lightbearinglord | [ closed post: hold fast to the center ]

It isn't so early, and the sunrises are slowly coming earlier -- Claudius doesn't spend as long dragging himself out of bed for breakfast. And now that Laertes and Sagramore have looped him into the meal rotation, he looks forward to seeing them and seeing what they bring. But the sun through the window is deceptive, Claudius knows, and he's still in his dressing gown and huddled under the warmth of the kotatsu, considering risking the chill and checking the birdfeeders when Lan Wangji knocks. He reluctantly leaves the heated sanctuary -- but when he opens the door, he's glad of it. "Wangji! What an unexpected pleasure."

Despite the absence of a smile, the look on Lan Wangji's face is unmistakably warm, pleased to have caught the person he was hoping to see and, quietly, just as pleased to be received with gladness for his presence. "You asked to meditate with me."

"I did, didn't I?" Both times Claudius asked, he was rather beside himself -- it takes a moment to remember, but only a moment. "And you're not a man to avoid saying no until the other party forgets they ever asked. Well, come in. Even the workbook recommends meditation -- can you believe that? I have a workbook," he adds, for helpful context.

Indeed, if Lan Wangji had not wanted to do this, it would have been evident from the moment Claudius asked. So bidden, he steps inside. He likes to see the ways in which this room has evolved over time, from the day that he sat in it as Claudius grappled with Galahad's absence to this morning, when it could not be more obvious that this is a home for two people. Unaware of the meal rotation, and keenly aware of his own tendency to grow fond of people who are poor at caring for themselves, he produces two still-warm youtiao from his qiankun pouch, wrapped neatly in wax paper, and presses them into Claudius' hand. "What is the purpose of the workbook?" he asks, sincerely curious.

The warmth of the parcels surprise Claudius -- he sets one down, then unwraps the other. No sooner does he start to devise words of thanks than he recalls their promises. No thanks are necessary. He takes a bite, and finds it tears easily, with the same delectable texture as some of Laertes's or Galahad's pastries. "It's a remedy book," he says, covering his mouth as he chews. Thanks or no, he's still civilized. "Or akin to one. Rather than a list of recipes and aliments, it's a list of questions meant to inspire self-reflection, with some rather pointed suggestions. Evidently, avoidance is symptom of my aliment." He rolls his eyes at that, because it really is obnoxious. He thought avoidance was his best coping strategy. "It's called Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, which is a mouthful."

"Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder," Lan Wangji repeats, to be certain that he has it right. If Claudius has a workbook, then no doubt the library can provide him with further information later, but he can make some educated guesses based on the name. There's no need to ask what the trauma is. The thought of it stings a little, but not so sharply when paired with the sight of a relatively cheerful Claudius eating youtiao in his dressing gown. "And meditation will help you recover?"

Truth be told, when Claudius opened the workbook, he expected to check off a single, obvious trauma and kept finding more connected to it, like ripping up ground-ivy and seeing how far the roots spread. It's made progress slower-going than it would be otherwise -- but it helps to think of an aliment with symptoms to uncover, rather than a vice of cowardice he'd rather not confess. "It's presented as an alternative to avoidance. Avoidance functions as an anesthetic, I suppose, like using liquor to numb the pain during a field surgery -- which serves well enough, when nothing else is available. But after a certain point it's like the wound has grown gangreneous under the bandages, and ignoring it does more harm than good. So I'm meant to do other things. Talk to someone, mindfully breathe, meditate." He casts a sidelong look of who would have thought?

Meditation as a practice that opposes avoidance. It makes clear enough sense, when Lan Wangji thinks of it. He has never known how to avoid himself, even when it might have been a soothing option, even when shame threatened to drag him irrevocably into its grip. He has only ever been able to clearly see the things he would rather not, his fears and desires and pains, and let them pass through him, as deep as they run. He imagines he would not have survived his seclusion otherwise.

"You may do any of those things with me," he says, as plain as he can be. "It may be difficult. Releasing your thoughts requires facing them first. But it will not be impossible, and I will be with you."

Claudius's first thought is that it's too early and he's too sober to be this sincerely touched, and his second thought is that that’s probably a pattern. He doesn’t have to be drunk and distempered to have a sincere feeling, but one does tend to lead the other. Perhaps such thoughts always come up later because never lets them see the light of day.

"The reverse is true, too, I'm sure you know,” he says, after a moment fighting his self-consciousness. “I’m with you. We’re equals.”

Lan Wangji is grateful, just now, that Claudius knows him, and that he will see the softening look of affection that lights his face. "I know." Pushing past his own hesitations, he sets a hand at Claudius' shoulder, heavy enough that it can't be mistaken for a reluctant touch. "Eat, make yourself ready, and then come with me."

Then Claudius takes a moment savoring the fluffy youtiao (and since he knows Galahad likes fluffiness, he makes sure to reserve the second youtiao for him to try whenever he returns to their room today). "This is quite good," he observes. "Shouldst thou ever make too many of these, thou shouldst bring them to the café. Thou couldst be one of our patissiers, alongside Laertes and Galahad."

"Thank you," Lan Wangji says; it's an almost reflexive politeness, but he does mean it. In the absence of most of his old methods by which to be helpful, he has found it more and more fulfilling to ensure that the people around him are well-fed. "Perhaps I can make a better impression on the café than I did at the talent show."

“I thought thou madest a magnificent impression,” Claudius says, quite cheerfully. “I bade thee to impress thy husband, and so thou didst. And I learned we share a common interest, though we’ve never spoken of it.”

Lan Wangji narrows his eyes in a credibly playful performance of suspicion. "You are not referring to rearranging furniture," he says dryly.

"No, I always find a fit young man to do that." More to the point, he says, "Making proper bindings is both a skill and talent. And to do it so swiftly! It shows a practiced hand." He is aware that Lan Wangji has no memory of lashing together Wei Wuxian's wrists with his hair ribbon, in front of an audience, but he still deserves to be commended. In Claudius's opinion, it was quite the commendable and creative use of a hair ribbon.

Regrettably -- or perhaps not -- that was not the first time Lan Wangji has done that in front of an audience after a drink, and the audience the first time was arguably a worse one. At least he married his victim in the interim. There is nothing he can do to stop the immediate and predictable reddening of his ears, but he manages to gather himself in order to say, with perfect gravity to it, "He escapes too quickly if it is done improperly."

Claudius laughs warmly at that. "Sagramore won't struggle unless I ask him ... and then I think he likes to test the boundaries, and find them firm. I've reconciled with Sagramore," he adds, softening. "I attempted an apology, but he wouldn't have it. You know I'm manipulative by nature ... I can never be certain I haven't influenced someone unduly. But Sagramore's been quite insistent that he made his own decision, and he wants to make his own amends."

Wei Ying likes the same thing. He likes to know that there is nothing he can do that could convince Lan Wangji to let go of him. Possibly Lan Wangji ought to have removed his hand from Claudius' shoulder during that little conversational detour, but now he is glad he didn't. "Sir Sagramore spoke with me." He frowns, briefly, at the memory of that, Sagramore's contrition and his own inexpertly-controlled anger. "He loves you. He could have done nothing but end his association with Luo Binghe. And he was right not to allow you to apologize for wanting to be loved without compromising yourself."

"E'en so?" Claudius shakes his head, but smiles. "I think too oft on what stories can spread from a single action. Others, I'd argue, don't think oft enough on how they'll be perceived by others ... but it is a fault in me. One I'll lay on the cut-throat rumormongering at court. I fear to be misrepresented, to be misunderstood, but an thou dost understand me, I find my reputation bothers me far less. It's a virtue of thine," he says. The only request Claudius ever wrangled out of Lan Wangji was to protect Wei Wuxian's reputation here -- but in Lan Wangji's presence, with his quiet conviction and devotion, Claudius is sure Wei Wuxian rarely worries about reputation himself. It's because Lan Wangji loves so loyally, Claudius thinks. Having someone that loyal always at your side is naturally reassuring.

That earns Claudius another warmly fond look, not exactly a smile but something close to it. If Lan Wangji's regard for him can ease the built-up fears left behind by the sticky hands of that cutthroat court, then that is all the better. "I would prefer to say that reputations do not matter at all," he says, "but Wei Ying was cast out for his and died for a rumor he could not control." His own reputation was spotless, until he married the Yiling Patriarch. He would do it again a thousand times. "Still, even the most skilled social architect I have known could not attain complete mastery of the hearts and minds around him."

"Well, now I want to hear about the most skilled social architect you know," Claudius says, brightened by curiosity. "Would we get along, do you think? Or would we always be outmaneuvering each other?"

Lan Wangji has to take a silent and pensive moment to consider the mindboggling thought exercise of Nie Huaisang and Claudius in the same room. It is occasionally easy to believe that he never knew Nie Huaisang at all -- that even the delicate, fragile boy who whined about da-ge's expectations, his unwilling childhood companion, was all a construction. That can't be true, however. More likely, Sect Leader Nie began the work of layering pieces of himself after the death of his brother, and that is when it became impossible to track which piece was real and which was the performance.

"You would like Nie Huaisang," he says, after that moment, "and I suspect he would like you, but that he would be unable to resist trying to use you for his own ends. He is known as the Headshaker¹ for his ability to pretend at useless ignorance."

¹This is a pretty loose translation of Nie Huaisang's title, 一问三不知, which more literally means "one question, three I-don't-knows."

“Ah, I know the type. I’m too proud of my own cunning to pretend at uselessness or ignorance … but my protégé at court was a Headshaker to the core. It’s the most efficient way to deal with the likes of Polonius. Look at him like you’re utterly lost, until he has to state his expectations outright, or else give up on whatever he’s asking. Nine times out of ten, he’ll give up. It’s both frustrating and fascinating to watch.” Claudius smirks and shakes his head, remembering. Idly, he crumples up the wax paper and tosses it into the waste basket, before turning to the wardrobe where he can consider what to wear. This will undoubtedly take some time.

That does sound precisely like Nie Huaisang, and even more precisely like Nie Huaisang cajoling Jin Guangyao into solving every minor sect squabble on his behalf -- ostensibly so that he could while away his days on frivolous pursuits, but Lan Wangji knows better, now. "It is an effective tactic." Sensing that the portion of events wherein Claudius gets dressed may be a lengthy one, Lan Wangji avails himself of a seat at the kotatsu. "Nie Huaisang accomplished his revenge with most none the wiser."

"He must be an exceptionally talented man." That is, by Claudius's standard, the best outcome for an act of vengeance: to have done it so subtly no one would ever suspect you a hand in it. Other men, he's sure, prefer the more forthright approach, but why paint a target on your own back? "Who was he avenging?"

Lan Wangji has no choice but to say, just a little wryly, "His older brother."

"Ah," Claudius says with a laugh. "Well, I must admit ... if anything happened to thee, I'd be as willing to architect such a plot for thee. And I would have not thee to advise me wisely, so the plot would become more convoluted and cunning as time went on."

Cognizant of the fact that this is a high honor coming from Claudius, Lan Wangji gives him another of those quick, fond little glances. "Thank you." It is a good thing he is around, and has no intention of leaving Claudius to his own devices. "If you want, I will tell you the story of Nie Huaisang," he adds, "after we meditate." He is not above utilizing an incentive.

"Such shameless bribery! Know thou, it will work." With a thoughtful hum, he contemplates his two wardrobes, the curated one and the one that answers the mansion's whims. "What if I dressed in thy style today? Would it suit me?"

Naturally, Lan Wangji knew the bribery would work. That is why he did it. At the question, he contemplates Claudius in turn, recalling how jarringly unusual he once found his typical clothing. It no longer strikes him that way, the result of all their familiarity, but he does feel a sentimental pang at the thought of his friend dressed in the style of his world, as if preparing for that aspirational trip to the Cloud Recesses after all. "Mn. Perhaps not in Lan colors." Out of loyalty, he does not mention that Claudius' hair is much too short.

"Those are thy azures and thy argents, ay?" asks Claudius, another thing Claudius gathered quickly from observing Lan Wangji. It makes it easy to plan future wedding wear. For now, Claudius thinks of darker clothes, warmer hues, and pulls from his wardrobe a black jacket with a folded collar and pleated skirt, a golden serpent winding over its shoulder. Or and sable are Sagramore's colors, but Claudius finds himself rather fond of them. "I do like layers," he says admiringly. "What should I layer this with?"

That golden serpent makes Lan Wangji smile fleetingly, though Claudius isn't likely to see it, what with his contemplation of his outfit. If Claudius truly wants to dress in this fashion, he may as well do it properly. Lan Wangji stands again and crosses to that wardrobe, reaching over Claudius' shoulder easily enough to slide open a convenient drawer. "Zhongyi," he says, having produced a pair of plain white trousers and a long-sleeved undershirt, "and a skirt¹. At least one robe over those. A sash. I can tie it for you. And then that zhaoshan."

¹The specific word used here pre-translator is chang/裳, a pleated skirt to go beneath that aforementioned middle layer. Also, as usual, MDZS is an ahistorical melange of whatever, so we're partly going on vibes here as to what cultivators actually wear.

"There are many layers," Claudius says, with appreciation, taking in the many folds of fabric over one arm. "Well, I do enjoy them, as I said. In conversation and in clothing. And I would be obliged if thou wouldst assist me."

There could easily be several more layers than this, but they are planning to meditate as a pair of friends, not attend a banquet or a discussion conference. "I will not allow you a breach of etiquette," Lan Wangji assures him. "Begin with the zhongyi and I will assist you from there."

Claudius laughs, both from fondness and because he does fear breaching etiquette an inordinate amount -- it feels natural, that Wangji should provide that education for him, the way Wangji taught him how to use chopsticks. He must have started thinking of Lan Wangji as a brother, even back then.

But that's a conversational layer. He starts navigating layers of actual fabric, removing his dressing gown to clothe himself in the zhongyi, unselfconscious as he does so. He also reveals a lot of marks left by Galahad, the rows of roses and peonies planted along his neck and chest.

Lan Wangji is unruffled by standing by, holding the piled layers of clothing for Claudius, and waiting for him. It would be impossible for him not to notice the chains of purpling bruises, however, with the tiniest little twitch of a smile. This must be how Wei Ying would look every morning if he did not have a slowly-growing golden core to speed his healing along. It's something of a shame that he does, in this respect only. He steps in once the zhongyi's components are in place so that he can wrap the skirt around Claudius' waist and tie it crisply for him; then, as he holds out that middle layer of robe with the expectation that Claudius will slip his arms into the sleeves, lets his gaze catch on one of those blossoming marks, now especially visible where the color bleeds beneath the white collar of that undershirt. "Galahad," he guesses, with confidence.

Claudius laughs, not surprised at Lan Wangji's accuracy, but suitably impressed. "Galahad," he says, "is a menace. None would think it of him, particularly if they met him back when he was chaste and would blush at the smallest insinuation of being otherwise. Know'st thou, I think I remember Wei Wuxian saying something similiar. At the talent show: no one back home would ever believe me that Hanguang-jun is so unreasonable ..." At this point, he's entirely teasing. He knows Lan Wangji doesn't remember that part of the talent show. He neatly pulls out the sleeves of his robe, seeing how far they go -- Claudius already knew the cut-sleeve story, but he has a new appreciation for it. Claudius would gladly cut the sleeve off even this fine a fabric, if Galahad were comfortable on top of it.

Lan Wangji does not remember that portion of the talent show, but it sounds so exactly right that he believes it immediately, with hardly any embarrassment. Wei Ying bemoans his husband's cruel and unyielding nature nearly every night.

"Mn." He's temporarily silent as he arranges Claudius' robe for him, smoothing it down neatly and then pulling it around him. He's efficient and practiced, but gentle, and moving more slowly than he otherwise might so that Claudius can observe. It puts him in mind of Lan Xichen, showing him all these same motions when he was still much smaller than his brother, tying his forehead ribbon into his hair for him. "It must be folded left over right," he says, demonstrating as he tucks the collar into place and then continuing, while he unwinds the sash, as if there had been no interruption to the previous topic. "I would think it of him. I first bit Wei Ying years before kissing him." The connection there, which he assumes Claudius will easily ascertain, is that he sees himself in Galahad.

"Didst thou?" Claudius laughs, a sharp, bright laugh like a flash of light down a creek. (Like the sort of example one might look for, when poetry students or disciples. He tilts his head a moment, while Lan Wangji works. "I can imagine it too clearly. What did he say, at that first bite?"

Most of this memory is not pleasant, but looking back at it more than twenty years later softens it. Lan Wangji begins wrapping that sash around Claudius' waist, tidy and focused, as he recites Wei Ying's words -- almost dispassionately, but with an underlying rueful amusement. "'Lan Zhan, you've gone mad today! You're a dog! Stop biting me!'"

Claudius laughs with joy, and even hides the laughter in one of his long, layered sleeves. "What a disrespectful man! Know'st thou, even when Sagramore plays a dog, he is not half so disrespectful. And I --" He holds a finger to his lips, and winks. Tidy and wrapped in Lan Wangji's well-tied sash. "I understand such men need taming and chiding. It's because we have some wild instinct in us, but when we are humbled ... all of us longs for that humbling. Wei Wuxian longs for thee completely. I know this to be true."

This next twitch of a smile is not quite so tiny. "Mn." Lan Wangji takes the time to finish his task, tucking the ends of that sash away and smoothing it all out. He gives Claudius' robe a few businesslike tugs to ensure it falls the way it should. "I know that now."

"Ay, after all thy tribulations," Claudius says fondly -- the two certainly have had their share of tribulations, out of all the lovers Claudius knows. It's part of his fondness for them. "Now thou canst both bite and kiss."

Lan Wangji is keenly aware of all those tribulations, of just how impossibly lucky he has been when, once, he had come to accept that he would never leave his mourning and that he would walk through the remainder of his days alone. His luck came at a price -- but Claudius will learn of that during the story he's agreed to tell. "Every day."

A glance at the jacket Claudius has chosen reveals that his sleeves are not going to fit without intervention, and so Lan Wangji reaches into the wardrobe one final time to produce two long strips of silk, like the ones he uses himself but in a dark grey. He catches Claudius by one wrist, then the other, to brace him as he binds up his sleeves for him. Once that is finished, he retrieves the jacket for Claudius and gives him a mutedly expectant look: What do you think?

"Sleeve garters," Claudius observes with a delighted laugh, as he slips his arms and neatly-bond sleeves through the jacket. "Dost thou know what this is? This is convergent evolution.” The next time a lover tries to pull a shirt over his head and Claudius has to explain there’s a very specific order to how these pieces come off, he’s mentioning this.

In all his layers, Claudius nearly looks the part of a gentleman. Lan Wangji regards him with fondness, quietly pleased with himself, and then glances back up with a second look of expectant anticipation. He knows he needs to do little else to prompt an explanation of convergent evolution.

"Like fruit," Claudius says by way of introduction¹. "Dost remember that charming story I told thee, about the Garden of Eden, and the fruits of all the trees made for mankind to consume? In sooth, trees do not bear fruit in service of mankind. Trees make fruit so that there can be more trees. The oldest forms of plants, simple mosses that grow by the water and in the shadows of stones, spread through spores like the ones Tress uses -- but without the wind to carry them, spores can only spread so far. Trees are far more ambitious. They have more specialized structures, roots and leaves, and woody stems which help withstand cold and heat. They also have flowers, which grow into fruit, and which animals will want to pick and eat. Animals have more locomotion than most trees do, of course, and sow their seeds farther. The more sumptuous the fruit, the more animals prefer it. In many ways, fruit is meant to tempt. It's because fruit is tempting that apple trees have survived; Crowley really only illustrated that fact. You could call him an early patron of agriculture."

While speaking, he straightens the cuffs of his sleeves, and does a testing half-twirl to see how the fabric flows around him. He rather likes it. "But apples aren't the only plant to have evolved for fruits. So have thy loquats. So have tomatoes, which came from the Americas with Mexican cuisine, and are not even a tree, but a vine. In parts of the world separated by vast oceans -- indeed, in thy world and mine -- fruits have evolved independently. All because, as a fashion of seed dispersal, fruits tend to succeed. There's an example of convergent evolution." Idly flexing his hand, showing off his wrist and the fit of the jacket, he says, "The same must be true of style. Some styles are invented, of course, but others evolve -- and naturally some evolve alike²."

¹ Some men will say would you like to hear about convergent evolution and not wait for an answer, or they will wait for the slightest inquisitive look. Between Lan Wangji and Galahad, Claudius is used to this.
² You heard it here, first: sleeve garters are like biological fitness.

Not once did Lan Wangji believe that tale of the Garden of Eden, for more than one reason. All the cruelty of its featured deity aside, he could lend no credence to assuming everything was created with its purpose bent toward serving mankind, constructed out of selfish arrogance. This explanation finds more purchase. The universe wants to sustain itself, in its infinite simplicity and complexity; the growth of the ten thousand things prevents their dying out.

"Humans do not differ so much, even across oceans," he says, watching with satisfaction as Claudius enjoys himself in his new clothing. "Every fruit and every scrap of clothing flows from the same source." And, at last, now that Claudius is dressed: "Are you ready?"

"I am," he says, surprised at himself. When he was drunk -- he can remember it for clearly, for all that men drink to forget. He knows he expressed how much he feared meditation would be like prayer, another desperate call to the universe and the forces that shaped it, begging for something bigger than him to fix him. But the ritual of getting dressed, clothing himself in armor to face the world, always has its way of strengthening him. And now the ritual's shared. Every fruit and every scrap of clothing flows from the source. Even if his prayers go unanswered -- there's an answer. This is something different (and so, so familiar).

Lan Wangji meant it when they spoke by the fire: he knows that this is something Claudius can do, as long as he has guidance, and he considers it an honor to offer that guidance. He doesn't need to lead the way down the mansion hallway, because Claudius knows where to find this little room. He has visited it often enough. Making their way there is merely a short walk with a friend.

Once they are inside, his first order of business is to cross to the corner in order to light a stick of sandalwood incense. A gentle touch with a flicker of qi is all it takes, and then he sits. Telling Claudius to do the same would amount to wasted words.

For once, Claudius sits appropriately, copying Lan Wangji's movements precisely. His usual, sprawling sitting position is best for showing off trousered legs, anyway. The way the skirt settles around him like this is quite comfortable, the scent of sandalwood drifting in the air quite pleasant. "So," he says, "what now? Where do we begin?"

The sight of Claudius with his skirts arrayed around his knees, sitting there in near-perfect imitation of him, threatens to make Lan Wangji smile again. He considers the question, though, and considers Claudius himself. He has a busy mind, one that is always working. He has needed it to survive a life in which the nimbleness of his mind was all that he had to defend against the threat of those larger and stronger than him. Now Lan Wangji has the task of teaching him to calm it and empty it again, and of helping him believe himself safe enough to do so.

"Place a hand over your lower dantian," he begins, demonstrating with a hand flat to his abdomen, "and the other over your middle dantian." His own free hand flattens over his chest. "Breathe, and fill them with that breath. When you release it, do so slowly. If it will help you, match your breathing to mine."

"Dost thou know ..." Claudius can't help but laugh, a fond, fluttering laugh he can feel under his fingers when he mirrors Lan Wangji with a hand to his abdomen. When he places a hand on his chest, he feels the same laugh rising through his abdomen, before the sound spills out. "Sometimes, when thou say'st dantian, I hear it as an untranslated title. And sometimes I hear it as an alchemical term." The translator always leans towards artistic license, with him. It's why he thinks he can still understand so many puns. But before he can go on about it, he breathes -- there are times he's started on a subject and forgotten to breathe -- and makes himself breathe in slowly.

It feels too long, at first. He's too used to shallow breaths, like a rabbit made to run, who hasn't yet lost sight of a predator. So he listens for Lan Wangi's breath, and lets that soft sound guide him.

With a flare of answering fondness, Lan Wangji meets Claudius' gaze. "Internal alchemy," he says, and that will have to be enough of an exploration of the nuances of the translator for now. He doesn't intend to allow them to become distracted. As such, he presses on.

"Shut your eyes. Continue to breathe, slowly, with me, and drop your hands when you are ready." For a collection of breaths, he is silent, his own breathing deep and even. He listens in turn, to be sure that Claudius is with him. "Think only of each breath. When other thoughts come, release them without fighting them. In this room, you need to do nothing but nourish your body with breath and nourish your spirit with qi. Where there is one, the other follows."

His first thoughts, flickering with the low flash of light behind his eyes, are wry, self-deprecating, something about how the shallowness of his breath must speak to the state of his spirit -- he can't stop the thought from starting, but he does go back to his breath before he finishes it. Think only of each breath. How much is there to think? He tries to focus, but every other thought feels like weeds crowding around the edges of his head, strangling the ground before any new seed takes root. He worries about his health. He worries about time passing. He's worries how boring he must be -- not to Lan Wangji, perhaps, but then he worries about a dozen other people not here and what they've always thought about him.

He breathes out, slow, and tries just to think of the air passing through his lips, his chest falling. He's tilling the earth. He pulls up the weeds, then tries to let them go. There's no use in dwelling, in planting them again.

"Good," Lan Wangji says, eyes still on Claudius' face. He knows it well enough now to see, when it comes, the minute release of tension between his brows. He knows Claudius' qi, too. He has scoured his meridians and poured his own spiritual energy into them. Here, with none of that urgency, in a safe room with the sky lightening through the window, he catches the flickering rhythm of its circulation as Claudius breathes and begins painstakingly to settle.

With some, he might remain silent from here. Claudius worried about doing this, though, in the flippant way he has that means he cares very much. His thoughts will want to creep back in and fill his lungs and mind. So Lan Wangji continues speaking, low and measured, carving a gentle path for Claudius to follow. "You share this breath with every other thing in this universe. You share it with me, with Danding and Xiaoxue, and with the trees outside as they wait for spring. Like the fruit, like those scraps of clothing, it all springs from the same source, differing only in name. Breathe and feel that sameness."

Claudius taught himself to identify fabric by feel. When he settles back into his body, every draped layer surrounding him feels like something familiar -- cotton spun from cotton blooms, silk spun from silkworms. Somewhere bolls must form on mallow branches, like white pearls form within the shell. Somewhere there must be groves of mulberry trees, and the children of wild moths emerging from their eggs to feed. Even worlds away, he knows it must be warm there, or the eggs wouldn't hatch. The mulberries wouldn't fruit. It all springs from the same source. Even worlds away, he knows breathing leaves must fill the sunlit air with oxygen. People live and walk beneath them, who couldn't live without them.

There's plenty to think about. Wryly, Claudius realizes that's another ancillary thought -- thinking about thinking, typical -- but he breathes in, sharing that air, the same air that brings Wangji's voice to him.

Voices, too, are breath. He lets Wangji's words fill his lungs, and become a part of him. Perhaps he'll form some fruit from it.

Satisfied that Claudius is with him, Lan Wangji shuts his own eyes. He no longer needs to look to take the measure of him. "There is power and life in you, the power and life that is in everything." These next words are words he knows so well that they ask no thought of him, only the comfort of well-worn pattern. "The one produces the two. The two produces the three. The three produces the ten thousand things. The ten thousand things carry yin and embrace yang."

There are countless ways to meditate. Lan Wangji could be icy and remote in the cold spring. He could be holding brush-straight handstands with Lan Xichen. He could be flowing from one sword form to the next, Bichen alight in his hand. This morning, he is here, caught between worlds and glad for it.

To his credit, Claudius doesn’t scoff — what power? Voices, too, are breath. Lovers’ whispers, demagogues’ declarations, the adages of old men, the murmur of the crowd. They spread like cotton seeds, and drift, touch down and take root. Put Claudius on a battlefield and his breath would quickly tire, but he has enough life in his lungs to join a sea of voices. Enough even to sing, when it suits him.

Cotton seeds, drifting. One touches down, and becomes two, the last seed of the old plant and the first seed of the new. Two becomes three. Generation after generation, season after season, the three becomes ten thousand. Floating on the air, carrying yin, embracing yang.

He could be anywhere, doing anything. Doing something more productive — no. The cotton plant is still, and still produces ten thousand things. It doesn’t rush. He resists the urge to rise and pace, recites Wangji’s mantra in his head. The one produces the two. The two produces the three …

For a time, Lan Wangji continues to speak with the cadence of waves lapping at a shore. "Empty yourself of everything. Let the mind rest at peace." So often, words fail him when he needs them the most, as if his meaning hides beneath a thousand layers of silk. These words are easy and true. These words set him loose from his body, sending him along the curving waterways of Caiyi and the lotus lakes of Yunmeng, letting him unwind an endless ribbon from Wei Ying's hair, escorting him down the white, white paths of the Cloud Recesses as the mist clears and the mountain stretches down toward the land. These words hold him in his body, in this room that smells of sandalwood, as he listens to Claudius' breath while it deepens and holds the awareness of Claudius' qi while it moves within and without him.

"The ten thousand things rise and fall while the self watches their return. They grow and flourish and then return to the source. Returning to the source is stillness, which is the way of nature." He slips into silence then, to see if Claudius can endure it.

Silence is always a struggle to bear -- he bore it so easily, he thinks, as a child, but that was when he had a duty to be seen and not heard. Now it feels remiss to let a conversation lapse, a failure if he can't smooth over the slightest awkward pause. Frankly speaking, it raises his blood pressure. He remembers lamenting to Lan Wangji that between Lancelot and Galahad, he would have to bear the burden of speech like Atlas on his shoulders.

So perhaps he's putting the burden down. With the next, sigh-like breath, he wills his shoulders to sink. He lets them rest. He listens to the silence, and recognizes there's still sound in it. Their breaths still stir the shared air. It's a kind of touch, Claudius recalls from diagrams. Sound moves on waves, and like fingers strumming harp strings, it brushes by something in the outer ear.

The ten thousand things carry yin and embrace yang. Carrying like a sound, like cotton seeds on the wind.

It is quiet, and there is only the evenness of their twin breath. Conversation is a gift others give him, more and more often these days. This is something he can offer in return: a peaceful silence, the gentle rise and fall of each inhale and exhale, the kind of hush in which the voice of a qin would resonate without obstacle.

Lan Wangji can sit this way for days. He did so at intervals when he was younger, when the silence was all that he wanted. Causing noise is prohibited. Do not use words frivolously. He has more worldly attachments now and finds himself unable to regret them. He would not want this all the time, not anymore -- and he will not ask so much of Claudius, not during his first morning meditation.

He waits until the stick of incense burns low and then goes out. He opens his eyes. "Claudius."

Claudius eyes open slowly, letting light back in gradually. He'd be dazed otherwise -- like someone emerging from a dim cavern, to be struck by a sudden sunflare. As remedies go, he doesn't know whether this meditation healed something in him. But he does feel, almost, relaxed. All that tension's left his shoulders. "Wangji," he says with a smile.

Lan Wangji isn't quite smiling, but Claudius will probably recognize this expression of his, the one where his eyes are just crinkled at the corners, all warmth. "How do you feel?" There are some niceties he dispenses solely for the ritual, the comfort of the etiquette. Not this one.

"Reasonably calm." Reasonably, but also exceptionally, given his usual disarray of humors. "Thou may'st not know this, but I have very few hours of calm in a day."

He knows. He recalls listening to Claudius under the compulsion of that truth spell, a tumble of explanations and fears and the way he tucks away his anxiety to make himself more palatable. "Join me again. It will become easier."

"Thou wilt see me more and more often." Until thou hast tired of me is the light, self-deprecating add-on that should follow, but he refrains. "The aim is to make meditation as easy and natural as reaching for a drink in times of turmoil. That's a well-trained instinct."

Those instincts can exist in tandem. Lan Wangji knows that, too, from loving and living with Wei Ying. He doesn't say as much; it will not help Claudius, and he is too fond and relaxed to dwell, just now. "As often as you want. Do you still want that story?"

"More than anything, please."

Lan Wangji might have predicted that eagerness, but it makes him fonder still anyway. Firstly, he rises to replace the stick of incense with a fresh one, lighting it anew. He pauses, glancing out the window at the sun glinting off the sparse remnants of late-winter snow. Spring feels, finally, imminent.

He returns to his seat, sleeves trailing as he crosses his legs again. This story is like a dozen strands of hair knotted together. The only way to unravel it is to pick one strand and begin there. "Qinghe Nie was founded by a butcher. Its cultivators do not cultivate with swords as I do. They cultivate with sabers¹ and the resentful energy of beasts. It is a dangerous path. Nie cultivators live short lives and often die of qi deviations." He knows someone else who died of a spiritual backlash, but he keeps a calm demeanor as he speaks. "Xiongzhang was always close with Nie Mingjue, who became the sect leader of Qinghe Nie as an adolescent. He hoped I would become similarly close with Nie Huaisang." He pauses again, an evocative enough pause to say, clearly, that he and Nie Huaisang did not become close. Plainly put, they could have not have had any less interest in one another.

¹Dao, or 刀.

Claudius tries to envision Lan Wangji as the dutiful disciplinarian he was in his youth, tries to envision him crossing paths with an Osric-like man, from whom serious requests slide like water off a sea otter stole. Immediately he laughs. "I'm sure your xiongzhang would be satisfied," he says, "with any friend you managed to make." But not that one, pointedly.

"He was pleased when I met Wei Ying." Of course that happiness didn't last past Wei Ying's exile from the cultivation world, but Lan Wangji doesn't dwell on that today, either. This is a story for Claudius' entertainment. "After Wei Ying's death, Nie Mingjue suffered a qi deviation and died. Nie Huaisang became the Qinghe Nie sect leader. He relied on the counsel of Jin Guangyao, the sect leader of Lanling Jin. Lianfang-zun, Jin Guangyao, took the role after the death of his father, Jin Guangshan. Jin Guangshan was known for fathering illegitimate children. Jin Guangyao was one of those bastards. Prior to his acceptance as a son of Lanling Jin, he served Nie Mingjue under the name Meng Yao."

Claudius's eyes are wide and, frankly, delighted. It's dizzying in the same way listening to gossip the first day in a new court is, already untangling the knot of relations and business partners and illegitimate children that lies at the heart of understanding anything about the way societies move. "Well," he observes, "that does sound like quite the pairing of sect leader and counselor. Tell me more."

They have reached the part of this story that begins to intersect unavoidably with personal matters, but Lan Wangji remains impassive in his retelling for now. Claudius' overt glee is an easy motivator. "Jin Guangshan had another bastard son with the second daughter of the Mo family. As an adolescent, Mo Xuanyu was brought to Carp Tower to study cultivation. His time there ended abruptly. He was a poor cultivator and a cut-sleeve who, according to Jin Guangyao, made advances on his own half-brother." He is skeptical about the truth of these accusations, but the reality will never be uncovered now.

It's a familiar sort of rumor -- the sort often spread about a man whose only sin was loving other men, and not being politic or subtle enough to disguise it. Claudius can imagine the murmuring gossips with fans before their mouths, saying, not only that, his own half-brother …

"And yet the philandering of their father, which produced two bastards, was easily forgiven," he remarks, with a wry roll of eyes. "What a difference power can make. What happened to Mo Xuanyu?"

More than two bastards, but if Lan Wangji begins listing any more of Jin Guangshan's illegitimate children, they will never reach the point. "Mo Xuanyu returned to Mo Manor, disgraced. He was rarely seen until years later. My junior disciples had been summoned to Mo Manor for a night-hunt. They used their signal flare to request my assistance subduing a dismembered arm with significant resentful energy. Mo Xuanyu had been assisting as well. Several members of the Mo family had been killed by the time I arrived.

"Before I could speak with Mo Xuanyu, he fled. The next time I saw him, he barely let me thank him. The third time, he had a bamboo flute in hand, and he played a song only one person could have known."

Claudius smiles, slow and syrupy-sweet, fond as he always is of Lan Wangji's love story. "The song you wrote for Wei Wuxian."

"Mn." He lets himself steep in the memory of that moment, lingering in the notes that had echoed only against the walls of the jingshi for twenty years. Wen Qionglin falling to his knees, Wei Ying with a new face and body but none of his power over the dead diminished. Lan Wangji was frozen with shock, disbelief and hope and swelling determination to do better this time, to stay by his side and protect him the way he had failed to thirteen years before.

It's a beat too long before he gathers himself, looking at Claudius with a hint of sheepishness. He trusts Claudius to understand his lapse into distraction, at least. "Mo Xuanyu was gone by then. He had sacrificed himself with an old, forbidden ritual. He intended to summon the Yiling Patriarch to take revenge on his cruel family on his behalf."

"Ah. It's a shame about the Yiling Patriarch," Claudius says, knowing well how Lan Wangji feels about Wei Wuxian's reputation after death. "But if there was a spirit I could summon to take my part against persecution and cruelty, I know Wei Wuxian would be a wise choice." It's a shame Mo Xuanyu couldn't live to see, but Claudius can take some solace in the cycle of reincarnation Lan Wangji believes in. Mo Xuanyu gave up his body for a spirit that deserved a second life, and one day may be reborn in a body of his own, a body knowing nothing of rejection or abuse.

It warms him, Claudius' faith in Wei Ying's goodness. He thinks of the little he knew of Mo Xuanyu. He was slender, with delicate features, a sweet and lovely face. Lan Wangji knows those features better than he knows his own now, but he'll never know the man who once wore them. He was a middling cultivator at best, a cut-sleeve who painted his face like a hanged ghost, and a bastard whose family scorned and abused him. He should not have died, but he did. Wei Ying should not have lived again, but he does.

"When Wei Ying awoke in his new body, his arm bore four wounds, one for each member of the Mo family upon whom Mo Xuanyu wanted revenge. In the process of taming the severed arm, as Mo Xuanyu's tormentors died, the wounds healed. If Wei Ying had not fulfilled that portion of the sacrificing ritual, his soul would have been destroyed."

Wryly, Claudius remarks, "That would rather limit his options, I suppose. So that was the end of the Mo family?"

"Mn." Lan Wangji is nearly wry in return. He considers how best to tell the next part of this tale. He promised the story of Nie Huaisang, and everything he has said so far does wind its way back to Nie Huaisang and his plans. But he's well aware of how specifically delighted Claudius becomes whenever he speaks of Wei Ying. And so: "Wei Ying still believed I hated him. He had forgotten my confession and that I fought for him. I took him back to Gusu anyway."

Claudius's eyebrows both shoot up. "Did you? What was the mood of that journey like?"

For a slightly embarrassed moment or two, Lan Wangji's expression, such as it is, can't quite seem to decide where to settle. "I didn't know Wei Ying had forgotten. I was certain he knew I loved him. He had also forgotten the origin of that song, and thought me fooled into seeing him as Mo Xuanyu." It seems such a simple tangle to explain now, but that set of misunderstandings carried them along for some time. "He determined that in order to escape me, he must appall me by behaving like a shameless cut-sleeve who was hopelessly attracted to Hanguang-jun. In my horror, I would release him."

Claudius laughs loud at that, just barely covering his mouth with his hand for a scrap of dignified reserve. "My, my. Wert thou horrified?" he teases, shameless. "What didst thou do?" He has a guess, which is freeze, and stare straight ahead, and not from horror.

In the years between Wei Ying's death and his return, Lan Wangji had changed. He knew precisely what he wanted. Although he had been looking down, flirting with the possibility of shame, he glances up at Claudius with renewed serenity. "I told him to mark his words. When he came into my bed and refused to leave it, I used my body-locking spell to keep him there until morning."

"A body-locking spell," Claudius repeats, impressed and delighted. "Thy first time sharing a bed, and already thou wert flirting with bondage."

"He had made his choice," Lan Wangji says, apparently unbothered, but there's a glint of self-satisfied humor in his eyes. "At the Cloud Recesses, my sect attempted to subdue the severed arm, but its resentful energy was overpowering. Uncle was injured. I settled it only with Wei Ying's help during a duet. In the aftermath, I realized that the arm was pointing us northwest, toward Qinghe."

"Qinghe," Claudius repeats, testing his knowledge of names and relations in this fascinating, interconnected story. "Where Nie Huaisang was sect leader?"

"Mn," Lan Wangji says, pleased with, but not surprised by, Claudius' attentiveness. "Near Xinglu Ridge, we were directed to what the people of Qinghe called the man-eating castles. It took some time to track Nie Huaisang so that he would speak with us." He pauses, just for a beat, thinking of Nie Huaisang and Wei Ying's reunion with all its dizzying layers of deception. "The castles were kept by the Nie clan to house the clan's sabers, whose violent natures persisted even after their wielders' deaths."

"Like a family crypt," Claudius ventures, envisioning the crowned sarcophagi at Roskilde Cathedral, each a monument to a past life and reign, many of them clutching swords in their stone hands. "Man-eating is quite descriptive. Were these sabers dangerous?"

Lan Wangji nods. Family crypt is an apt description, despite the absence of any Nie family members in the castles themselves. "The saber spirits demanded continuous blood and battle. The Nie clan sealed them away and collected corpses, ones on the verge of turning fierce, to appease them. Any interloper who destroyed those corpses would become their replacement."

"Quite dangerous," Claudius confirms, rapt. "What did you do?"

"Wei Ying and I extracted his nephew from the walls of one of the castles." And not a moment too soon. "He had acquired a curse mark from within them. When I left in pursuit of Nie Huaisang, Wei Ying took the curse mark onto himself." Lan Wangji says this part just a little darkly, the way he can never be entirely unruffled about anything that involves Wei Ying sacrificing himself for another. "The arm in our possession reacted violently to the mark. We surmised that Wei Ying's nephew must have been in the presence of the arm's corresponding leg."

Wei Wuxian does seem to be in the habit of sacrificing himself for family members, whether giving up a golden core or taking on a curse mark. "Fascinating," Claudius remarks. "A sort of sympathetic magic. Like calls to like. Was that why the arm had led thee to Qinghe?"

Again, Lan Wangji nods. "The body wanted to reconstitute itself. Within those walls, we found both of its legs. Once we had them, it shifted course and pointed us to Yueyang instead."

It's a puzzle, which delights Claudius -- that it's a puzzle with body parts doesn't put him off at all. Anatomical books always mesmerized him. Even on the battlefield, it was envisioning those pages and diagrams that carried him through his first amputation. "The next arm, I suppose. Or something else?" A head? A torso?

"The torso, within the cemetery of the massacred Yueyang Chang clan. It was not until Yi City, where we encountered corpse poison, several of my junior disciples, and Xue Yang, the cultivator who exterminated Yueyang Chang, that I located the second arm." Explaining Xue Yang in his entirety would take an entire additional story.

It was the torso. Even hearing the story, there's a satisfaction in feeling the pieces come together, across a long journey (which Lan Wangji neatly elides). "From Qinghe to Yueyang to Yi City. The pieces sound quite deliberately scattered, as though to make the reassembly more difficult. Did you have any sense of what would happen, once they were united?"

"Only that it would be a fiercer corpse than any we had seen." Excepting, perhaps, Wen Qionglin, but the Ghost General was docile enough by then, and very forgiving of Lan Wangji's tendency to drunkenly shove him aside in pursuit of time with Wei Ying. "Before we could locate the head, it reassembled itself. Wei Ying led it away from the juniors. Xiongzhang had joined us. He subdued it with me, and realized that he recognized it." Here, Lan Wangji obligingly pauses so that Claudius may try his hand at guessing the corpse's identity.

Claudius considers the cast of characters. Naturally, it would have to be someone already dead before this particular leg¹ of the story began. There was a veritable cascade of deaths and inheritances, between Qinghe Nie and Lanling Jin. But the most important clue is someone Lan Xichen would recognize. Perhaps someone he was close to, all those years ago, when Lan Wangji failed to befriend Nie Huaisang.

"No," Claudius says with shock. "Not Nie Mingjue?"

¹ Heh.

"Nie Mingjue," Lan Wangji repeats, with another small nod of confirmation. He is surprised to find himself with just enough distance from this story to feel a little satisfaction at Claudius' apparent shock. "It was known that he had died of a qi deviation, but his corpse was powerfully resentful. Its ferocity could be explained only by a murder."

Claudius audibly gasps. Yes, he knew this was a revenge story from the beginning, but all the pieces start to come together like -- well -- like the reassembled corpse of a close friend with an unmistakable torso who died from a qi deviation. "Nie Huaisang," he says. "Nie Huaisang knew it was a murder, didn't he?"

"Nie Huaisang knew," Lan Wangji confirms again. "But we did not realize that until later, after Nie Mingjue's murderer had been discredited, disgraced, and then killed, too. Nie Huaisang's reputation cloaked him well."

Edited 2024-06-17 00:06 (UTC)

“Who was it? Thou hast me on the edge of my seat,” Claudius says, as though he wouldn’t be inching towards it regardless. He’s given up that straight posture to lean eagerly forward.

Lan Wangji can hardly restrain himself from a fleeting look of affection at Claudius' eagerness. He is, of course, still sitting as straight as a brush, and he does return to some more overt somberness as he answers. "Wei Ying knew it. Xiongzhang was reluctant to believe. He and Jin Guangyao had been intimate friends since the Sunshot Campaign."

Claudius nearly gasps again. “Nie Huaisang’s own counsellor?” And another close friend of Lan Xichen’s — Claudius begins to understand why a charming, trusting man like that would end up in seclusion, with a pang of sympathy.

"Mn." Nie Huaisang's counsellor, and the former right-hand man to Nie Mingjue. "Meng Yao and Nie Mingjue had met on the battlefield at Hejian. Nie Mingjue defended Meng Yao against his detractors and took him in as advisor to the Nie clan. Xiongzhang visited Hejian and they became close as well. Later, at Langya, Nie Mingjue witnessed Meng Yao killing a Lanling Jin commander using Qishan Wen techniques. After his dismissal by Nie Mingjue, Meng Yao became a spy. He infiltrated Nightless City, the seat of the Wen clan, and passed intelligence to my brother, who passed it to Nie Mingjue."

"A rather complicated relationship," Claudius surmises. Claudius rarely spoke to anyone from his service in Normandy, but he knows what bonds form on the battlefield. And for one man to defend the other from all detractors, until there's one step taken too far ... He thinks back to what he recalls of Qishan Wen and the Sunshot Campaign, their brutal methods, their shows of force. All the same, Claudius's instinct is to wonder what the Lanling Jin commander did, particularly to a bastard son of the Jin family. Unwanted sons aren't treated kindly. "Thy brother is a sympathetic man, to still trust in Meng Yao. Was his intelligence reliable?" There's a complicated feeling there -- it would be very easy for this man to take advantage of Lan Xichen's trust, and pass on faulty information to hurt Nie Mingjue. It's the sort of thing Claudius used to do, which he only occasionally feels a pang of guilt for.

"It was reliable, and Nie Mingjue won several victories," Lan Wangji says, "until an attempted ambush on Yangquan. Qishan Wen took Nie Mingjue captive and brought him before Wen Ruohan, the sect leader. He met Meng Yao again there, and learned that he was the spy in Nightless City. Meng Yao killed many of Nie Mingjue's subordinates and offered him to Wen Ruohan for death by torture. At the last minute, Meng Yao killed Wen Ruohan instead. That is how he earned acceptance by his father, who granted him the name of Jin Guangyao."

Ah, of course. Claudius could almost roll his eyes, if it weren't for the tragedy of it. He's met bastard sons of nobility who would do anything for their fathers' approval, to have some proof their birth and life were worth something, despite their illegitimacy¹. "I see. Despite Meng Yao's last minute reversal and acceptance as a Jin, I take it Nie Mingjue wouldn't forgive the slaughter of his subordinates that easily."

¹ Edmund. He's thinking about Edmund FromKingLear.

"No. Nie Mingjue was a morally rigid man." Famously so, and he was one of the first to condemn Wei Ying and advocate for his exile from the cultivation world. Lan Wangji is glad for the small, peaceful world of this room, the lingering and familiar sandalwood scent, and Claudius' company. It makes it easier not to dwell. He is not telling that story today.

"After the war, my brother, Nie Mingjue, and Jin Guangyao entered a sworn brotherhood, the Venerated Triad. Nie Mingjue was reluctant, but agreed. Xiongzhang knew he wanted to monitor Jin Guangyao."

"Thy brother was popular, to have two sworn brothers. No wonder he was counted among the cultivation world's eligible bachelors." A tease, but a softly-made one. From the way Lan Wangji has described him, Claudius imagines Lan Xichen as a kind, attentive man who cares as deeply as Lan Wangji himself does, and who would've taken his oaths of brotherhood seriously. A loyal man, whose heart would be divided between two of his sworn brothers' enmity for each other -- and Lan Xichen lost them both. It's sincere, when Claudius says, "It's a shame his heart was not treated more kindly."

The cultivation world's most eligible bachelor, Lan Wangji could correct him -- but he knows Claudius must remember that. Lan Xichen has always wanted to please and see the best in everyone. One brother, killed by the other. Lan Wangji thinks it will be some time yet before Lan Xichen emerges from seclusion and resumes his duties.

"Yes," he says, simple enough and equally sincere. There is a story to resume. "Xiongzhang, Wei Ying, and I determined that we would investigate further at a Lanling Jin discussion conference the following month. Jin Guangyao had been the sect leader for years by then, following Jin Guangshan's death."

An investigation at a discussion conference. Claudius's interest is certainly piqued. "A fine opportunity, with so many gathered. How didst thou proceed?" he asks.

"Wei Ying used the Paper Metamorphosis technique the evening of the pre-conference banquet." A little abruptly, Lan Wangji's face softens with fondness. "It is dangerous, but it affixed his soul to a small piece of paper in the shape of a man. He slipped into Jin Guangyao's quarters to spy on him, and discovered his hidden treasure room in the process."

A hidden room! And a little paper man with Wei Wuxian's soul -- Claudius's eyes catch on that moment of softening fondness, as they always do on his friend's face. "Dangerous, and fiendishly clever. Wei Wuxian seems to like plans that are both."

Lan Wangji gives himself that moment to recall Wei Ying's paperman, the absurd fragility of it in his hands with Wei Ying's unconscious form beside him. Wei Ying's soul, which had already spent thirteen years in fitful, half-aware discontentment, in the flimsiest possible vessel. They needed those answers, but his breath had not quite filled his lungs properly until Wei Ying returned to his new body. "He barely escaped. I called him back just in time. Before Jin Guangyao discovered him, however, he found a land deed for Yunping, and the final piece of Nie Mingjue's body."

“The head,” Claudius says, not because it needs to be said, but because it feels like a call-and-response. The last piece of a puzzle, locking into place. “He’d kept it?”

"The head. He had kept it, heavily suppressed." With that, Lan Wangji turns grimmer again. "Its resentful energy was so strong that it pulled Wei Ying into the Empathy technique without his permission. He saw Nie Mingjue's memories and much of his history with Jin Guangyao."

"Extraordinary. Did he tell thee what he saw?" It's almost impossible to imagine he didn't. The more Claudius hears stories from Lan Wangji's past, the more he understands Wei Wuxian's courtship was a faltering, awkward thing -- all the more reason for Lan Wangji to advise Crowley against secrets and subtlety¹. But they trust each other so completely now, and these journeys must have gone a long way to building up that trust.

¹ Claudius. Claudius. Who told Crowley to be subtle? I'm your typist, and I won't let you get away with that.

"Yes, later." Lan Wangji takes another short pause. He has always known this story would continue to intersect unavoidably with some painful memories. He would not have volunteered to tell it if he did not already trust Claudius with these things. "In the escape from Carp Tower, Wei Ying's identity was revealed and he was injured. We took him back to the Cloud Recesses so that he could recover. Our next move was uncertain, because I trusted Wei Ying, and my brother trusted Jin Guangyao."

Claudius knows how Lan Wangji loves, how fiercely and how endlessly -- I have never known how to feel anything by halves, he'd said, or how to love with any reservation. Lan Wangji was once a young man who touched no one, and now whenever he returns a touch, he grasps back with both hands. I have also never known how to take back my love once it is given away. He said that, too. It struck Claudius to his soul, the realization that after countless cycles of fairweather friends and temporary allies, he found a friend whose love would never leave him.

Lan Wangji loved Wei Wuxian, and trusted him. He loved and trusted his brother, but his brother was wrong. Loving both, he had to act, and the next move was uncertain. That uncertainty must have been agony.

"Ah," he says, and lets it say all of that. He touches Lan Wangji's hand.

The touch surprises him, a pleasant and welcome surprise like the first warm breeze of an oncoming summer. In this room, Claudius dressed in the style of his world and reaching kindly for him, he feels the reassuring weight of their agreed-upon brotherhood more than ever. Now that he is no longer a young man who touches no one but a grown man who touches the people he loves with gratitude for it, he turns over both of his hands, palms up, and offers them to Claudius.

"Wei Ying awoke four days later," he continues, and his voice remains calm. "He understood why my brother could not trust the Yiling Patriarch. He had seen Nie Mingjue's memories, and knew that during the years leading up to his death, he had been struggling more and more to soothe his qi as a result of his saber cultivation. Jin Guangyao would play the qin for him. Xiongzhang had taught him a musical cultivation technique, Cleansing. This technique calms the mind and spirit. On his bamboo flute, Wei Ying played the melody he had heard within Empathy. It was not Cleansing."

Claudius clasps Lan Wangji's hands, with both of his own, giving as much as he's given. He runs his fingers, over the back of Lan Wangji's, steady and soothing. "What was it?" he asks.

"Below the Cloud Recesses library pavilion, the Room of Forbidden Books houses more dangerous texts. After the Cloud Recesses was burned during the war, Jin Guangyao helped fund the rebuilding effort." He looks fondly down at their joined hands for a moment, and then back to Claudius' face. "We discovered a page missing from the Collection of Spirit Turmoil, a book of songs from Dongying with the ability to stir up agitation and illness in the listener."

Claudius presses Lan Wangji's hands for his own comfort, here. Naturally he doesn't care for the idea of some song that could ruin his health, turning his own body against him like the blood parasites did. With all his anxious, constant medicating and brewing of medications, it may be one of his worst fears. "He would've been covering his tracks, then," Claudius pieces together. "So no one would be able to read it there, and identify the same notes in his song. And that's what would lead to a death that appears to be by qi deviation."

"Yes." Lan Wangji returns the firmness of Claudius' grip, matching it. That page should never have left the Room of Forbidden Books, which is locked and open to only a few. Its contents are there as much to protect the world from them as to protect them from the world. But, as he has already said, his brother trusted Jin Guangyao. "I don't know how Nie Huaisang discovered it, but he knew. Jin Guangyao had dismantled the body because Nie Mingjue's resentment was so powerful. Nie Huaisang was still a poor cultivator and could find only the arm. That is why he wanted Wei Ying alive again."

Claudius nods slowly. "So that old, forbidden ritual of Mo Xuanyu's ..."

Lan Wangji nods, too, more crisply. "Nie Huaisang convinced Mo Xuanyu to perform the sacrificing ritual, then planted the disembodied arm at Mo Village. He knew Wei Ying. We were all students together. He knew that Wei Ying would solve it."

"Wei Wuxian is the first one I would go to for such a puzzle, too." It's not a puzzle that comes up often in his own life, admittedly. Claudius feels a mixed yet strong respect for Nie Huaisang (like certain drinks). Certainly, he'd preyed upon Mo Xuanyu in a moment of weakness ... but also gave him the means to take revenge¹. While bringing back a lost friend and ally on which Nie Huaisang could rely, sharply aware of what was possible on his own, and what was beyond his abilities. A useful skill for for a head-shaker to have.

¹ It's just something Claudius might considering doing if he had a vengeful young man in front of him and a problem to solve, that's all. Perhaps not the whole self-sacrificial ritual. (It's incidental that the duel at the end of Hamlet turned into a sort of self-sacrificial ritual for revenge.)

Edited 2024-06-27 01:59 (UTC)

For that, Lan Wangji's steady gaze goes a little warmer, just briefly. It still strikes him with quiet gladness when people here seem to pick up his admiration for Wei Ying's good qualities. He always imagined his feelings for Wei Ying as too big to contain, too bright to dim, emanating from him and turning him into a beacon. Here, for the first time, it feels as if others can see that, and they let that light reflect onto them. "Mn," he says, and then he sobers again. "Nie Huaisang was determined to see Jin Guangyao's downfall. Wei Ying's resurrection was only one piece of his plan."

"Of course." What's a scheme without many moving pieces? "What we were the others?"

Where to begin? Lan Wangji doesn't let go of Claudius' hands, but he does relax his grip again. "Without revealing his identity, he sent Jin Guangyao a letter, threatening him with the public reveal of his crimes within seven days. A second siege of the Burial Mounds commenced, as Jin Guangyao panicked and tried to identify his accuser." He realizes, as he says it, that he has never explained precisely the circumstances of Wei Ying's death to Claudius. He hesitates, then says, "I will tell you of the first another day." It has been too peaceful and companionable a morning for that now.

"I know thou wilt," Claudius says, and the words come so easily it surprises him. Usually he's too prying and curious to let something like that go -- but he felt no doubt at all that Lan Wangji would tell him later. Lan Wangji remembers the promises he makes.

It's a slight surprise for Lan Wangji, too, his own easiness in the smile that touches his features in answer to Claudius' faith in him. As with most of his smiles, it lasts for very little time, but it is distinct. "Despite Jin Guangyao's efforts, we escaped the Burial Mounds with very little loss of life," he continues after a moment. "We retreated to Lotus Pier to recover. Nie Huaisang persisted. Two women came forward to reveal Jin Guangyao's secrets. Firstly, that he was behind the death of Jin Guangshan. Secondly, that his wife, Qin Su, was another illegitimate child of Jin Guangshan. Jin Guangyao married her knowing that, and then killed their son, fearing he would display some defect that revealed the nature of their relationship."

Claudius raises an eyebrow. "Never has a man so swiftly gained my sympathies and lost them in the same story. Jin Guangshan ..." He shakes his head. "So much of the fault for this lies at that man's feet. And whatever my former God may've said ... I don't believe the children should suffer for the sins of the fathers. I cannot fault Jin Guangyao for who he fell in love with. But in killing his son, he simply made one more child suffer for his father's indiscretions. In covering those sins, he only passed them onward."

With a final scoff, he says, "And to think this man slandered Mo Xuanyu for being a cut-sleeve."

There is a reason Jin Guangyao and Jin Guangshan both earned entries in Lan Wangji's burn book. In fact, there are several reasons for both; he has elided some only because this is not a story about Wei Ying, saving one digression thus far. "Both father and son were monstrous and inflicted monstrosity upon each other," he agrees. "The land deed for Yunping led us to a temple Jin Guangyao was constructing. With his crimes exposed, he planned to flee to Dongying with his mother's coffin. He took my brother hostage, then Wei Ying and his nephew, then me."

"Quite a desperate series of moves," Claudius observes. “I’ve tried that in weiqi — making multiple captures in enemy territory to control the flow of the game. You always corner me regardless.” Thanks to content of his burn book entry, Claudius can guess it didn’t turn out well for Jin Guangyao, either.

Rather than saying yes, I do aloud, Lan Wangji contents himself with a single fondly smug glance before he resumes the story. "Nie Huaisang arrived, too. As another hostage, but I am certain he intended for Su Minshan¹ to capture him." Even then, it was so easy not to suspect him of anything as he was bundled into Guanyin Temple, complaining and disheveled.

¹Another burn book guest star.

"Clever Nie Huaisang," Claudius says with amusement. "Using his reputation for uselessness to his own benefit once more."

Nie Huaisang could not have let the final pieces of his revenge fall into place without his watchful eye, after all. "More truths came out. I told you of the curse whose blame was falsely assigned to Wei Ying. Su Minshan had cast that curse, and Jin Guangyao had used it to arrange the ambush that led to Wei Ying's death." Briskly, he continues rather than pausing there: "Nie Huaisang had placed a poison trap within the coffin of Meng Shi, Jin Guangyao's mother, and already removed her body. He had also unleashed Nie Mingjue's corpse to hunt Jin Guangyao. When the corpse arrived, Jin Guangyao had Wei Ying's nephew held with a qin string around his neck. His fear of Nie Mingjue was so strong that he could not hold it steady. That is why I removed his hand."

"Well-done," Claudius says, rather mild, but sincere. Plain congratulations can't capture how much he admires Lan Wangji, and not simply for the skill it takes to remove a man's hand without harming the hostage in his grasp. (Though of course Claudius has no doubt it was impressive. He's seen how graceful Lan Wangji is with Bischen.)

"Wei Ying and I were able to seal Nie Mingjue's corpse in Meng Shi's coffin. My brother had no choice but to believe the truth of Jin Guangyao's crimes, but he still loved him. He silenced him and treated his wounds." Having come finally to, arguably, the culmination of this story, Lan Wangji returns his gaze to Claudius' hands in his own. "Nie Huaisang could accept nothing less than Jin Guangyao's death. When xiongzhang turned to Nie Huaisang to request the pain medication he had lent him for a previous wound, Nie Huaisang screamed for him to look out behind him. He turned back and ran Jin Guangyao through with his sword, Shuoyue."

Edited 2024-07-01 04:41 (UTC)

Claudius presses Lan Wangji's hands in his. Both the Lan brothers, it seems, love deeply and (some would say) unwisely. With all his imaginative empathy, Claudius can only begin to envision what Lan Xichen must have felt, running through the sworn brother he'd hoped to heal and reform. Lan Wangji would've seen it, seen the hope draining from him. Even if it was a fool's hope, it should've been Lan Xichen's to keep. "Let me guess," Claudus says dryly. "Nie Huaisang's screams were less than sincere?"

"Jin Guangyao had not moved," Lan Wangji confirms. He watches, and feels, Claudius' grip on his hands tighten, and he lets himself take a little comfort in it, even if it is not comfort to which he feels wholly entitled. Jin Guangyao's death was not painful for him, but Lan Xichen's anguish still stings to have witnessed, and it is an anguish that has only barely begun to abate. "The blood from his wound broke the seal on the coffin that contained Nie Mingjue. Nie Mingjue rose and attacked them both, but Jin Guangyao pushed my brother to safety before Nie Mingjue broke his neck. Both are still in that coffin."

It would to be an extraordinary ending for a tragedy, two men who'd been allies and enemies both locked in the same coffin, continuing the same struggle. It is a tragedy, that Lan Xichen is still living through -- only the story of it has a conclusion, because stories always do. Lives keep going.

But (Claudius thinks) a mystery always ends with some sort of parlor scene, where the detective explains everything that's happened. That's why Claudius asks, "So how did Wei Wuxian discover Nie Huaisang was behind it?" He has a fair guess it was Wei Wuxian.

"We both knew something was amiss when my brother attacked Jin Guangyao. Jin Guangyao was the first to accuse Nie Huaisang directly." The fury on Jin Guangyao's face is etched into Lan Wangji's memory, along with the sound of his laugh. Good one, Huaisang. Excellent work, concealing yourself for so many years. "After we sealed the coffin again, Wei Ying questioned Nie Huaisang. There were several small inconsistencies in his actions at the temple. Wei Ying pointed out that the person who sent the letter threatening to expose Jin Guangyao had done so unnecessarily, because Jin Guangyao would never confess, and that person would have known that. The goal was not a confession, it was to make Jin Guangyao as hated as possible in the eyes of the public."

Sounds like they've been plotting for a long time, Nie Huaisang had said, casually. "Wei Ying also pointed out that Nie Mingjue's body had last been left with him in Qinghe," Lan Wangji continues, "and that when we met Nie Huaisang in Qinghe, he behaved as if he had never seen Mo Xuanyu, whom he would certainly have met at Carp Tower. He was probing to ascertain whether it was truly Mo Xuanyu or if Wei Ying had returned." He lapses into silence, just a moment of it. "There was not enough proof to corner him."

“Of course,” Claudius says with a sigh. “The least likely suspect has the most time to cover his tracks. The cleverest ones leave no tracks to begin with.” Claudius can respect that; it certainly gives him a newfound respect for the Osrics of the world, who cultivate and trade upon their perceived uselessness. “What did he say when confronted? Did Nie Huaisang shake his head and say I don’t know?”

"Mn. I don't know," Lan Wangji says, if with considerably less quavering inflection than Nie Huaisang himself said it in that temple. "I really don't know." He lets the corner of his mouth quirk into a delicately aggrieved expression. "He is the chief cultivator now."

"Politics," Claudius sums up eloquently.

"Politics." Lan Wangji exhales, slow and deliberate. He is reluctant to take his hands from Claudius'. "I cannot promise a story of that length each time you join me in meditation."

Claudius laughs, appreciative of the time it took, the time Lan Wangji has shared with him. "Tell me the truth. When the two of us meet, is it the most words you ever speak in a day?"

Lan Wangji weighs the question seriously. Admittedly, he speaks considerably less around Wei Ying unless there is an extenuating circumstance. Wei Ying can read his face nearly as well as Lan Xichen can, he was present for most of the stories Lan Wangji might tell, and Lan Wangji can always communicate with him by taking hold of him and making whatever he wants to happen a reality. "Often, yes."

"I'm honored," Claudius says with a beaming smile. "Thy words are rare, and rarity adds value. Each story thou hast told me is a treasured gem."

The brightness of Claudius' smile reflects onto Lan Wangji's face like the moon over water. Claudius already knows how he can find it difficult to speak and how the closer he comes to the things that matter most, the more he must pry those words from himself as if from a child holding onto a beloved toy. If they are treasures, he hands them over because he trusts Claudius to care for them.

[ closed post: hold fast to the center ]

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