Lan Wangji (蓝忘机) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lightbearinglord) wrote2024-05-25 10:49 am
lightbearinglord) wrote2024-05-25 10:49 am
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[ closed post: 熟能生巧 ]
Galahad is not improving quickly, but he is improving, and Lan Wangji can ask no more of him. He began from a shaky foundation, his body weak and untrained but no longer gifted with the resilience and ease of learning that comes with childhood. He is diligent. He arrives in the training yard every morning at chen hour with determination simmering in every young line of his serious face. By now, Lan Wangji has the detached familiarity with Galahad's body that comes of putting it through its paces each day. He knows when to call their training finished -- when Galahad is trembling not with effort, but with exhaustion. Slowly, he is developing greater strength, flexibility, and balance. He holds his yet-unnamed sword with more confidence. When Lan Wangji takes hold of him to correct his posture, he can feel the incremental thickening of the muscles of his arms and shoulders.
At times, Lan Wangji thinks with regret of Magnus declaring that he no longer wants to fight. He and Galahad are such intimate friends; he is steering Galahad down a path that Magnus abandoned with clear intention. Still, he knows without having to question it that Galahad would never have allowed himself to remain too weak to defend Claudius. If he insists on learning to wield a blade, this is the least Lan Wangji can do. He will keep Claudius' beloved, a young man who's come to mean more to him, too, than he could have anticipated, safe from his own eagerness. He will guide him with patience and care.
This early spring morning, Lan Wangji is watching as Galahad assumes horse stance. He assesses him from a distance for a moment or two, then steps closer. "Do not let your knees fall," he advises. He touches Galahad's shoulder, recentering his back and taking the measure of his qi at the same time.
CWs for grief & discussion of death and gun violence.
At times, Lan Wangji thinks with regret of Magnus declaring that he no longer wants to fight. He and Galahad are such intimate friends; he is steering Galahad down a path that Magnus abandoned with clear intention. Still, he knows without having to question it that Galahad would never have allowed himself to remain too weak to defend Claudius. If he insists on learning to wield a blade, this is the least Lan Wangji can do. He will keep Claudius' beloved, a young man who's come to mean more to him, too, than he could have anticipated, safe from his own eagerness. He will guide him with patience and care.
This early spring morning, Lan Wangji is watching as Galahad assumes horse stance. He assesses him from a distance for a moment or two, then steps closer. "Do not let your knees fall," he advises. He touches Galahad's shoulder, recentering his back and taking the measure of his qi at the same time.
CWs for grief & discussion of death and gun violence.