[ open post: Lan Wangji and guests ]

[lightbearinglord]

In the wake of his disorienting and unpleasant stint in Gu Xiang's body, Lan Wangji has done his utmost to resume and enjoy all of his usual pursuits. He has, he believes, thoroughly made up for his lapse in his promise to Wei Ying. He has wielded kitchen knives, his ink brush, and Bichen with precision and enthusiasm. He has sunk into long, restorative shichen of meditation. He has, at Claudius' behest, thoroughly perused Emily Post's instructions regarding how to conduct oneself as the best man at a wedding.

There is the matter of his qin, too. The discovery of the spirit in Gideon's sword struck Lan Wangji with greater surprise than he might have expected. Such things were once commonplace for him; he hardly went two weeks, before he came to this place, without finding himself called to some night-hunt. He does not like to believe that he could become complacent, and he has always practiced diligently, but still.

The tableau is a familiar one: a certain parlor near the entryway of the mansion, one that often houses this particular cultivator along with his spiritual instrument. Wangji is balanced on a table at the center of the room, polished black wood gleaming and strings freshly tuned, and Lan Wangji sits cross-legged before it. He is not actually playing it at this precise moment, however, because he currently has guests. A small white rabbit sits next to the qin, munching his way through a piece of lettuce. An equally small brown rabbit is perched in the crook of Lan Wangji's elbow, eyeing his brother with some envy. Ostensibly, the rabbits are in trouble, because they have recently laid waste to Lan Wangji's copy of Emma. It is impossible to tell, because Lan Wangji is petting Danding's head with exactly as much solemn focus as always.

Comments

[ravkanwitch]

Presumably, Nina and Mothwing were very sensible and met up again at sunset as promised, to check in on the state of their own bodies. She nods with a little smile. "Yes, I think she really enjoyed it. Both Sagramore and Susan made her human food-- twoleg food, as she calls it."

[lightbearinglord]

It's something of a balm to hear that some people here, at the least, enjoyed their time in bodies not their own, and it is endearing to imagine Mothwing in Nina's form sampling various human foods. Twoleg foods, that is. He glances at Xiaoxue, who is sniffing Nina's fingers studiously. "At least these two remained themselves."

[ravkanwitch]

Well, okay, she pets Xiaoxue as well. "That's a good thing because they're perfect the way they are," Nina declares. "During the first body swap, I kept running up to someone only to discover that they were someone else. It was a little embarrassing." She doesn't seem too hung up on it, though. Even though she ran into Aleksander in Luo Binghe's body, it all worked out in the end.

[lightbearinglord]

For as much as Lan Wangji likes Aleksander, he has made a conscious effort never to mention Nina to him. He met Nina first, and he knows the wariness she feels about her own Grisha abilities, not to mention her entirely legitimate fear about the jurda parem. For that reason, he does not mention Luo Binghe's efforts to toy with both him and Claudius -- but his jaw does tighten a little. "Mn." He releases a breath. "I meant to speak with Sir Sagramore and found Master Asmodean instead."

[ravkanwitch]

“Oh, I did the same,” she says, with a little smile. “It was a little awkward at first but it was fine. I think I’m lucky in that I get along with most of the people here.” Nina sometimes wonders if she truly does or if there’s something in her that craves approval and belonging, enough that she turns on charm when she needs to. It’s almost conniving in a way. Kaz would be proud.

“Not that I haven’t had some false starts with people,” she confides. She thinks of Claudius — and Galahad too.

[lightbearinglord]

On the whole, Lan Wangji would say the same for himself. After a lifetime of cordial but distant relations with nearly everyone but his own family, he is perpetually and repeatedly surprised at the number of people here whose company he enjoys and who, even more surprisingly, seem to enjoy his. Then again, there are a few obvious and glaring exceptions.

He gives Nina a gently prompting look. She doesn't need to tell him about those false starts, but she may if she is comfortable doing so.

[ravkanwitch]

"One of them was Claudius." Nina leans in closer, though it isn't much of a secret. She suspects Claudius wouldn't mind the retelling; it's water under the bridge at this point and much less touchy than her conversations with Galahad. She even gives Lan Wangji a small smile to note that it's not serious. "We were both in an awful mood when I first arrived. I was stressed. He was exhausted. I cried to get out of the telling him too much about myself."

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji takes the time to picture this with something like amusement. Claudius greeted him with such aplomb, and Lan Wangji became irrevocably fond of him so quickly thereafter, that it requires a little additional effort of imagination on his part. Wei Ying once very memorably tried the crying to get out of something trick on him. Lan Wangji paid it no mind. "New arrivals are often distraught," he says. "I was."

[ravkanwitch]

"He was brewing something with a lot of herbs. It was a little creepy. And I was so paranoid, I briefly went by a different name when I first arrived." Nina laughs a little and gives both of the rabbits and extra little scritch on their soft heads. "I helped him pick out a watch for Galahad recently. We're fine now."

[lightbearinglord]

The rabbits are predictably beginning to settle in Nina's presence, their noses gently twitching and their ears relaxed. Lan Wangji notes this with a little invisible fondness for all three parties. Claudius brewing something with several herbs sounds perfectly everyday to him, but people do arrive here from a wide variety of unusual contexts, so he nods. "I had lost track of my husband and my students when I arrived." The rest of that, the and therefore I was panicking completely beneath my moderately calm exterior, seems too obvious to bother vocalizing.

[ravkanwitch]

“That must have been really disconcerting. I’m glad he’s here now,” Nina sympathizes. She suddenly realizes something. “You know, the second before I came here I was actually in a different body. Slimmer. Blonde. Maybe that added to the disruption.”

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji looks back up at Nina's face with immediate surprise, muted though it may be. "A different body?"

[ravkanwitch]

Nina hesitates, just for a moment. “In my world, there are Tailors, who are able to change appearances a little bit little, using pigments and other supplies to help their work. I used to be able to do their work, even though I wasn’t trained in it — except under jurda parem, I was able to transform someone into someone else with what was basically the snap of two fingers.” She only hazily remembers that. Kaz’s request. Wylan’s agreement. His blonde hair darkening into Kuwei’s black hair.

“I was under cover before I came here. For my country and my King. I suppose I looked too Ravkan because they made me more Fjerdan to blend in — but when I arrived, the changes were gone.”

[lightbearinglord]

If Lan Wangji had a slightly worse grasp on self-control, he might glance down, at this juncture, at the qiankun pouch at his waist. The jurda parem is tucked inside of it, as it has been since the day Nina passed it to him. But he does not. He studies Nina's face. "You would not rather still look Fjerdan, would you?"

[ravkanwitch]

"I like what I look like," Nina says, easily. "I wouldn't change it for the world.¹"

¹Some may say she eventually does rediscover "her world" and discover that staying in her Fjerdan form is worth it, but that's an alternate universe now.

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji gives her a little nod, then, of approval. He has some mixed feelings on this subject, but he keeps them to himself. Asking himself, or Wei Ying, whether he would rather Wei Ying have stayed in his original form is a passage to endless unanswerable questions. "Then that was not your first experience in a body not your own."

[ravkanwitch]

"No, though a cat is significantly different," she says, laughing a little. She considers telling him that Luo Binghe made her a delicious broth but does not, turning thoughtful instead. "At the end of the day, though, even though I prefer this body, I think if I found the right person or the right situation I'd be happy with a different one. Wylan-- the person that I transformed-- Jesper fell in love with him while he was transformed. He was eventually returned to what he looked like at the start, but it didn't really matter to either of them."

[lightbearinglord]

"Mn." Shen Yuan knows this already, so it is likely useless to keep it from anyone he actually likes. Lan Wangji exercises a little conscious effort of will to work past his instinct to hoard and defend every scrap of information about his husband. "Wei Ying is in his second body."

[ravkanwitch]

"I see," Nina says. It's mostly in earnest and only quite mildly in jest (with a dash of Nina picking up on the quirks of people she speaks with), but she does give him a familiar open look, as if to invite him to say more if he wishes.

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji watches the rabbits, the way they snuffle at Nina's hands and then tuck their limbs beneath themselves. There is no gentle way to say this. "He died. When he returned, it was not in the same form."

[ravkanwitch]

Nina frowns. "Saints, I'm sorry. But... you still love him. And he's here now." That doesn't take away the pain of it, she understands, but it's a balm at least.

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji looks back up at Nina, then. He wonders about the people she described, Wylan and Jesper, and whether she misses them. She must. "I did not anticipate seeing him again after his death. His shape hardly mattered."

[ravkanwitch]

"That makes sense," Nina says quietly, more subdued. "You're very lucky. I hoped the person I loved would come on the day of the visitors. He didn't. Now I'm afraid he'll come after I've finally..." She trails off. Gotten over him? Never. Recovered? Wrong word. Healed? ...Maybe.

[lightbearinglord]

Lan Wangji is impossibly lucky, a fact to which he returns almost every day. Few people get a second chance in this particular way. Lan Wangji never forgot Wei Ying across all those long, mundane, grueling, fruitful years, and never loved anyone else, but he did, slowly, heal. That took nothing away from the strength of his feelings when they reunited. He tries, now, to choose his words carefully. "Thirteen years had passed. I had changed. When I recognized him, I still loved him."

[ravkanwitch]

Nina nods, understanding. "I think that's why I didn't see him on visitor's day. Maybe I'll never see him again, even here. It might not be right for me." She considers something for a moment before taking a sudden, different tack. "Do you... believe in gods? Or any kind of religion?"