on his back at the edge of the platform, so he could lay his head in A-Yao’s lap.  Out of the corner of his eye, he could swear he saw A-Yao hug the robe to himself after pulling his arms through the too-long sleeves, but he could not be sure.  As a concession to all of the other things he wished to do or say, Xichen reached out to hold A-Yao’s forearm, the easiest part of him in reach, and give it a light squeeze before letting his eyes fall closed.

Xichen dozed for a while after that, with the feeling of the fall breeze cool on his face, but A-Yao warm beneath and beside him.  It was too late in the season for most insects, but the trees rustled in the distance, a calming, lulling sound.  Given half a chance, he would fall asleep here.

He had not quite done so when careful fingers brushed across his face in the ghost of a touch.  When he did not startle or pull away, it seemed A-Yao became bolder; the fingers began to massage at his temples, his forehead, at the tension at the tops of his cheekbones and around his eyes.  They worked around his ribbon, always careful not to touch.  Xichen gave a sigh of pleasure, and received a faint laugh from above him in reply.

Eventually, A-Yao must have been satisfied with his work, because he stopped massaging.  Instead, he just ran his fingers across Xichen’s brow in a rhythmic pattern.  He was so relaxed and content that it took him a moment to realized that A-Yao was tracing skin just beneath his ribbon, in constant parallel.  He would not touch without permission, Xichen knew, but he could, he could; it had always been A-Yao’s to touch, from the moment they met.  The sudden rush of wanting this inspired was so heady that Xichen stiffened just slightly.

Naturally, A-Yao noticed.  “There, you are er-ge, back with me?”

The game up, he didn’t have much choice but to open his eyes to the sight of A-Yao leaning over him slightly, silhouetted against the night sky.  One strand of hair hung over his shoulder, dark against blue over goldenrod robes, and his smile was far too soft and serene for his dimples.  He was the most beautiful thing Xichen had ever seen.  Instead of any of that, he said, “good evening,” in the warmest voice he could possibly muster, and was content to catch what might just be a tinge of pink in A-Yao’s cheeks.

“Alright, I think it might be time for Lan-zongzhu to retire for the night.”

Xichen did not miss the use of his title, the chance he had been given to ask, ‘but what of er-ge?’  He would play this game, but not with such obvious bait.  Instead, he tilted his head to look past the edge of the pavilion and judge the position of the moon in the sky.  “Yes, it is perhaps later than is proper for a Lan to still be awake, and seen wandering the halls or gardens of Jinlintai.”

A-Yao gave him such a withering look that Xichen nearly started giggling again.  He held it back with the help of years of practice keeping his face serene and neutral.  “Yes, quite.”  A-Yao’s voice was dry enough to cure a fish, and so obviously affected.

“Then, will this noble and filial san-di help his er-ge save some face, and let him spend the night here?”

A-Yao’s nose wrinkled up and his mouth tilted into a smile again.  “I think your face is plenty thick, er-ge!”

“Mn, one must not tell lies.”

A-Yao made a noise of disbelief, but his face softened even further as he reached out one finger to run it below Xichen’s ribbon again.  “Alright, you can stay.”

[tmariea]

Sunflower Child

Fandom: MDZS/Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation/The Untamed

Characters: Lan Sizhui, Wen Ning, Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji

Rating: G

Summary:

Most young witches, the ones who live with their birth families, know that they are witches before their magic manifests. Most young witches don’t learn they are witches by turning their skin purple while trying to bake cupcakes for their best friend’s birthday. Lan Sizhui, as he is learning very quickly, is not most young witches.

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Written for this year's MDZS Secret Santa event!

Most young witches, the ones who live with their birth families, know that they are witches before their magic manifests.  Most have watched their parents, or siblings, or aunts and uncles doing magic, just another facet of daily life.  Many even have some rudimentary lessons when they’re young, so they know what and how to expect the day when their powers arrive.

Most young witches don’t learn they are witches by turning their skin purple while trying to bake cupcakes for their best friend’s birthday.

Lan Sizhui, as he is learning very quickly, is not most young witches.

He isn’t even the one who notices.  When Sizhui’s a-die — a man of very few facial expressions for all he is a man of strong emotions — freezes in the doorway, eyes wide, and calls, “Wei Ying!  I think you need to get down here!” that’s when Sizhui knows something is very wrong.  He freezes, mouth full of cupcake and frosting, and takes quick stock.  He doesn’t feel like he’s bleeding anywhere, he hasn’t knocked any of the glass bowls onto the floor and broken them, and the rabbits are visible through the door to the living room, perfectly safe and content in their pen.

Sizhui goes to put the cupcake down, and that’s when he notices his hand.  He lets out a loud yelp and jumps hard enough that his stool tips over backwards and spills him onto the ground with a thump.  A very small part of him, whichever part isn’t panicking at the moment, registers the sound of his baba coming down the stairs, and then beginning to laugh at him.

“Baba!  What?  I don’t know— how—? Baba it’s not funny!” Sizhui exclaims from the floor.  He doesn’t mean to sound sulky, but it’s kind of hard when he’s also maybe a little bit trying not to cry.

“No it is not,” a-die agrees, kneeling down to help him sit up, and then running fingers through his hair to check for lumps.

“No, ah, sorry A-Yuan, Lan Zhan.”  Baba stifles another round of giggles, by the way his ponytail shakes and his mouth is twitching around an attempt at a serious expression.  “Are you OK?  Does it hurt at all?”

Sizhui shakes his head, which has mercifully escaped injury by the feel of it.  He lifts his other hand and finds it just as purple, all the way up his arm, but bizarre appearances aside it doesn’t feel any different.  “What happened?” he asks, as if his fathers are any more likely to know.  And then, hesitantly, “Is it everywhere?”

“Mn,” a-die confirms, with a solemn nod.

Baba crouches down in front of him, takes his hands and gives them a little squeeze.  “It’ll be alright.  Who knew our little radish would grow into a little witch, huh?”

“A witch,” Sizhui repeats.  His voice sounds kind of far away and high pitched to his own ears.  He leans back against a-die’s shoulder, hoping maybe he can absorb some of his perpetually-calm exterior.

Sizhui knows about witches of course.  They’re not common, but there’s usually a couple in most towns, maybe a dozen or two in a larger city.  He thinks that a lot of them even do the same normal things as everyone else, just with magic.  And flying brooms.  He can’t picture himself on a flying broom, no definitely not.  That is something to freak out about later.  “H-how can I be a witch?  How did you not know?”

“Witchcraft runs in families,” a-die says from behind him, voice softer.

The adoption agency hadn’t had any information on Sizhui’s birth family.  He nods; it makes at least a little bit of sense.  “Then, I did this?  But how?  I don’t know any magic.”

“It doesn’t usually show up until you’re a teenager,” baba supplies, “and then can do some odd things if you don’t know what you’re doing.  I went to school with a couple of siblings who were witches for a little while; some of the things that happened around them were so funny!” 

Baba stands up suddenly, with a little, “oh!” and heads inexplicably towards the living room.  He returns with Bichen, and deposits her in Sizhui’s lap, before pulling out his phone and wandering away again.

Sizhui instinctively begins to run his fingers through Bichen’s white fur, feeling himself start to actually calm down.  His voice sounds less strange when he asks the next question on his mind, “If I don’t know magic, how do I undo it?  A-die, am I going to be stuck like this?  No one can see me like this!”

“I think your baba is working on that,” a-die replies.

As he trails off, they hear from the other room, “Wen Ning!  Hey it’s been forever, how are you and Wen Qing doing?” A pause, and then his voice starts to get closer again as the loop of his pacing takes him back across the house. “Do you still live in the area, or know any witches who do?  Yeah, my kid.  No, no, nothing serious!  But, I think he may need a crash course in magic.”  Baba arrives back in the kitchen just in time to give them a wink and a thumbs up.  “You’re the best, we’ll see you in a little while!”

Sizhui thinks he may disagree with the assessment that this is ‘nothing serious,’ but the rest sounds promising.  Wen Ning lives in Dafan, a small town about an hour’s drive away, so they settle Bichen back in her pen and all three pile into the car.  A-die drives, and baba sits in the back with Sizhui, like he used to do when Sizhui was six and would fall asleep on his lap on the way back from family functions.  The words ‘I’m not a kid anymore,’ are on Sizhui’s tongue, but he swallows them back down when baba takes his (purple) hand.  Which is still really weird, he’s not going to lie, but it’s not nearly so scary now that they’re going to see a witch his baba knows who can fix it.  The witch thing in general though, maybe it’s kind of cool but it’s also so much; he’s not sure what to feel about it yet.

It seems Sizhui is destined to repeat the whole little-kid-backseat-thing, because he falls asleep on baba’s shoulder not ten minutes into the drive, lulled by the motion of the car and the traditional music a-die always plays through the radio.  He wakes up to baba’s fingers carding through his hair, just as they hit Dafan.  It’s a small town, nestled at the base of the mountains.  Sizhui recognizes it from weekend markets his fathers have brought him to before, or hikes he’s taken nearby with classmates.

“There you are,” baba says, as Sizhui sits up to watch the traditional buildings of the town square slide past outside the window.  “I think the magic might make you tired at first, until you get a handle on it.  I always remember Wen Ning taking naps in the strangest places.”

“Ah,” Sizhui, replies simply, less comforted by that fact than slightly mortified by the possibility of falling asleep somewhere unintended.  He changes the subject as the car takes a turn onto a smaller street leading back towards the edge of town.  “Does he not live in Dafan?”

“Mn,” a-die confirms, “a few minutes out of town.”

The house that they pull up at is the only one along it’s stretch of road, on the last piece of flat ground before the land starts to rise up into foothills.  It’s built of dark brown wood, with a roof of curved black tiles and large windows divided into many tiny square panes.  All of that is secondary to the greenery bursting from the yard, and around the edges of the building.  Ivies crawl the walls, so thick in places that it would be hard to tell what the house looks like beneath, and flowers take up almost the whole fenced area at the front of the house in a riot of color doing it’s level best to overtake the path.

Baba doesn’t seem to be intimidated by the chaos, leading them up towards the porch and setting roses and lavender swaying as he passes.  Sizhui and his a-die follow at a more sedate pace.  The scent is just as much of a jumble, but to Sizhui’s surprise it’s not overwhelming.  Instead it smells as if someone bottled every scent memory he’s ever had of sun-drenched summers into one tiny patch of land.

The door to the house, which baba knocks on with two short, sharp raps, is a bright poppy red.  It opens not a minute later to reveal a person who Sizhui presumes is the witch they’re here to see.  He doesn’t get a good look though, before baba yanks him into a crushing hug with a cry of, “Wen Ning!”

“Wei Wuxian, hello,” the man says, slightly muffled from where his face is squashed into baba’s shirt.  It sounds resigned, and Sizhui can’t help but laugh quietly; his baba is known to inspire that feeling in people.

Once he’s released, the witch stands up and straightens out his oversized gray sweater and cardigan, which he’s wearing despite the August heat.  His long hair is only loosely pulled back from the front and out of his face, but the rest is left untied.  He looks like he might be about Sizhui’s fathers’ age, but his round face and the swathed-in-blankets impression of his clothing makes him seem younger.  He turns to Sizhui and his a-die, and bows.  Sizhui wonders if it isn’t in part a ploy to hide his expression, as he can see the corners of his mouth twitch just a bit as he takes in the magical mess Sizhui has made of himself.  He straightens and says, “I’m Wen Qionglin, local witch and apothecary for Dafan.  Most everyone calls me Wen Ning, though.”  His voice is a little slow and halting, and quiet, almost difficult to hear from where he stands on the porch.

A-die bows with the posture and formality as if he were greeting a great teacher.  “Lan Wangji, Wei Ying’s husband and father to Lan Sizhui.”  Sizhui does his best to copy his a-die’s bow.  “Thank you for helping on short notice.”

“I really appreciate it,” Sizhui adds, with feeling.  He figures there were probably witches who lived closer to them in Gusu, but there is something comforting about Wen Ning not being a complete stranger.  Or perhaps it’s result of the softness the man himself seems to exude.

“And I’m Wei Ying, which you still won’t call me after all these years!”

Wen Ning just gives a small smile and a sheepish duck of his head in response to that.  “Nice to meet you.  It’s no trouble to help Wei Wuxian’s” - baba just pouts - “family.  Come in, please.”

The three of them follow Wen Ning into the house.  Sizhui is immensely interested to see what a witch’s home looks like.  His first impression is that there are quite a lot of dark colored walls, the paint in the living room where Wen Ning settled them such a deep emerald to be almost black.  But there are enough windows, and light wood furniture upholstered in cream and dusty-red fabric, that it feels still strangely open and airy.  There are a handful of pictures on the walls, mostly Wen Ning with a tiny woman who looks a lot like him; Sizhui assumes this is the Wen Qing that baba had mentioned.  Every other inch of the walls are covered in shelves packed to the brim with plants, and some random stands and side tables besides.  There are leaves in every color of green, from the palest, almost-white to deep jewel greens, and even some in reds or deep purples.  One corner of the room has been given entirely over to the strangest citrus tree Sizhui has ever seen, bearing what looks like lemons, limes, oranges, and some very bizarre thing shaped like a hand, all at the same time.

Their host gestures for them to sit and disappears into the next room for a moment - presumably the kitchen - and returns with a tea set and a large wooden box.  He sets both on the low coffee table.  “Sorry, the tea selection may be a little overwhelming.  I’ve got most anything you might want in here,” Wen Ning pats the top of the box affectionately, “magical or non-magical both!  Oh, although most of the magical ones are medicinal, so ask me what they do first, or if they’ll interact with anything you already take.  They have the red labels.”

Sizhui and his baba lean over the box to start inspecting.  He actually reads the labels, while baba just starts grabbing things and smelling them.  A-die asks for a simple ginseng, which Wen Ning puts aside while the other two continue their search.

“Butterfly pea?” Sizhui asks, pulling out a small jar that looks full of dried blue and yellow flowers.

“Oh that’s a fun one,” Wen Ning replies, with a little smile playing around the edges of his mouth.  “It makes bright blue tea, but turns pink if you add lemon juice.”

“Ah, no thank you.” Sizhui doesn’t quite drop the jar as if it’s burning him, but it’s a near thing.

“I’ll have that one!” Baba exclaims, plucking the jar back up.

“Ba!” Sizhui groans, at the same time as his a-die says in his warning voice, “Wei Ying.”

Baba just sighs and puts the tea back, before handing over a different one that smells distinctly sharp and cinnamon-y.  Leave it to him to find a tea that is somehow also spicy.

Sizhui just watches as Wen Ning scoops out the leaves into individual strainer baskets over each cup, and pours.  He notices that the witch’s movements are a little stiff and stilted, like his voice, but he makes both cups without spilling any.  “I have a nice chamomile.”  He says once he’s done and waiting for the tea to steep.  “Something simple and familiar?”

Sizhui lets out a breath.  “Yeah, that sounds good.”

Wen Ning makes two cups of the chamomile, and takes the second one for himself, before settling into an arm chair across from them.  “So you turned yourself purple,” he starts.

Sizhui thinks he might be blushing.  He is also very glad there aren’t any mirrors in his immediate eye-line, because he does not want to know what that looks like.  A-die makes a small gesture from next to him, not quite nudging, but a clear ‘mind your manners.’  “Yes, Apothecary Wen.  I’d never done anything, ah, magical before today.”

Wen Ning gives a small, jerky nod.  “Do you know what caused it?  What were you doing before?”

“Maybe?  I was baking.  It’s Jingyi’s - that’s my best friend - birthday tomorrow, so I made some cupcakes.  I was trying one when a-die noticed…” he trails off, looking at his purple fingertips. Blackberry cupcakes.  The exact same color as the frosting.

“Cooking mishaps are pretty common.  Qing-jie wouldn’t let me near the kitchen for a while.  Until I got more control over my magic.”

“You turned yourself purple before too?” Sizhui exclaims.  He’d definitely feel better if that was the case.

“Not that exactly.  I made a chicken soup once that crowed like a rooster when we tried to eat it, though.  That was really… disconcerting.  And some cookies that made Qing-jie breathe out sparkles all day.  That’s when she kicked me out.

“Magic, when it’s new and you don’t have anywhere to direct it, comes out in a lot of ways that are both weird and logical at the same time.  It likes to follow the path of what we put into it - ingredients, materials, sounds or words, gestures - and what meanings we focus on for them.  If that makes any sense?  Sorry, I haven’t really taught anyone before.”  Wen Ning had dropped his eyes to his lap partway through his explanation, but he raises them back up after he finishes speaking.

Sizhui risks a quick glance at his parents to see what they’re making of it.  A-die has a blank, polite look on his face, so he’s probably not sure.  Baba is nodding though.  Which, baba likes a puzzle, or those mystery stories where you have to put clues together.  “The frosting was this dark pink,” he muses, trying to think about it like a puzzle.  “I added a few drops of blue color because I didn’t think it looked enough like blackberry.  I was thinking it needed to be more purple!”

Wen Ning gives him two sharp nods and a smile.  “That’s probably it!”

“So, does that mean you know how to fix it?”

“I have some ideas.  Finish your tea, and then we’ll go out to the garden.”

Once all of the cups are drained, Wen Ning leads Sizhui - just the two of them, his fathers elected to stay in the house where it’s cool - through the kitchen and a room that was likely meant as a sun room but has been turned into a veritable tropical greenhouse instead.  After walking through the heat and humidity, the summer sun is nearly a relief.

Stepping outside, all Sizhui can do is stare.  Wen Ning had called this a garden.  And while he doesn’t think it’s quite large enough to be a farm, it stretches hundreds of feet back from the house until it hits a copse of trees just before the land begins to rise towards the foothills.

“This is…” Sizhui starts, and then backtracks on just saying an incredulous ‘this is a garden?’ since it feels somewhat rude.  “Do you take care of this all by yourself?”

“Mn.  Mostly.  I have an uncle that helps get things started in the spring.   Qing-jie will pitch in if she’s in town, too.”

“It’s amazing.  Is it all for your magic?”

Wen Ning shakes his head.  “Some.  I just eat the vegetables, and sell the extra at the town market,” he gestures towards a large patch where the red of ripening tomatoes stands out against a backdrop of trellised leaves, and winter squash vines sprawl over wide swaths of ground.  He tilts his head to another section next, a riot of color even more chaotic than the front garden, “The cut flowers too, and the teas.  I use a little magic on all of it though, to help it grow and keep the pests off.  But we need the herb garden.”

He leads Sizhui not immediately to the herb garden, but instead to a wooden cabinet nestled up against the house, protected by the eaves.  From inside he pulls a basket, a set of clippers, and two sets of gloves, and deposits all but his own gloves into Sizhui’s arms.  

Sizhui follows him out into the rows between sections of garden, through the warm afternoon full of the sound of buzzing insects.  It smells just as much like heaven out here as the front garden did, and there’s a breeze lightly stirring his hair and keeping it from sticking to the back of his neck.  By all rights, it should be a perfect, relaxing summer afternoon, but he’s starting to feel unsettled again.  “Apothecary Wen, you said you had ideas,” he starts.  He really shouldn’t doubt Wen Ning when he’s so kind as to help, but part of him had thought that a trained, adult witch could just wave a hand and he’d be back to normal.  “Is there not a spell in a book, or a potion recipe?”

Sizhui is more expressive of his a-die, he knows that.  But everyone is always complimenting him on his maturity, a calmness and steadiness beyond his years.  And it’s not quite that he tries to hide it when he’s scared or upset, but usually it’s only his fathers who can see it, his best friends every once in a while.  

Wen Ning gets it right away, stopping and turning back, placing a hand on Sizhui’s shoulder and bending down a little so they’re on the same eye level.  “No, but we will fix it, I promise.  I have recipes for a lot of common things, headaches and stomach aches and anxiety.  I also have a lot of tinctures and creams for psoriasis and acne and skin clarity, which we’ll draw on a lot of those ingredients and their properties today.  But magic does weird, unexpected things sometimes, so as witches we learn to be creative.”

Sizhui takes a deep breath and lets it out, and decides that it is comforting, if Wen Ning is used to getting creative with magic.  He’s even done a little bit of improvising himself before, playing around with tunes on his guqin or the piano, and they’ve come out OK.  Maybe magic will be the same.  He hopes.  “Alright.”

Wen Ning studies his face for a moment more.  Sizhui had noticed the witch looking at him slightly more than he might have expected while they were having their tea, but he’d figured it was the oddity of having a purple teenage boy on his couch.  But now it’s almost as if he’s looking for something.  Before Sizhui can start to feel uncomfortable, Wen Ning nods and straightens up again, then continues to walk through the garden.  This time, they walk side by side.  “Good.  Plus, I’m very good at magical skincare.  It’s my best seller,” Wen Ning says with a wink.  

It startles a laugh out of Sizhui, and decides he feels almost all the way better.

As soon as they step off the gravel path and into the main body of the garden itself, it’s clear that this is where Wen Ning is most in his element.  His soft face brightens up with excitement as he trails his fingers amongst the leaves and begins rattling off common names, scientific names, and properties.  Enough so that Sizhui begins to worry about remembering it all, before Wen Ning stops and says with an embarrassed air, “Most of this we don’t need today.  Just useful information, if you decide to shape your magic in similar ways.  We actually only need the mint, it’s good for focus and concentration, so it should help you channel your magic.”

There are a lot of things in that statement that Sizhui has questions about, but he starts with, “My magic?”

Wen Ning looks down, a sheepish expression crossing his face.  “Ah, sorry.  I’ll go through the ingredients and guide you, but undoing the effects when our magic does unexpected things is one of the first lessons a young witch does.”

Sizhui wonders if that’s something he would have known if he had grown up with other witches, with his birth family.  It causes a little pang in his stomach, part sadness part curiosity.  One that he’s not entirely unfamiliar with, for all that he loves his fathers and wouldn’t trade them for the world.  He shakes off the thought instead of letting it linger, and tells Wen Ning, “Alright, I’ll try.”

They pick the mint.  It’s in it’s own little patch, surrounded by a thin brick border inscribed with runes that Wen Ning explains, with a laugh, are to keep it from taking over the whole garden.  He points out some other plants as well that aren’t ready for harvest yet - fennel, red ginsing, licorice - which they’ll use dried from what’s stored in the house.  

Then they circle around to the other side of the garden, to collect rose hips.  There are roses in every color and size growing, red and pink and yellow and purple, solids and two-color, buds with loose, ruffly petals and ones with smooth petals packed tightly together.  The rose garden is a little more orderly than the rest of the cut flowers too, and Sizhui thinks it looks like it’s straight out of a magazine, but Wen Ning makes a frustrated little sigh as soon as they approach a large, trellised bush covered with pink roses.

“Is everything alright?”

Wen Ning waves off his concern.  “It’s just beetles.  I’m going to go get something for them, if you’ll pick some rose hips from this bush.  We’ll need 15.”

It doesn’t take long; the bush has plenty to harvest.  It also has plenty of the iridescent beetles about the size of a fingernail which had so upset Wen Ning.  He hasn’t come back yet with his beetle solution though, so Sizhui starts to walk down one of the paths through the roses while he waits.  His attention is drawn instead to the tall stalks of sunflowers past the roses.  Some are short enough to only be at eye level on him, others rise over a foot above his head.  He can’t resist reaching out to touch the center of one, where all the little seeds point outwards.  He has the faintest memory of looking up and up and up, all the way up to so many huge yellow flowers he could barely see the sky.  He’d reached for them, in the silent begging of a small child, until someone with a face he can’t remember had clipped a flower as big as his torso and placed it in his lap.

“Do you like sunflowers, Lan Sizhui?”

Sizhui jerks a little in surprise at Wen Ning’s sudden appearance, his thumb pressing roughly against the scratchy surface.  “They’re pretty.  And almost nostalgic?  I feel like I may have spent time around a lot of them when I was little.”  He turns around to see the witch smiling widely, at either him or the flowers, he’s not quite sure.

“I know the feeling,” Wen Ning replies.  “My popo loves them, grows even more than me.  So many that Qing-jie and I would play hide-and-seek among the stalks.  It makes sense though; they’re my family’s symbol.”  He steps up to the sunflower that Sizhui had been looking at, takes the clippers from the basket, and snips the flower from it’s stalk, before nestling it between the mint and the rose hips.

“Is it for the, for my uh…”

“No, just for you.  So you can take something nice with you, not just a memory of your magic doing things you didn’t want.”

“Thank you Apothecary Wen!” Sizhui bows, the basket swinging at his elbow as he does.

“You’re welcome, but it’s nothing.”  Wen Ning leads them back to the house, and Sizhui trails just a step behind, still brushing his hand lightly against the sunflower as he does.

Inside, they wave to Sizhui’s fathers - a-die has found a book on plants and herbs to read, and baba is sprawled across the couch and his lap, on his phone - and grab an orange off of the odd tree, for the peel according to Wen Ning.  Then they go into a room which would be a home office in anyone else’s house.  Instead it has been transformed with strings of drying herbs strung up across the whole ceiling, and open shelves full of big glass jars and metal tins against two of the walls.  The another is taken up by a long wooden workbench, the surface of which looks like it has been stained frequently over the years.  Wen Ning gestures for Sizhui to put the basked on the bench, and then begins collecting tools for their work.

“You mentioned something earlier about how I decide to shape my magic, what did you mean?” Sizhui asks, accepting a heavy mortar and pestle that Wen Ning passes him.

Wen Ning is quiet for a moment as he collects a few jars of dried herbs, a thoughtful look on his face.  “Remember I said magic comes out of ingredients, and thoughts.  Our thoughts and magic are the real catalyst, but the ingredients are like a framework to direct it.”  Sizhui nods; he does remember even if he’s not sure if he understands yet.  “I use things people do think of as ‘ingredients,’ herbs and flowers and stuff.  Which,” Wen Ning measures out a few spoonfuls of fennel seeds into the mortar and pestle, “you’ll need to grind that fine.  ‘Ingredients’ can be anything that might provide direction though.  Lots of people work with sigils and talismans.  I do sometimes, if I need something lasting - like the mint border.  People can speak spells, or move their bodies - I’ve seen magic like sign language and magic like dance.  You can do magic with sewing, or pottery - although that’s usually sewing or carving sigils into the cloth or clay - or with cooking, or music.”

“I play guqin,” Sizhui blurts at the thought of music. Although, maybe he shouldn’t play for a little while, until he learns some control.  That’s a sad thought, but then what could he do with it later?

Wen Ning nods.  “I can see if I remember anyone nearby who uses music.  Or I can ask around, if that’s something you want to try.”

Sizhui is surprised.  He’d thought maybe Wen Ning would be able to teach him magic.  But he tells himself that it’s not as if they’d talked about it.  He was only helping out in an emergency, not committing himself to being a teacher for however long it took to learn.  “OK, thank you,” he says, and changes the topic.  “So then, what do witches do?”

That startles a laugh out of Wen Ning.  He tilts his head to the side as he looks at Sizhui, long hair spilling over the front of his shoulder.  “For jobs?”

“Mn.”  The question of what having magic means for the rest of his life has been one of the bigger ones knocking around in Sizhui’s head all afternoon.  He doesn’t say it though; it’s the kind of question that usually causes an adult to say he’s really mature, when actually he’d rather they say something reassuring instead.

“Anything really.  You could probably guess, but there’s something about magic that matches up really nicely with creating. A lot of witches are artists.  Qing-jie is a doctor and a researcher.  She studies combining magical medicine with science to use in her practice.  Uncle Four is in construction.  He uses talismans to help balance loads more safely, or write fire and earthquake protection into the frame of buildings.  Some don’t use magic for a career, and want to just do it for fun.  You’ve got time though, to think about any of that, after you learn.  And after you’re not purple anymore.  That looks fine enough.”

Sizhui dumps the fennel into a clean glass jar Wen Ning brought out, and then they work on chopping and grinding the rest together.  The witch writes down all of the individual ingredients and the properties they’re trying to draw on for the tincture, too.  Which, Wen Ning says would be better than a cream or a lotion so Sizhui doesn’t have to worry about missing spots, which is a mortifying thought if there ever was one.

Once all of the ingredients are prepared, Wen Ning clears off the table and places only the jar and the list of ingredients in front of Sizhui.  “Now, to add the magic which will activate it.  Have you ever meditated before?”

He nods, “A-die does, and I join him sometimes.”

“That makes things easier.  Begin as if you’re meditating, and I’ll talk you through where to direct your focus.”

Sizhui pulls over a stool and gets comfortable, before starting to count his breaths.

Wen Ning’s voice, already soft and slow, becomes even more so as he instructs, “Good.  Focus on the center of your chest, just a little lower than your heart.  You know the feeling of warmth, or a good tightness, when you are very joyful or really love an activity that you’re doing?  That is what you’re looking for in that place.  That’s your golden core, where your magic lives.”

Sizhui pictures it behind his closed eyelids, a warm glowing ball in his chest.  He’d felt it earlier today, what he’d thought was only just happiness that his baking for his best friend had come out so well.  Maybe that’s how some of the magic had gotten mixed into it in the first place.  “I think I have it.”

“Now try to feel that warmth flow through your body.  Down into your stomach, and your legs, through your shoulders and arms to your hands.”

That part is less easy.  He holds his fists to that little knot in his chest, and tries to feel as if they are grabbing hold of some piece of it and dragging it through his veins, but he keeps loosing hold of it. He grabs the thread again and again in an imagined hand, until he makes a frustrated noise and sways in his seat.

“That’s OK,” Wen Ning says from somewhere that feels very far away.  “It’s a new skill.  Let’s take a break for a moment, and have something to eat.  I’ll be back in a minute.”

Sizhui hears footsteps retreating, and eases his eyes open against the late afternoon sunlight casting a pattern of panes through the window and onto the workbench.  He picks up the jar and tilts it side to side, looking at the way all the powders and pieces of what is supposed to be his cure shift together.  It smells pretty nice actually, if he pays attention to it.  He starts a little when the door opens and closes again, and he puts the jar down quickly.  “Sorry, I hope I didn’t disturb anything.”

“Not at all, it’s not a bad idea to interact more with your ingredients.  Here,” Wen Ning puts down a plate of small, round cookies and another pot of chamomile tea on the table, and sits on the other stool.  “Tell me about something other than magic, while we eat.  Try not to think about it at all for just a few minutes.”

So Sizhui talks about the rabbits while they clear the plate of the cookies - surprisingly light in texture and flavored with cardamom.  He even pulls out his phone and flips back to pictures of Bichen and Suibian when they were small.

“Is this you, Lan Sizhui,” the witch asks, about a picture where a nine-year-old Sizhui sits on the ground with both rabbits tucked together in his lap, and a radiant smile on his face.

“Mn, we’d only had them a few months, and it was the first time they sat in my lap.”

“You look like…” Wen Ning trails off, staring intently at the picture, and an odd quality to his voice.

“I look like what?”

He gives himself a little shake, and then says, “You look like you love them very much.  A-are you ready to try your magic again?”

“Yeah, alright.”  Sizhui puts his phone away, and closes his eyes again.  He does feel better for the snack, and it’s easy to find the knot in his chest again.  This time he forgoes trying to picture grabbing the magic, and instead thinks about the feeling of warmth from the first drink of tea and how it flows down his throat and to his stomach.  He thinks of what it would feel like if it kept spreading throughout his whole body.

“There, you’ve got it!” Wen Ning exclaims.  “Now, put your hand above the jar, and think about your ingredients, and what you need them to do.  Think about pushing your magic into them, and waking them up.  You can open your eyes and look at the list if it helps.”

Sizhui takes a deep breath, and opens his eyes.  He looks at the individual pieces of mint and fennel and orange peel, rose hips and licorice root and red ginseng, remembers the smell.  His fingertips feel tingly, the same way they might if his hand had fallen asleep, and then a red symbol blooms above the jar.  It’s gone quickly, but Sizhui thinks it looked like a stylized sunflower, with a spiral as the base of each petal that then unfurls away from the center of the flower.

There’s a loud noise, like something smacking against the wood of the table top, and the feeling of the magic flickers away.  “Ah, Apothecary Wen I’m so sorry!  I lost it.  Did I ruin it?  Are you OK?”

The last is said as he looks over to see that the sound was Wen Ning catching himself with a hand on the worktop.  “Tha-that’s Wen magic,” the witch stammers out.  He looks a little dazed, staring at Sizhui but in an unfocused sort of way.

“Wen magic?  What does that mean?”

“Each family has a magic signature, colors and patterns.  They’re unique.  Wen is a red sunflower, that red sunflower.”  Wen Ning holds a palm up then, the one that’s not still supporting him, and above it blooms the exact same symbol that Sizhui just made, without thinking, over the jar.  “Do you know anything about your birth parents?”

Sizhui shakes his head slowly, feeling confused and overwhelmed, and perhaps a little dizzy.  He wonders if that last one is the magic, he did fall off a chair the last time he used it.  “No, there were never any records.”

“What’s your given name?”

“Yuan, my given name is Lan Yuan.”

Wen Ning makes a punched out sound at that, and his eyes are starting to look a little wet.  “I-I think you m-might be my cousins’ son.  We weren’t very close; I didn’t think it was odd that we didn’t really have contact with them after they moved.  But you look so much like my cousin when he was your age, and the magic...  I have letters, and photos.  Let me- let me go get them.”

Sizhui follows when Wen Ning leaves the workroom.  He feels a little unsteady, and looks at his fathers without really seeing them.

“A-Yuan?” A-die asks in a questioning, concerned voice.  

This alerts baba, who jumps up from the couch, and comes to take Sizhui’s face in his hands.  “Is everything alright?  You’re still purple, did it not work?  Did something go wrong?  Where’s Wen Ning going?”

Sizhui glances at where the witch had just turned the corner into the hall, and shakes his head.  He takes his baba’s hand and leads him back to the couch, where he sits between his parents and says, “Apothecary Wen says I have Wen family magic.  He thinks my birth parents might be his cousins.”

This pulls a startled, “What?” out of both.

“When I did magic, it looked like a red sunflower.  He said that’s the Wen family symbol and color.  He’s gone to get pictures.  E-even if it’s true, you are still my parents, and I’m still your son!”  Sizhui blurts out, suddenly anxious.  They’ve talked about ways to try to find his birth family before, if he ever wanted to, but he hadn’t decided what he wanted to do yet, or when.  He wasn’t expecting to have an answer sprung on him like this.

“Ayah, of course you’ll always be our little radish!” Baba cries, flinging his arms around Sizhui and a-die, to squash them both together in a hug.

“We never doubted,” a-die reassures.  “A-Yuan shouldn’t doubt either.”

That’s how Wen Ning finds them when he comes back with what looks like a shoebox that’s been covered in nice paper.  He sets it on the table, and kneels down to flip through the papers inside.  “Ah, here!”  He hands over a postcard, covered in photos like what someone might send for a holiday card; the address is from Dafan.

Sizhui’s hands are shaking just a little bit when he takes it, and stares at what is probably his own birth announcement, and baby photos.  It reads ‘Wen Yuan, born January 12th,’ and dated 17 years ago.  There’s him wrapped in a blanket in the hospital, in a crib in what must have been his childhood home, held between a man and a woman that he doesn’t know.  Except, he’s looked at nearly the same face as the man’s in the mirror for years.  It’s a little older, and Sizhui’s nose is a little wider and flatter - like the woman’s - but the eyes and the mouth are so, so similar.  He brushes his fingertips lightly over the glossy paper, and blinks hard against the moisture in his eyes.

When he looks back up at Wen Ning, he’s offering him a letter this time, with a photo sticking out between the folds.  There’s a date on the back of the photo - his third birthday - and it shows him sitting between the same two people on a couch.  He has cake crumbs on his face, and is waving a paper butterfly on a stick with a big grin.  Sizhui remembers, ever so faintly, that paper butterfly.

From where he’s looking over Sizhui’s shoulder, baba says, “this looks so much like when we brought you home.”

The letter itself is addressed from Qishan this time.  Qishan was the city his fathers adopted him from, when he was four.  The first line reads ‘A-Yuan is still having some trouble getting settled into our new home, but his birthday party certainly helped that along.’

“We got that shortly after they moved, and didn’t hear much after,” Wen Ning clarifies, as if wanting to fill the silence.  As if not wanting to ask the question hanging in the air.

Sizhui swallows hard.  “I think you’re right.  I think this has to be me.  Do you-do you know what happened?”

Wen Ning looks down at that, his face clouding over.  “No.  But I can ask Popo, or some of my aunts and uncles, someone may be able to help us track down an answer.”

“OK, OK that would be.  Good.  Maybe not right away though, this is all a lot.”

A-die runs a hand up and down Sizhui’s back.

“That’s understandable,” Wen Ning replies

“Then, you said you and my birth father were cousins, that would make you my tang-shu?”

“I think that would be right, but,” Wen Ning’s smiling, but it looks a little shy, “I don’t have any nephews, if you wanted to call me shushu?”

“Yeah, alright, I can do that shushu.  And you should call me A-Yuan.” The tears break at that point, and Sizhui passes the picture and letter to a-die, at risk of ruining them.  “C-can I hug you?”

Wen Ning gives two sharp, enthusiastic nods, and stands.  Sizhui comes around the table, and throws his arms around him.  Wen Ning’s hug is much stronger than Sizhui might’ve guessed from his appearance, but like just about everything else he’s experienced with the witch, inherently comforting.

“All this time, we weren’t even far from each other, and never knew,” Sizhui mumbles into Wen Ning’s shoulder.

He lets himself cling for a moment, before he steps back to rub his eyes and then bows formally to Wen Ning.  “Shushu, will you teach me magic!” He had felt disappointed at the thought of going to a different teacher before, but now that he knows Wen Ning is his shushu, that he could learn magic from a member of his family the way witches have for hundreds of years…  “I know it’s asking a lot, and I don’t know if I’ll want to do magic like yours, or with music yet, but I want to learn your magic, our family’s magic!  Please.”

“I would love to!” Wen Ning tells him with a big grin, but then it twists up in amusement at one corner.  “But maybe you should hold off on deciding until we see if your tincture works.”

“Ah.”  Sizhui had almost forgotten all about it in this new excitement.  That’s a good idea though, he would really like to stop being purple.  And then maybe go home and curl up with Bichen and Suibian and a movie that has absolutely nothing at all to do with magic.

His newly minted witchcraft teacher returns to the workroom to fetch the tincture and Sizhui’s sunflower, and then shows them some old family photos while they wait for it to steep, from holidays or family reunions when he was a child.  It seems Sizhui's birth father had only attended a few of the larger functions so there's not many, but the resemblance is striking.  

“That picture of you with your rabbits really made me suspect.  But I didn’t think it was possible, I didn’t know—”  Wen Ning trails off, but Sizhui can guess the rest of the thought; he hadn’t know Sizhui had been adopted, hadn’t known he wasn’t living with his birth family anymore.  “There wasn’t anything else it could be though, when you had the family signature.  Which,” he pours a small cup from the kettle, and holds his hands around the bottom, just the faintest red light spilling between his fingers and the porcelain.  “This feels like we’ve got it right.  Give it a try.”

Sizhui takes the cup, and feels that some of the heat has been drained off, enough that he can drink all of it in one go without burning his mouth.  It tastes a little muddled up, with all of the things they added, but not bad.  That same heat that he’d felt when he called his magic spreads through him though, gentle and easy.  “Did it work?”  He jumps up from the couch again and goes to a mirror that he’d seen on the wall earlier.  Staring back at him is his normal self.  He tilts his head from side to side, and inspects his arms and legs; there’s not a hint of violet anywhere.  “It worked!  I did magic! Thank you shushu!”

Sizhui gives Wen Ning another bow, and his fathers stand to do the same.  Since that’s about all the excitement it seems anyone is up for in one day, they decide on a good time for more magic lessons, and prepare to make their goodbyes.  Wen Ning even suggests with an amused smile that with some training Sizhui might be able to come out here by himself on a broomstick, which is starting to sound more like a fun prospect than a scary one.  

He leads them out to the porch then, and bows Sizhui’s fathers.  “Thank you, for caring for A-Yuan so well.  He’s grown into a fine young man, and I look forward to teaching him.”  They bow back, and Sizhui does too, feeling his face flush under the praise, and feeling much better now that he won’t have to worry about what a purple blush looks like anymore.

A-die heads down to the car first, baba trailing a little behind.  Before Sizhui can follow, Wen Ning hands him the jar with his tincture.  “I don’t have any need of this,” he explains, “And we shouldn’t let any of your hard work today go to waste.  Any of it,” he adds again with a wink.  Sizhui hears his baba, who is still just barely in earshot, snort at that.

Sizhui imagines the look on Jingyi’s face when he eats the cupcake, and then sees the result.  “I’ll have to find a good use for it, then.”  When he gets down to the car, he turns back around to wave back, with the hand holding his sunflower.  “Thank you shushu, I’ll see you next week!”

[tmariea]

I just never stop thinking about the fact that Hua Cheng is a ghost fueled by love, when most ghosts are fueled by resentment. Not to say he doesn’t have resentment in there because he sure does but that’s not the reason.

And not just any ghost, but an incredibly old, incredibly powerful ghost. Everything he has done and built, every time he has clawed himself back into the world, has been because of the enduring love he holds for Xie Lian.

[hadeswritesthings]

with permission to write about this concept from @tmariea

Ghosts formed from love (not anguish)

Oh, you who hold not resentment in your heart

Or at least not as your reason for existing

But have your love as core of your own world

And the object of your love as your true mission

Compass and your God at the same time.

Oh Ghost King that managed through the ages

Through challenges and battles long, unending

With your belief and adoration only

To still remain a presence in this world

(to carve out your own corner for your god).

Oh soldier boy that had no true beliefs

No reasons to exist and to continue

What would you think if you saw your own future

And the way that you now stand sure and strong

(the way you dedicate with all your Love).

Oh ghost, that most often is created

Through hate and true regrets that ripple far

Tell me now how your own soul you mended

With threads of love and care for one more laugh

To see his highness happy (even if far).

[tmariea]

I just never stop thinking about the fact that Hua Cheng is a ghost fueled by love, when most ghosts are fueled by resentment. Not to say he doesn’t have resentment in there because he sure does but that’s not the reason.

And not just any ghost, but an incredibly old, incredibly powerful ghost. Everything he has done and built, every time he has clawed himself back into the world, has been because of the enduring love he holds for Xie Lian.

[litengal]

Love that he didn't even expect to be returned...🥹

[tmariea]

All he ever wanted was to protect Xie Lian, and be in the same world as him, and give of his love. Receiving anything in return never needed to be part of the equation. Selfless love on a whole different level.

[tmariea]

I just never stop thinking about the fact that Hua Cheng is a ghost fueled by love, when most ghosts are fueled by resentment. Not to say he doesn’t have resentment in there because he sure does but that’s not the reason.

And not just any ghost, but an incredibly old, incredibly powerful ghost. Everything he has done and built, every time he has clawed himself back into the world, has been because of the enduring love he holds for Xie Lian.

[tmariea]

Wash Away the Weariness

Fandom: TGCF/Heaven Official's Blessing

Pairing: Hua Cheng/Xie Lian

Rating: G

Summary:

“San Lang is so kind for letting me borrow his bath.” “Actually gege, I was hoping you might let me help you wash.” ----- Or, Xie Lian comes home dirty and tired after a day planting in Puqi Village, and Hua Cheng takes this as the opportunity to spoil him that it is.

Written for day 12 of MXTX-tober: Hair

Read on AO3, or below the cut!

By the time Xie Lian made it back to the Shrine, the sun was well below the horizon.  It had been a planting day in Puqi Village, an activity that most Heavenly Officials would have deemed beneath his dignity.  Even if not Xie Lian’s particular dignity, then at least the dignity of his station.  The locals at least were always grateful for extra hands, and he was grateful for a way to give his thanks; everyone here had allowed him to make a home for himself, the first real home he’d had in a while.  He needed to at least repay the favor.  He had spent several awkward conversations deflecting requests to bless the fields with good fortune in the coming season though, for fear of causing drought or blight instead.After all that work since sunup, he was entirely ready to collapse on his mat and sleep until noon - except, there was more planting to be done at dawn anyway.

What Xie Lian hadn’t been expecting was there to be light from the Shrine windows, but he wasn’t surprised.  He hadn’t told Hua Cheng about the planting days on purpose.  He would have wanted to drop all of his other obligations to help Xie Lian out, regardless of any indifference towards the village.  But, he seemed to have a preternatural sense for when Xie Lian had a hard or tiring day.

The ghost king in question was sitting by the altar when Xie Lian opened the door, watching smoke from the incense he had no doubt lit drift into the air.  “Good evening, San Lang,” Xie Lian said, and leaned down to steal a quick kiss.  He wanted nothing more than to drop into Hua Cheng’s lap and melt into his hold in the way only an exhausted body could, but he had to admit he was completely bedraggled.  He’d tied his hair up into a very messy bun, his robes were still tucked up into his belt and pant legs rolled to expose the mud smeared all the way from his knees to his toes, and he wondered if the dirt embedded in the whorls of his fingerprints would come out even if he scrubbed them with a brush.  He knew Hua Cheng had personal experience stumbling back in such a state from planting days where he’d helped, but Xie Lian hesitated still.  “Let me clean up a bit first.”

“Welcome home, gege.  What have you been up to all day?”  Hua Cheng asked, letting his gaze drift across Xie Lian’s body.  There was a spark in his eye that made Xie Lian have to fight back a blush; he shouldn’t be appealing when this much of a mess, right?

“Planting water chestnuts.  There’s more to be done tomorrow too.  San Lang is always welcome to stay the night, but I’ll need to sleep before long.”

Hua Cheng only hummed, the light in his eye changing to the one from when he got an idea instead.  “This one might have something for that then, if you would permit me to take you back to Paradise Manor for the evening instead.”

Xie Lian turned to hang his straw hat on it’s peg while he pretended to consider.  He had a feeling he knew at least part of where Hua Cheng was going with this.  Truly the draw of Paradise Manor’s real bath, in comparison to the basin of cold water he would have washed up in here just so he wouldn’t have to make a fire and heat it, was just too great.  “Alright, so long as San Lang can have me back here by dawn tomorrow.”

“Anything for you Dianxia,” Hua Cheng intoned, and Xie Lian did a bad job of concealing his snicker at the muscle that twitched in his cheek.  He knew Hua Cheng would be loath to give him back so soon.

Xie Lian kissed that cheek in silent apology, and took Hua Cheng’s hand, letting himself be whisked back to the Manor.  As soon as they stepped into in the main hall, he felt some of the tension he hadn’t even noticed relax out of his shoulders.  It was still early spring, and the Shrine had been colder than he had realized.  “San Lang is so kind for letting me borrow his bath.”

“Actually gege, I was hoping you might let me help you wash,” Hua Cheng said has he began leading them in the direction of the master suite.

Xie Lian felt his cheeks start to heat, and raised his free hand to press it against the side of his face.  Being comfortable even just changing or otherwise being nude in front of Hua Cheng as something he was still very much getting used to, much less any kind of touch in that state.

Hua Cheng gave his hand a comforting squeeze, no doubt picking up on his hesitancy.  “Only if gege wishes.  I can wait for you to come to bed if you would prefer to bathe alone.”

“I think I would wish,” Xie Lian replied, taking a steadying breath and squeezing the hand back.  Hua Cheng was never anything but respectful of him and how far he was comfortable progressing their relationship.  He doubted this would be any different.  He looked back up at Hua Cheng with a smile, just in time to catch a pleased look on the ghost king’s face.

“After you then.”  Hua Cheng opened the door to his suites and gestured forward.

Ghost City had many bathhouses, beautiful and well-appointed with amenities.  However, Hua Cheng’s station and wealth afforded him his own private bath, a fact that Xie Lian was grateful for.  It wasn’t even just a bronze tub, which would have been luxury enough, but instead a small pool sunk into the floor and lined with stone tiles.  It was also already full of steaming water; Hua Cheng must have called ahead on a private array to have it filled before they’d even arrived.  Xie Lian thought he could just about melt at the sight.

He stepped over to a bench near the wall to begin undoing his robes, only to be stopped as Hua Cheng said, “Allow me.”

All Xie Lian could muster was an, “Ah, okay,” and then let his hands fall to his sides.    He hardly knew what to do with them while Hua Cheng stepped up so they were only standing with inches between them. Xie Lian had been dressed and undressed constantly in his life as a prince, but that was so long ago it almost felt as if it had happened to someone else, or something he’d read in a book once and only imagined.  He’d fallen completely out of the habit.  

Hua Cheng reached for the edges of Xie Lian’s robes, which made the god’s heart rate pick up with momentary nervousness (ridiculous, you take off your outer robe every night to go to sleep with him), only to settle back down as those hands lingered, caressing his shoulders in a calming way.  Each piece of clothing was the same, gentle hands brushing up and down at his waist, his hips, until he was bare before Hua Cheng.

“Is this alright, gege?”

“Yes, this is fine.”  And actually, it was.  Hua Cheng’s touch had spoken of slowness and care, in a way that had assuaged much of his self-consciousness.  It still burbled along under the surface, but at a level that he could set to the side.  Xie Lian gave him a warm smile, and stepped up to the edge of the pool.

The water was so hot when he first stepped in, that he had to pause for a moment standing on the bench halfway into the pool, before easing the rest of the way in with a groan.  He could hear Hua Cheng’s delighted laughter from behind him.  “San Laaang,” Xie Lian said with only a touch of a whine in his voice.  He turned around so he could drape his arms lazily along the edge of the bath, and rest his cheek on them, while he watched Hua Cheng finish folding his white robes neatly onto the bench.

“Yes, gege?  Is the water nice?” he asked, while removing his rings and bracers to place on the bench too.

“Very nice, thank you.  But you, you are enjoying this too much.”

Hua Cheng only made a humming noise in his throat, one which sounded suspiciously like a self-satisfied agreement, and moved next to collect a towel and rummage about on a set of shelves.  He pulled down bottles and brushes and soap beans, before coming to kneel on the towel next to the bath and lay out his finds.  “Of course I am enjoying a chance to spoil my Dianxia.  It’s my favorite activity.  Aside from holding my Dianxia, or kissing my Dianxia, or—”

Xie Lian cut him off by sitting up and pressing both of his hands to Hua Cheng’s face.  “You are too much!  And all of that is too much too.” He took away just one hand to gesture to the row of tools and products.  Hua Cheng just kissed the palm still over his lips, causing Xie Lian to squeak in surprise at the same time as he felt like sparks were shooting up his fingers and down his wrist.  His reflex was to pull the hand away, but Hua Cheng gently caught his wrist and lowered it to his lap to begin cleaning under the nails with a pick.

Xie Lian felt he could hardly protest a second time; he had agreed to let Hua Cheng help him bathe after all.  What had he expected that to consist of, a quick wash of his body and hair with rice water?  There was no way it was going to be that simplistic.  So he sighed and relaxed back against the edge of the pool, letting all of his muscles slacken against the tiles - slightly warm from the proximity to the water - and his hand lay still in Hua Cheng’s lap.

Once the nails on his first hand were cleaned and an attempt had been made on the dirt in his fingerprints - as expected, there was still a little bit between the creases but also Hua Cheng had been gentler with his scrubbing than was truly necessary - Xie Lian passed over his other hand willingly.  “What is San Lang thinking about?” he asked.

“I was wondering if gege would let me paint his nails.  I expect gege wouldn’t want black, but I could get pale peach, or gold, or,” and Xie Lian couldn’t help but notice the faint flush nearly hidden by the bowed angle of Hua Cheng’s head, “would you wear red?”

“Ah, I don’t know, it seems so impractical for me!  You know I work with my hands all the time,” Xie Lian replied with the first thoughts that came to his mind.  It had always been the same when he was Crowned Prince; even though painted nails were fashionable with the nobility his cultivation training had made it impractical.  But then he paused to considered it further.  There was something really beautiful about Hua Cheng’s black nails against his pale hands.  What might it look like against his own?  What would it look like to so boldly wear Hua Cheng’s color?  “… maybe someday.”

“I’ll have to find a few colors gege might like then, for someday.”  Hua Cheng did a bad job of disguising the excited light in his eye behind a self satisfied grin.  

Xie Lian couldn’t help but smile back as his heart did funny things in his chest at the sight of Hua Cheng so happy.  But then remembering the ghost king’s particular penchant for going over the top, added, “Just a few.  A pale peach sounds nice.  And San Lang can pick out his favorite red, too.”

It was Xie Lian’s turn to be satisfied with himself as Hua Cheng let out a breathy, “Gege,” with a gob-smacked expression on his face.  He recovered quickly enough though, giving Xie Lian possession of his hand back and asking for a leg next.

The position that required made Xie Lian laugh at first, with his hands braced on the seat so he could rest a foot on the side of the pool.  It remained funny, and a little ticklish, while Hua Cheng scrubbed at the dirt on his foot and up his shins from ankle to knee.  It became less so, the anxiety he’d kept at a buzz so low he had nearly forgotten it bubbling up again, as the hands attending to him moved up to his thigh.  Xie Lian’s hands clenched almost without his notice around the edge of the bench, and he bit the inside of his lip.  How had, through all of this so far, he failed to notice the distinct presence of each of Hua Cheng’s fingertips?

The anxiety spawned frustration, his mind pulling in two different directions by the emotions.  This was Hua Cheng, he would never touch him in a way Xie Lian didn’t want.  And he did want that kind of touch to mean something more someday, to be comfortable with that, but not now, not now.  And it wasn’t that now, the hands gentle but not insistent so why couldn’t the rest of him believe—

“Would gege tell me how to plant water chestnuts?  I’ve only ever helped with the rice.”

Xie Lian snapped out of his spiral with an inelegant, “Huh?”  When he looked back up into Hua Cheng’s eye, that gaze was locked onto his face and held a different question, ‘are you still alright?’  Xie Lian took a calming breath and shook the competing thoughts out of his head.  “Oh, ah, yes of course.”  He launched into a description of water chestnut bulbs and how to bury them in the flooded fields, while Hua Cheng’s hands resumed their task.  It was easy enough to throw himself into the distraction; Hua Cheng’s hunger for knowledge was vast, and wonderful for knowing his full attention was fixed on Xie Lian’s words and only his words.

By the time he was done with the miniature lesson, both of his legs were clean, and Hua Cheng instructed, “Gege, turn around so I can wash your back.”  That he could do with a contented sigh.  Even if the hands against his bare skin was new, there was an easy familiarity from Hua Cheng running his hands up and down Xie Lian’s back as he fell asleep, any time they spent the night together.  This time it was accompanied by a harder press of fingers, thumbs tracing with intention in an arc from the top to bottom of his shoulder blades, then down the middle of his back on either side of his spine.  When Xie Lian made an inquiring noise, Hua Cheng answered, “Gege did such hard work bent over all day; this lowly one couldn’t possibly let him go back out sore tomorrow.”  And then he really set to work on his back, section by section, devoting knuckles and the heel of his palm to the task in addition to his thumbs.

“San Lang,” Xie Lian groaned as Hua Cheng dug into a particularly difficult knot.  He felt like he was only being held up by the shape of the bathing pool and those hands.

“Yes?  Is there something you wanted to tell me?” asked his mischievous ghost, as if he was completely unaware of the absolute puddle of god that was about melt all over his bathroom floor if he kept that up.

“Feels good.  That one had been bothering me actually.”  Xie Lian momentarily dislodged the hands as he rotated his shoulder a bit to test the improved mobility, and then leaned back again.

“I couldn’t let gege hurt,” Hua Cheng said, voice softer than before and touch fleeting.  It took Xie Lian a moment to recognize that it had been the gentlest kiss to the spot.  But then the insincere tone was back.  “Should I give gege more massages then?  Maybe next time on the bed so I can give better pressure?”

“Heavens yes,” Xie Lian said with another moan.  He recognized the irony of getting so worked up about his legs and then egging Hua Cheng on in this.  But his beloved teased him so much that it was always a great pleasure to fluster him in return.  This time apparent in the way his hands stuttered where they had continued with the massage.  He grinned thinking of the faint cracks he knew would be on Hua Cheng’s face - the almost imperceptible widening of his eye, the slight slackening of his jaw.  Xie Lian would would let himself be teased forever if only he could see that expression too.

It seemed the massage didn’t just stop with his back, because as soon as Hua Cheng got his hands into Xie Lian’s hair, he started rubbing circles into his scalp.  If Xie Lian had thought he couldn’t get any more boneless, this just about proved him wrong.  Hua Cheng laughed at him as he obviously fought to keep his head from lolling.  “Come, lay your head on my lap,” he instructed.

“Ah, I’d just get San Lang wet,” Xie Lian protested, not even mentioning the obvious impracticality.

“We’re about to get into sleep clothes anyway.  Please, gege?”

Xie Lian gave in, because that really did sound nice.  To still give access to most of his head, he turned a little to rest the side of his face on Hua Cheng’s knees.  He did have to turn his head back just a bit to try to see Hua Cheng’s expression, such a soft smile.  Xie Lian loved knowing that he was the only one who got to see Hua Cheng like this, something special just for the two of them.  

He stopped considering such things pretty quickly though, as the hands returned to his hair.  This time Hua Cheng’s fingers seemed to just be absently rubbing, without any particular goal.  It still felt good, and Xie Lian found himself drifting with his eyes half-shut for a little while, until the dig of the tile into his shoulder reminded him where he was.  “Alright, enough of that,” he said, far too sleepily for the admonishment to mean anything, “I’m about to end up spending the whole night in your tub, and then I really will be sore in the morning.”

“Apologies gege.  I guess I will have to find a better place next time, so you can fall asleep in my lap comfortably.”

Xie Lian’s cheeks felt warm at the thought, and perhaps if he was lucky Hua Cheng would assume that was just from the heat.  He was only ever lucky when it came to Hua Cheng, so maybe he could convince himself it was working.  He did want to do this again though, so he gave an affirmative, “Mn,” in reply.

He had to lift his head back up then, so Hua Cheng could actually get to the task of washing his hair.  After that, he stepped out of the bath to let Hua Cheng bundle him up into the biggest, warmest towel he’d ever felt, pinning his arms to his sides and all.  Xie Lian laughed.  “San Lang, I look like one of your butterfly cocoons.”

“Sure,” Hua Cheng replied with a grin, “but usually it’s the pretty thing that comes out of the cocoon, not what goes into it.”

Xie Lian snorted dramatically, to prevent himself from dissolving into giggles at his ghost’s shameless flirting.  He wiggled a hand out from the towel and pushed against Hua Cheng’s chest.  “You said you were about to get into sleep robes too.  Go on, while I dry off.”

“But I was supposed to get to help gege with his whole bath.”

“I think I can do just this one thing, so you’re not still wet too.  Go on, and then I’ll let you comb my hair.”  Xie Lian had a feeling that would be a good enough exchange, and it was at least one that Hua Cheng accepted.  He turned back to the bench and handed over a set of white sleep robes, before starting to strip off his own outer robes.  Xie Lian set to his own task, cheeks heating.  ‘Ridiculous, he’s been seeing you naked all night,’ he tried to tell himself, promptly realized that that was just making matters worse, and decided it was best if he just stopped thinking.

Dressed and dried, Xie Lian sat down on the stool set out before a bronze mirror.  Examining his own reflection, especially in a stable surface rather than in a stream or a basin of water, was also an activity he’d fallen out of practice with.  Time was, the figure in the mirror was always proud and tall, impeccably dressed and convinced of his own invincibility.  The Xie Lian who looked back at him now still had an upright posture, but a little tired, a little worn around the edges.  But then he watched the reflection of Hua Cheng step up behind him, saw the way his own face changed.  Hua Cheng had always been the one to remind him what it meant to be happy, and what did a little wear compare to a gift like that?

“Would Dianxia let his San Lang braid his hair?” Hua Cheng asked, shaking the god from his minor ruminations.

Thinking of a day in his little shrine, when their positions were reversed, Xie Lian said, “What, you don’t want to give me a crooked ponytail?”

“No, I think that one is better suited for me, don’t you think.”  Hua Cheng’s eye was sparkling as reached around to the small table and picked up a vial of hair oil.

  They were surrounded by the scent of honeysuckle as he began to work it through Xie Lian’s hair.  It was a different scent than Hua Cheng usually wore - a little musky, a little like roses - so he must have bought this oil with Xie Lian in mind.  As much as Hua Cheng liked to insist that everything he had was Xie Lian’s, this kind of little thing was what made him feel most like he belonged in Hua Cheng’s home.  Not everything handed over to him, but the thought of his hair oil on the shelf next to Hua Cheng’s.  Something for each of them, next to, not subsumed by.

He felt like those thoughts, all of his thoughts since he sat down before the mirror really, were too weighty, too complicated, to voice in the state of sleepy relaxation that was taking him over again courtesy of the hands in his hair.  So instead he said, “This scent is nice.  Thank you for picking it for me, San Lang.”

Hua Cheng was good at understanding him without words anyway.  “Of course, gege,” he said out loud, but the slower stroke of his hands against Xie Lian’s scalp before he separated the hair out for braiding said that he knew.

Xie Lian stood once the braid was tied off, and Hua Cheng took his arm again, as if leading him to a grand procession, not just through the door to the bedroom.  He even held open the door, and pulled back the sheets.  Xie Lian could protest, but at this point he felt like there may not be any purpose left to that.

“You know, maybe I should come out to help with the planting tomorrow, now that gege has so kindly taught me how to plant water chestnuts,” Hua Cheng suggested as he rounded the bed and slid beneath the blankets on the other side.

“Hmm, but I thought San Lang said he had important ghost city business to attend to.  I thought he said it might take all week.  Have you finished already?”  It was the reason Xie Lian had made a point of not mentioning the planting days in the first place.

Hua Cheng groaned and turned his face into the pillow.  “It’s so boring dealing with that trash.  Almost as bad as calligraphy practice.  Almost worse.”

“If it’s anything like calligraphy practice, then it’s good for you.”

“Gege is so cruel to his San Lang.”

Xie Lian could only laugh at the dramatics that he was well accustomed to by now.  “I suppose I will just have to make it up.”  He pulled on Hua Cheng’s shoulder a bit, to get him to turn his face out of the pillow, and leaned in for the kiss that he’d been wanting since he first found Hua Cheng waiting in Puqi Shrine.

The humming sound Hua Cheng made against his lips said that this was a perfectly acceptable apology.  As did the fingers that cupped the back of his neck and worked their way into the hair at the base of his braid, and the hand that stroked up and down his back, a mirror from in the bath.  Xie Lian hooked a knee over Hua Cheng’s legs, and shifted closer, but he really didn’t have the energy left for much more than that.  He let himself drift on the feeling of the lazy, languid kisses, until eventually he let his head droop into the crook of Hua Cheng’s neck.

“Next time, San Lang will have to let me help him bathe,” he said, mostly muffled into the red silk sleep robe.

It seemed Hua Cheng understood anyway, because he replied, “This lowly one couldn’t possibly let—”

“Shhh,” Xie Lian cut him off, and then leaned up to kiss the protest away.  “You took such good care of me.  I want to take care of San Lang too.”

“If gege would let me come out planting with him tomorrow, you’d have an excuse for that sooner.”

“San Lang!”  Xie Lian laughed and gave a halfhearted swat against Hua Cheng’s chest.  “I know I can’t really stop you.”  One look at the smug grin forming on his ghost king’s face, and Xie Lian turned over in his hold so he was facing away.  “Goodnight!”

“Good idea, we both have to be up early then.”

“I’m already asleep, I love you, goodnight!”  Xie Lian wiggled back until his back rested against Hua Cheng’s chest.  A pair of cool arms wrapped around him and pulled him back just a little bit further. Xie Lian was really almost asleep as it was.  But awake for just long enough to hear, “Goodnight, beloved,” before he drifted off.

[tmariea]

Been thinking about quanyin and what might’ve been going on in Yin Yu’s head as it all fell apart:

This was my dream, and I achieved it. This was my dream and the living of it is not what I had dreamed. But it’s still a great accomplishment and that can be enough.

The living of my dream is not what I had dreamed, and you’re the one who reminds me of that, without meaning to. It’s not what I hoped and you’re the only one who sees it.

You’re the only one who sees it, and you remind me that I could have something different, be someone different. But who would I be when I have defined myself by this for so long. What would be left of me?

What would be left of you when you achieve my dream too?

What if what is left of you is so much more? What if this fits you like a second skin? Why were you made for my dream? Why wasn’t I?

I can’t say any of that. Because you saw that this thing wasn’t a fit for me but you ran on ahead. Because I brought you to the place we both are today, because I was supposed to be your mentor, because I told you ‘no I’m going to stay’ before. I can’t tell you this, I can only sit in my misery and watch you from afar until I break.

[tmariea]

I've been working on a Renaissance Faire AU for Hualian, and feel like screaming into the void about it a little bit...

Sure this is from Ch 5 and not directly related to the premise of the AU at all but, I love this conversation so

[tmariea]

Woke up this morning with thoughts of a Xie Lian who got to spend more time with Honghong-er calling him ‘my little ruby.’

And then when Xie Lian puts together that Hua Cheng is Honghong-er, picking up the nickname again. It’s to his great delight that he learns this flusters Hua Cheng.

[tmariea]

Random minor official who’s missed the memo about staying away from Hua Cheng: what are you?

Hua Cheng: a ghost

Official: no, I mean what gender?

Hua Cheng: a calamity

Official: no, I mean… what do you have between your legs?

Hua Cheng: usually dianxia

[tmariea]

Modern AU where Xie Lian doesn’t like to give up clothes that are still serviceable but have small holes or tears.

Problem is his mending skills suck, and Hua Cheng is not about to let his gege walk around with badly mended clothes. So Hua Cheng learns how to repair clothes with embroidery, and over time Xie Lian’s clothes become more and more covered in embroidered flowers.

[tmariea]

Hello friends, today I’m bringing you a bit of a different kind of art than usual - starting in October, I will be opening commissions for custom designed dice rolling trays! I will have 2 slots available, pricing and more details on the comms sheet.

If you’re interested I’d also recommend following my Twitter account https://twitter.com/amariteattrpg - I’ll be posting more photos of the work I’ve done so far throughout this week as a lead up! Please also contact me through my twitter account if you are interested; the mobile notifications are more reliable

[reiding-and-writing]

Reblog if you're a fanfic writer and you wanna know what your followers' favorite story of yours is ❤

[caroleandtuesdayzine]

PRE-ORDERS ARE NOW OPEN!

Greetings, Martians! Pre-orders for Voices from Mars: A Carole & Tuesday digital zine are NOW OPEN until December 24th!

The following products will be available:

PDF Zine - $15

Digital Merch Only - $15 

PDF + All Digital Merch - $25

All pdfs and digital merch will be sent through email once the preorder period has ended! 

Check out our store: https://voicesfrommars.bigcartel.com/

[tmariea]

I got the chance to write for Voices from Mars: A Carole and Tuesday zine. Take a look around the digital zine and merch!!

[cianidix]

Hey everyone, here's my part ror the @atla-bigbang ! This was the piece I drew for tmariaea's Zuko-centric fic! It's an amazing fic and you should definitely check it out~

[IMAGE ID: A starry sky stretches over the Wan Shi Desert. Zuko is riding his ostrich-horse as he looks up at the night sky, searching for constellations. Two lionturtle constellations look down at Zuko.]

[tmariea]

New Constellations (ch 2)

Chapter 2 of my ATLA Big Bang piece!!

Read Chapter 1 here

Chapter summary:  Turns out, even after Zuko's lost his ship, navigation skills still come in handy. The myths just might come in handy too. After all, there's more than one type of finding your way.

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Zuko hated everything about traveling as a fugitive in the Earth Kingdom, and having parted from Uncle made it even worse, although he’d never say it aloud.  He hated the plants that were all different from back home and made his head feel like it was full to bursting.  He hated that there wasn’t much food to forage for, and wasn’t much left after the winter and the army’s requisitions (stealing) to buy.

He hated the nights too; they weren’t mild like back home, but downright cold.  Worst of all, as the landscape grew more arid the further he traveled, and it only got colder at night despite the warm days.  While his breath of fire could manage the cold, it left him with a weariness sunk deep into his bones.

Uncle was probably sitting close to a nice, crackling fire, making tea.  Hopefully not with anything that could kill him this time, because Zuko just couldn’t always be there to tell him not to drink tea made of strange plants.  Unlike Zuko, Uncle Iroh had always been a proper firebender; he’d had no unnatural pull toward the nighttime.

This time, Zuko had little choice.  Traveling by the stars was the only way he knew how to navigate in this unknown place.  He had no compass or astrolabe, not even charcoal or good paper to write on for his calculations.  As much as he hated to admit it, the only thing he had left to his name were Zhu Yan’s stories and a map he had haggled with his last coin like his life depended on it.  He hardly even trusted the map.

For days now, Zuko had been heading northwest towards Ba Sing Se, ever since he left Lee’s village.  He knew that the Avatar needed to find an earthbending master next, and what better place to find one than the capital city of the Earth Kingdom?  Even if Zuko didn’t trust the map completely, the city was so large that, if it was even close to accurate, he wouldn’t miss it.

There was a desert in the way, though, and if Zuko couldn’t find enough provisions to last him the crossing, he’d never make it.  He looked up at the sky with a sigh, wishing the constellation stories had some more concrete answers to them, like “what to do when you are a broke, exiled Fire Nation Prince chasing the Avatar with several hundred miles of sand in your way?”  Instead of magical solutions written in the stars, he caught sight of the Lion Turtle constellation.

Zuko could almost hear Zhu Yan’s voice in his head telling the story: they were great islands that swam across every sea.  They swam until mortals no longer needed them to provide a safe home.  Some settled down, growing tired and weary and stony in their old age, and became the first stationary islands.  Some, though, were too young and restless, too eager to keep exploring, and those lion turtles swam off the edge of the world and into the sky.

“The world is round,” Zuko had told him flatly. “There is no edge.”

Zhu Yan had chuckled, lamented Zuko’s inability to simply enjoy a story, and then said, “The Lion Turtle is a tricky constellation.  Be careful when you choose to follow it—it’s been known to lead you where you need to go, but not always where you want to go.”

Zuko had scoffed at that, too.  While constellations weren’t static, he had learned well that they followed set patterns in the sky, by the night and the month and the season.  He knew all the calculations, knew that you could use a map and your instruments to know exactly where you would end up by following one constellation or another.  And yet tonight, with his head as empty of ideas as his stomach was of food, it felt as if there was hardly anything left but to chase a spirit tale.

Zuko closed his left eye so he could trace the curve of the strong, individual stars that made the Lion Turtle’s shell, the small cluster at its head, and the fuzz of tiny, far away lights just above its back that almost looked like an island forest obscured by morning fog.  He pulled on the ostrich-horse’s reins and turned her in a new direction.

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Zuko could feel the heat forming behind his eyes as he stormed away from the prison tower.  He hadn’t wanted Uncle to tell him he had another potential destiny as the descendant of an Avatar.  Now, more than ever, he felt torn between home and the position in his father’s regard he’d fought so hard to gain, and the part of him that had seen the wider world and found his old views childish and wanting.

Once he’d reached a reasonable distance from the building that he wouldn’t be easily spotted, Zuko found a flat spot obscured by an outcropping of stone and began to pace.  Everything about him was restless and wound tight these days.  Being home was supposed to be a relief, but it hadn’t felt anything like that at all.

The story about Sozin and Roku that Zuko had found had not been helpful.  Uncle had not been helpful.  He couldn’t ask Mai about any of this; she was loyal to Azula, and he couldn’t ask her to deal with his insecurities.  What prince of the Fire Nation, heir to the throne, doubts his country and his people?

He hadn’t heard that sneering voice in his head in a long time; not since he was first on his ship, frightened and set an impossible mission.  

Thinking of those early days on the ship reminded him of one other person in his life who had been a teacher.  Zhu Yan loved stories and history and tradition; maybe he would have some kind of insight.  Zuko pushed down a cringe of guilt that he hadn’t sought any of his original crew members from before the explosion, other than knowing that Zhao had requisitioned them to other ships for the ill-fated Invasion of the North.  The navy kept good records, he should be able to find that information easily now.

Zuko turned and headed towards the edge of the caldera instead of back to the palace.  The naval headquarters were down the other side of the mountain, near the shore.  His status should be enough to entitle him to the name and route of the ship Zhu Yan was stationed on.  Then he could send a hawk explaining his troubles and maybe get some real advice.  He chose not to acknowledge the fact that Zhu Yan had been just as known to answer a question with a cryptic story as Uncle was to do with a cryptic proverb.

He crested the lip of the stone formation and started down the switchbacks along the cliffside, pleased at the exertion after so many days of palanquin rides.  The crunch of his footsteps found a rhythm with the rush of the waves further in the distance and the gulls calling overhead.

It was even easy enough to walk around once Zuko reached the military base.  Wearing the nondescript clothing he usually did to visit the prison tower, he didn’t draw attention like he would in his royal robes.  Sailors were businesslike, and they had better things to do than to try to see the face under his hood when the guards had already let him through the gate.

Zuko made his way towards the building where naval records would be kept, and lowered his hood as he approached the door.  The man standing guard looked surprised to see him, but bowed and allowed him to pass.  Inside was a small open space between rows and rows of shelves, with another officer at a writing desk who stood as Zuko entered.

“Prince Zuko,” the man said, showing no reaction to the sudden appearance of a member of the royal family at his desk as he bowed.  “I am Corporal Iwao. How can I be of service?”

“Corporal, I am searching for a particular naval officer and the name of the ship he is currently serving on. A Lieutenant Zhu Yan.  He was stationed with the fleet under Commander Zhao at the North Pole, last I was aware.”  Zuko did his best to keep his disdain for Zhao off of his face.

“One moment, your highness,” Corporal Iwao told him and disappeared into the shelves with a bow.

He was gone for so long that by the time he returned, Zuko was sure he had memorized every inch of the small front area.  Corporal Iwao was carrying a large scroll which he set out on the desk and began to unroll.  Zuko tried to read the title at the top, hoping it would be the name of a ship he recognized.  The bottom dropped out of his stomach as he recognized the characters for “casualties.”

The man studiously ran his finger down the list until he reached the name ‘Zhu Yan – deceased’ so that Zuko could see for himself.  There were other characters which followed, detailing the campaign and date of death, but Zuko’s mind couldn’t absorb any of it.  

“My apologies your highness, but the officer in question was killed in action during the Siege of the North.  Is there anything else I can do for you today?”

“No, thank you,” Zuko said.  He couldn’t feel the words on his lips, could hardly hear them as he spoke.

The walk back to the palace was one step and one step and one step, on and on, with hardly a thread of memory to connect each to the one before it.  Zuko pushed open doors and barely registered the pressure against his skin, heard the bustle around him as if he was underwater.  When he reached the hallway to his room, there was someone waiting for him just outside the door.  He knew he should be upset about it, but trying to reach for the emotion only opened a yawning hole in its place.

“Zuzu, there you are!  I was starting to get worried.  Where have you been?” Azula said ‘worried’ like it was foreign word, and her expression was disinterested as she examined her nails.

This wasn’t the first time that Zuko just stared at his sister, unsure how to handle what this next game of hers would be.  He didn’t even have space for normal thought, much less what it would take to keep up.  

“I went for a walk,” he finally said.

“Fairly long walk.  Someone less trusting than me might not believe that.”

He didn’t feel anything as she spoke.  Not even the parts of him that were always afraid of her.  “Please go.”

“Is it so wrong to let my brother know that I care?” she asked, and then finally looked up.  There must have been something in Zuko’s face that Azula wasn’t expecting, because surprise slipped out from beneath her perfect porcelain mask.  Zuko could count the number of times he’d seen that happen on one hand, and if he had any capacity for it he would feel rather pleased with himself.

Azula examined him for a moment more and Zuko let her, standing still, feeling like the ability to even move was an ocean away.  Finally, she let out a frustrated huff and turned to leave.

Zuko pushed open the final door, had only enough presence of mind to lock it behind him, and sank down onto his bed facing the open window.  As the sun traveled across the sky, and shadows grew longer and then overtook the world, Zuko stayed in one place, only silence in his mind.

The next time he moved was out to his balcony after night had fallen.  The air was heavy with humidity and heat, almost nothing like the cool sea breezes from the nights that he practiced navigation with Zhu Yan on deck.  Zuko sat with his back to the railing, arms around his knees, and that is when the tears came.  Silent and slow and unending, until every star above his head bled into one.

Zhu Yan had loved the Fire Nation.  But in all the time Zuko had known him, he had never spoken about loving the war.  He couldn’t remember either, if he had ever asked.  But without anyone ever asking, and in fact against all Zuko’s protests, he had always shared how much he loved the fires in the sky, and stories that had been thought inconsequential for generations.

He had died for another man’s vanity.  Zuko had seen first-hand the aftermath at the North Pole.  There had been nothing gained there, no greatness the Fire Nation brought with them to bestow on the rest of the world.

He’d never hear Zhu Yan tell a story again.

How many other battlefields had been the same?  He knew so many people now, too, with voices they would always miss.  Would it be easier to count which battlefields had not left behind such pointless loss?

He’d never see Zhu Yan smile for something so small as when Zuko would listen without complaint.

Zuko thought back on the history he had read, of how even the start of the war had been for pride and had left friends lost in its wake.

He’d never again stand together with Zhu Yan on a deck beneath the stars while the world stretched wide before them.  Never get the chance to voice that he had started to hope that someday the world could look so wondrous to him too.

He wondered if perhaps that was his answer.

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When Zuko left the Fire Nation palace after the Day of Black Sun, he was far more prepared than when he had left Uncle behind on the edges of the desert.  Tucked away in the basket of his war balloon, he had plenty of rations, as well as an astrolabe, maps and star charts that he had lifted from the palace.  Of the things Zuko had stolen in his life, these were marked firmly in the ‘do not regret’ category.

After a few hours of following the Avatar and his party at a safe distance, Zuko had a pretty good idea of where they were headed.  Which was a good thing because by sunset his slower balloon had fallen considerably behind.  He lost sight of them just after the last light left the sky.

Zuko checked that the fire in the furnace was still burning steadily and dug his navigation tools from his packs.  There wasn’t much space to lay out a map in the bottom of the basket, but he made do as best as he could and crouched in the tiny amount of space that was left to start plotting a course towards the Western Air Temple.

It was ironic, Zuko thought, that the constellation which he followed tonight, the one who would lead him west, back to the first air temple he’d ever set foot in, was Siming.  The stories described them as softly beautiful spirit, who lived in the golden clouds at sunset and gathered every drifting soul into their arms as the day came to a close and sheltered them until dawn when they would prepare to enter into life anew.  Their constellation resembled a coiled fishing net.  Zuko had never touched a fishing net in real life, or one woven by the spirits.  If he chose to believe the stories, Zhu Yan had touched the net from the legend now.

Zuko took a long breath in, felt his fire rise up in his chest and released another blast of it into the furnace that was keeping him aloft.  He did not know if this is truly what happened after death, that every lost soul was scooped into a fishing net in the sky at sunset.  But Zhu Yan had believed, so for tonight at least Zuko chose to believe that his mentor had gotten one brief night to rest among the constellations that he had loved.

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The sun was setting over the Western Air Temple.  Dusk always made Zuko feel just a bit hazy, like he wanted to go curl up and savor the last patch of light like a pygmy-puma, and it had slowed Aang’s firebending energy significantly.  They had just finished practice for the day and were sitting on a ledge of the temple, legs dangling down into open air, to watch the sunset.

Aang kicked his legs idly, languid little bits of breeze trailing off of his feet and making the mists below swirl.  “Hey, this is probably a bit of a sensitive question, so feel free to not answer, but how did you do it?  You know, keep firebending after...?”

“After what?” Zuko asked.

Aang wouldn’t meet his eyes, but waved a hand in the direction of his scar. Zuko’s back tensed and he drew in a breath to yell – He was a firebender, the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation, how could he do any less?   How could Aang imply he was so dishonorable as to turn his back on his bending, on his nation and heritage, on the brilliant light they were tasked to bring to the rest of the world? – And let the breath back out, sat on the impulse like Uncle was always telling him to do.  Asked himself if those were his own thoughts, or just Ozai’s thoughts left in his head.

Which was probably even more the heart of what Uncle had wanted him to do.  Zuko sent up a silent prayer to the spirits to let him tell Uncle someday that he was sorry for learning the lesson too late.

He said to Aang, “Work, lots of it.  And not the kind of work you do by practicing firebending forms, but the kind of work that takes telling your heart over and over again that it doesn’t need to be afraid, even when it wants to be.”

“Wow,” Aang replied, “that’s pretty anticlimactic.  Sounds like you just had to have a lot of patience.” He had a mock frown on his face that Zuko had learned meant good-natured teasing.  So Zuko only elbowed him a little in the side while Aang dissolved into laughter.

“I have tons of patience! But, if you want something a little more exciting, just wait.”

“Okay. Whatever you say, Sifu Hotman.”

Zuko spared him an exaggerated eye roll as he turned back to watch the sun dip below the horizon and the sky grow steadily darker. Behind them he could hear the sounds of someone starting a fire and beginning to cook dinner, and some faint conversation. Beside him Aang was doing his level best to prove that he had plenty of patience, and only fidgeted a little.

Finally, when enough stars had come out, Zuko gestured overhead and said, “Every star up there is Agni’s brothers and sisters and siblings.  The whole sky is full of fire, fire that we can’t touch or feel.  But when we use the fire that Agni grants us, it’s as if we’re just a bit closer.”

“Wow,” Aang breathed out, looking suitably impressed.

“A good friend taught me all of the stories he knew.  Would you like to hear them?”

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Thank you all so much for reading!! And make sure to check out @cianidix ‘s fabulous artwork if you haven’t already!!!