Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“That was unusually stupid,” Jiang Cheng tells him.  “Even for you that was stupid.  What were you thinking?”

He knows it was stupid.  Lan Zhan and his stupid face, standing there in front of Jin Zixuan--what was that supposed to be?  What was he supposed to think?  Fight me instead, he'd said, and Wei Ying came perilously close to snapping: bad day for people promised to each other, huh?

But no matter how betrayed he felt, he couldn't put his fist in that perfect face.  Not after Lan Zhan had almost smiled at his drawing.  So he drew his sword, and everyone trying to get between them was suddenly a lot farther away.

“It really wasn't a good idea, A-Xian.”  His sister's voice is soft and sympathetic, so he squeezes his eyes shut and hides behind his hands.

“I know!” he groans.  “I know, it was bad!  He probably hates children, no one that clean likes kids, and now he's getting punished because of me again!  What if he stops talking to me?  What if he won't even look at me?”

No one answers--not even his sister, and she never ignores him.  He peeks through his fingers, disappointed and curious and still very offended on her behalf.  He's just dismayed by his own situation at the same time.  He can be offended and dismayed together.  He's sure Lan Zhan manages it all the time.

Jiang Cheng seems disgusted, so that’s normal.  “He doesn’t look at you now,” he says.  “Get over yourself.”

Their dear sister, the light of Wei Ying’s life and the only one he’ll forgive for being confused, asks, “Who are you talking about?”

“Shijie,” he says, because she’s forgiven but she should also be educated.  “I only fought with one person yesterday who’s worthy of our conversation!  Your stupid fiance is nothing; I hope he falls off the edge of the world and no one remembers his name.”

“Why can’t you think like that when you see him?” Jiang Cheng retorts.  “If you actually hit him they’ll kick you out for sure!”

“Oh, I was going to hit him,” Wei Ying promises.  “He’s a terrible person with awful manners and no conscience!  Also he has poor footwork,” he adds, because it’s true: if that’s how Jin Zixuan holds a sword then Wei Ying never wants to see him dance.  “It’s an embarrassment to his family.”

“You’re an embarrassment to our family!” Jiang Cheng exclaims.  “If that Lan Wangji hadn’t gotten in front of you with a sword they’d have taken away your robes by now!”

“He did, didn’t he,” Wei Ying says, frowning at the memory.  Lan Zhan had already drawn his sword when he said, fight me instead.   He didn’t hold it up, but he’d pulled it out.  Apparently in an effort to de-escalate the situation, if not for the words he’d spoken.

If Wei Ying had drawn first, it would have looked like aggression.  

Well.  It would have been aggression, with anyone else.  The idea that he could hurt someone like Lan Zhan was laughable, and that was what made it safe to try.  He never meant it, obviously.

But if he’d made threats and then drawn his sword unopposed, it wouldn’t matter if he meant it or not.  It would have been slightly better than punching the Jins’ golden boy, maybe.  Probably.   The sects were strange about acceptable violence and retaliation.  It still wouldn’t have been good.

Value harmony.  Do not sow chaos.  Fighting is prohibited.

But Lan Zhan hadn’t told him, don’t fight.   Lan Zhan hadn’t tried to stop him: he just goaded him to do it with swords instead of fists.  And Lan Zhan always drew first; it was Wei Ying’s favorite thing about him.  It was how they met, how they argued, how he knew his words made an impression.

If this time it happened to keep Wei Ying from getting thrown out of Cloud Recesses, surely that was a coincidence.

Chapter Text

It doesn't take long for Wei Ying to become suspicious.  It first prickles at his awareness when he sees the five adorable children standing obediently at the edge of the training grounds.  Obediently!  Children!  Five of them!  With not an adult in sight.

The feeling gets stronger when he sees the way they look at Lan Zhan: they worship him.  Which, what?  Of course little Lan disciples are probably told to use him as an example, the model for everything they do, but in Wei Ying’s experience that kind of thing usually makes kids do the opposite.

These children obviously love Lan Zhan.  And the best part is, he likes them too!  Wei Ying has to stare, immediately and repeatedly, because… look, he's good with kids, okay?  The kids at Lotus Pier think he's great.  He thinks they're hilarious imaginative brats and he encourages them in everything.  But Lan Zhan…  Oh, Lan Zhan.

Watching him almost smile at a child who follows him carefully at arm's length, one hand behind her back like a tiny adult, waiting to be handed a practice sword almost as tall as she is--it makes Wei Ying’s day.

And that's how his suspicion becomes real: this isn't a punishment at all.  Cloud Recesses knows punishment, which Wei Ying has reason to be very familiar with.  He and Lan Zhan haven't been put in charge of children's swordwork to punish them.

Lan Zhan, somehow, is being rewarded.

Well, except for the part where he has to teach alongside Wei Ying.  That part’s probably a legitimate trial.  But the children aren’t.  He doesn’t hate the children at all.

He also doesn’t make Wei Ying do anything, which is good at first because Wei Ying is too busy being struck speechless to help.  (Him!  Speechless!  He did not see this coming.)  But when the children follow Lan Zhan’s lead and pretend not to be curious about his foreign robes and really great sword, it starts to get insulting.

So Wei Ying does what he always does.  He runs his mouth.

His constant stream of questions doesn’t have any impact on Lan Zhan at all, but the children stare at him with wide eyes and varying degrees of horror when he doesn’t stop.  Lan Zhan continues to ignore him.  Normally this would be his cue to try harder, to step up his behavior, but the tragedy of Lan Zhan’s unwillingness to interrupt him is that it also keeps him from talking to the kids.

Not that he was having revealing personal conversations with them, but he’d been talking to them.  Wei Ying has been trying to get Lan Zhan to talk since the day they met.  So, before he can think too much about it, he turns and walks off the field.

There’s no sound behind him, no murmur of resumed instruction, and he thinks maybe he should have said something first.  But it’s fine, Lan Zhan doesn’t care what he does.  He’s probably just glad he can hear himself think for a moment.

Wei Ying puts his sword down.  They’re trained not to leave their swords, here at Cloud Recesses.  It’s different at Lotus Pier--no one swims with a sword--but it feels strange after all this time to replace it with a practice weapon and walk away.

Lan Zhan’s class is still silent when he comes back, and he’s tempted to poke the last kid in line and ask if the spot next to him is taken.  He doesn’t, because being mean to children is probably forbidden, but he takes the spot at the end of the line anyway.  Even kneeling, he’s taller than two of them standing up.  He looks at how they’re holding their practice swords and carefully imitates it before giving Lan Zhan his full attention.

Which the kids aren’t doing anymore, thanks to him.  Well, whatever.  Lan Zhan probably knows a dozen focusing charms.

Lan Zhan is watching him, cool and unreadable.  It's annoyingly interesting.  Then he says, “You may ask relevant questions as they occur,” and Wei Ying beams at him.

Lan Zhan doesn’t look impressed, but he never does.  And he said, you may ask relevant questions.   So Wei Ying thinks up every possible question, prioritizes based on interest and presumed relevance, and makes a game of carefully deploying one question for everything Lan Zhan says and no more.  Sometimes, when Lan Zhan answers with more than a single word, it counts as a new thing and Wei Ying gets to ask another question.

When the littlest child timidly asks a question before he can, he closes his mouth quickly.  He makes a new rule: the kids’ questions are more important than his, and he can’t distract Lan Zhan before he answers them.  This becomes increasingly unfair as the kids get used to him being there and ask more questions.

Well, he thinks with a sigh.  It’s supposed to be punishment, after all.

Chapter Text

He can’t stay after the first swordwork lesson, which is really too bad and probably the first time in the history of Cloud Recesses that someone has wanted to hang around after punishment to chat.  Been unable to move and forced to lie there until someone collects them, sure.  But being disappointed that it’s over?  Definitely a first.

So he leaves Lan Zhan at the edge of the training grounds and rushes to meet Nie Huaisang.  (He doesn’t run until he’s out of sight of the children.  Not because he wants to set a good example, just because, well.  He doesn’t need Lan Zhan getting in trouble because of him again. )  He feels bad sticking his co-teacher with cleanup duty, so the next day he makes sure to get there early.

Of course Lan Zhan is already there, and he exclaims in disappointment before he thinks.  “Ah, I was hoping you wouldn’t be here!” he says, but at least he knows right away how it sounds.  “I mean, not because I don’t want to see you--”

And now he’s implied that he does want to see Lan Zhan, which is true but saying so is bad form.  Lan Zhan doesn’t want to see him and Wei Ying doesn’t care, even though everyone should want to see him.  He’s adorable and charming and fun to be around!  What’s bad about that?

“It’s just that I left you with everything yesterday,” he says, because no one should backtrack more than once in a single sentence or it gets very confusing.  “So I wanted to get here before you today and get things ready, to make up for it!”

Lan Zhan gives him a single look.  “You know how to prepare a class?”

“Yes!” Wei Ying exclaims.  What does he think a First Disciple does, anyway?  “I mean, no, not here.  Obviously I teach the kids at home all the time.  But if I’d gotten here before you it would look like I'm trying, right?”

Lan Zhan hasn’t looked away yet.  “Are you?”

Wei Ying wants to fidget, but the fact that he doesn’t really understand the question makes him hold still.  “Yes?” he guesses.  He watches carefully for a reaction, but Lan Zhan just glances down at his waist.

“Keep your sword today,” he says.  “You’ll need it to demonstrate.”

Demonstrate?  But he can ask what that means while the kids are listening; he has to take advantage of Lan Zhan talking to him while they’re alone.  “Lan Zhan, you really like these kids, right?  You like this.  You like teaching.  So who decided to punish you with it?”

He looked away as soon as Wei Ying said, you really like.   Why?  Is he not supposed to like things?  Exultation is forbidden, cheering is forbidden; as far as Wei Ying can tell everything except being quiet and humble and reflective is forbidden at Cloud Recesses.  But surely they’re allowed to like things?

In case he shouldn’t have asked, he adds, “Is it me?  It’s okay, you can tell me if I’m the real punishment.  At least they didn’t make you teach me without the kids, right?  I made up a rule yesterday, did you notice?  If they ask questions I don’t!  I’m not that terrible, Lan Zhan, I really do want adorable children to get an education.  You should tell them to talk more so I say less, then it wouldn’t be so bad for you!”

Lan Zhan is staring at the practice swords, and Wei Ying thinks if he were anyone else he’d be frowning.  “Discipline isn’t always punishment,” he says at last.

It’s the kind of cryptic advice teachers love to give, and Wei Ying laughs at himself when he realizes he was waiting for more.  Of course that’s all Lan Zhan would say.  

“Okay!” he agrees, because Lan Zhan did answer, after all.  “Thank you, Master Lan!  Teacher Lan!  My friend, my brother, my--hey,” he says, when he forgets that he wasn’t going to mention this again until he’d gotten as much mileage out of it as he could.  “If you’re my husband, how come I don’t get a ribbon?  Shouldn’t I have my own ribbon?”

Lan Zhan lifts his head but doesn’t answer, and Wei Ying won’t make a secret of his disappointment.  

“Hey, Lan Zhan,” he complains.  “Why do you tell me helpful things like discipline isn’t always punishment, but you won’t tell me why my husband won’t give me a gift?  You answered my questions in class yesterday!  Should I wait to ask you then?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t move, and Wei Ying would bet even the part of his expression he can't see didn’t change.  “Not every question needs an answer,” he says.

“Ah!” Wei Ying protests, “This is cruel but true!  I don’t think you’re supposed to be cruel to me, Lan Zhan, there must be a rule about that!  Too much truth can be hurtful!

“However,” he adds, “in this case I’ll graciously accept it, because I don’t know which questions you think are worthy so I have to keep coming up with new ones!  Which I’m very good at--I don’t know if you noticed, Lan Zhan, but I have an endless supply of questions, so you have just as many opportunities to judge them!”

Lan Zhan is still staring straight ahead, to the point where Wei Ying actually follows his gaze to see if there’s something there.  There isn’t.

“I noticed,” Lan Zhan says abruptly, and Wei Ying swings around to look at him again.

“Ah, you did!” he exclaims, pointing at Lan Zhan.  “You know, if you just told me which ones are deserving of an answer to begin with, I wouldn’t have to think up so many!  I could just wait patiently for the answers to what I already asked!”

Finally, Lan Zhan looks back at him.  “Patiently?” he says.

“Okay, no, not patiently at all,” Wei Ying admits.  “Very impatiently.  But less distractingly, right?  I can’t be as distracting when I’m not talking as when I am, or you wouldn’t silence me so much!”

This, he thinks, is inescapable logic, and Lan Zhan seems to be considering it while he stares.  Until it becomes obvious he’s staring past Wei Ying, and there are two children trudging across the field when he turns.  They really just wander around Cloud Recesses alone, then.  What if they… fell from somewhere, or got stuck under a rock or something?

It’s probably like knowing how to swim back home, he tells himself.  Water kids learn water skills, and mountain kids learn… he doesn’t know.  Mountain skills?  Whatever those are.  How not to get trapped under rocks, maybe.

He would ask Lan Zhan, except he just admitted to knowing that endless questions are distracting, so to show he can be polite he should let Lan Zhan talk first.  He’ll probably greet the kids, right?  So it won’t be too long, even if he doesn’t speak to Wei Ying directly.

He does greet the kids, but not in a normal way like saying hello to them.  He bows to them like they’re adults, and they bow too, and Wei Ying only barely remembers to return the gesture when their little solemn faces turn toward him.  Wow.  Mountain kids, huh.  

He’ll take the water any day.

Lan Zhan hands out practice swords in silence and greets the rest of the kids the same way as they arrive.  The kids don’t even whisper to each other.  It’s a little eerie.

It’s a lot eerie, actually, but he decided to let Lan Zhan speak first and he will.  Probably.  As long as he does it sometime this year.

The first thing Lan Zhan actually tells their five small students is, “Today we begin with a demonstration.”

Wei Ying is so busy being relieved that--by the rules of the one-sided game he made up himself--he can talk now, he almost forgets he has no idea what Lan Zhan wanted to demonstrate.  He meant to ask, and now it’s almost too late.  “Wait, demonstration?” he says quickly, because Lan Zhan told him to keep his sword.  Are they going to fight?  In front of children?  “What are we demonstrating again?”

Lan Zhan draws his sword, so he does too.  He sees wide eyes and surprise from the children but not fear.  Not a single one steps back.

“A true sword,” Lan Zhan says, “does not advance until others retreat.”

He’s looking at Wei Ying, holding his gaze, maybe talking to him.  Maybe answering his question.  It’s hard to tell and Wei Ying doesn’t understand much of it until Lan Zhan looks away anyway.  It’s hard to think when someone is staring at him like that.  

“Someone” being Lan Zhan of course; lesser people are very easy to ignore.

“You may hold the line,” he’s telling the children.  “But you can not force others back.  You may only follow when they falter.”

Wei Ying frowns, because on one level, that’s an interesting thing to hear from someone who fights with as much passion as Lan Zhan.  But on another, it sounds almost as pointed as discipline isn’t always punishment.   Like it means something, if only he could decipher the words.

It sounds like Lan Zhan answering a question.

There’s no warning when Lan Zhan swings: nothing to predict the movement except everything he’s said and done.  Everything he’s given, even when Wei Ying didn’t make him help or stay silent or pretend not to see.  

Maybe, looking back, he only  gave those things when Wei Ying didn’t try to make him.

Suibian’s scabbard blocks the first swing, and he brings his sword up to catch Lan Zhan’s blade on the other side when he whirls.  He’s fast and brilliant and beautiful and Wei Ying wants to chase him so badly it hurts.

He holds his ground instead, and Lan Zhan’s eyes meet his.

He steps back, and Lan Zhan follows.  Wei Ying leaps, giving ground, and Lan Zhan is right behind him.  In front of him.  Whatever, he’s there is the point, following like he’s been invited, and Wei Ying wants to laugh.

Oh, he thinks, helpless and delighted as their blades flash silver in the sunlight and Lan Zhan presses ever closer.  This explains so much!  No one ever told him he had to fall back before Lan Zhan would come forward.  That he had to make space instead of taking it.

No one ever told him, until Lan Zhan did just now.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan doesn't know the answer to, who decided to punish you with this?   He doesn’t need to.  He knew better than to draw his sword in a crowd and he will accept the consequences, no matter the source.

He expects it was his brother.  The gentle reminder of patience with children, to be calm in the face of chaos, is reminiscent of his corrections.  And unlike everyone else in Cloud Recesses, his brother believes he and Wei Ying should spend more time together, so the “punishment” logically follows.

Lan Huan thinks he’s funny.

Lan Zhan is not grateful, because to be grateful would indicate he benefits from the situation somehow.  Avoiding a more appropriate punishment is not a benefit.  The company of a student who breaks almost enough rules to be expelled is not a benefit.  Watching Wei Ying wield a sword--

He takes a breath and sweeps the thoughts aside.  Meditation is for clearing the mind and strengthening the spirit.  He is not here for idle reflection on material concerns.

But those concerns are here for him.  The more he tries to focus on the moment, the more he’s aware of time passing.  Time until he will stand in front of children and give them only the attention he can spare.

He enjoys crossing swords with Wei Ying.  His brother wants him to admit it; he sees no reason to.  He’s aware of it, and he lets it influence his actions only when the situation is appropriate.  But he can’t deny that it’s distracting.  He can’t deny that “demonstrating” swordplay with Wei Ying was an experience he didn’t want to end.

Lan Zhan opens his eyes.  There’s no benefit in reliving the exchange again.  In remembering Wei Ying’s smile, or the way he yielded.  Especially the way he yielded.  

For once in all the time they’ve known each other, he yielded without question, and now Lan Zhan is unable to meditate.  Wei Ying’s influence on his actions may be limited, but the effect on his cultivation is staggering.  He must try harder, remove himself from Wei Ying’s presence entirely, or find some other way to overcome his influence.

It isn’t that I don’t know the answer, Wei Ying’s voice says in his mind.  It’s only that I’m considering a fourth option.

Disciples have been learning from the Lan sect for generations.  Their traditions will continue, no matter the choice he makes today.  There must be more knowledge than they have… more options than theirs that exist in the world.

Without moving, Lan Zhan considers the contents of the room.  He does not know how to encourage Wei Ying, but he can give him what he wants.  Or at least, what he’s asked for.  It remains to be seen how much the two overlap.

When he goes to meet Wei Ying on the training grounds, he isn’t surprised to find him already waiting.  It would make it look like I’m trying, Wei Ying said.  Lan Zhan holds out the fabric pouch he brought without a word.

“Hey, Lan Zhan!”  Wei Ying swings around, one of the smallest practice swords in his hand, and immediately comes too close.  He doesn’t quite walk into Lan Zhan’s outstretched hand, but it’s a near thing.  “Hi, see, I did it!  Aren’t you glad to know I can get places on time?  Can I make this practice sword shorter?”

He only glances at it so Wei Ying will know which question he’s answering when he says, “Yes.”

“Really?”  Wei Ying beams at him.  “Great!  Thanks!  What’s this; did you bring me a present?”

It doesn’t escape him that answering one of Wei Ying’s questions made him pause after the next one, so Lan Zhan repeats, “Yes.”

“You did!”  Wei Ying’s smile is less certain now.  His gaze flicks down and back, eyeing the pouch like it might be withdrawn at any moment.  Finally he snatches it with a laugh, exclaiming, “Lan Zhan, you’re too kind!  Giving me gifts!  What is the world coming to!”

It’s a strange reaction, even for him.  Especially for him. 

Lan Zhan watches him pretend a carelessness that belies his gentle fingers.  Teasing the ribbon out of its protective pouch, he shakes it free and watches the fluttering length untangle before he suddenly understands.  “Is this--”

Wei Ying holds it up, his eyes wide and guileless as they look from the ribbon to Lan Zhan’s face.  It’s the same forehead ribbon he wears, albeit without the clouds.  Wei Ying might technically be entitled to them.  But depending on what he does with the ribbon, Lan Zhan doesn’t want to answer questions.

“You asked,” he reminds Wei Ying.  He manages not to add, don’t let anyone touch it, because that’s not his decision.  He doesn’t even say, if anyone could benefit from restraint it’s you, partly because he’s no longer sure that's true.

“I--I asked?” Wei Ying exclaims.  He looks baffled and incredulous and he holds the ribbon away from his body, like it might latch on to him while he’s not looking.  “When did I--you mean yesterday?  I didn’t--”

But he did, and he seems to remember it when Lan Zhan comes very close to frowning.  “Ohhhh,” he says, drawn out but not much calmer than he sounded before.  “Oh, I said, shouldn’t I have--and why don’t you give me--oh.”

He hasn’t finished a sentence since he touched the ribbon, and Lan Zhan knows now that this was another mistake.  Not wrong, but a mistake nonetheless.  Wei Ying is awkward and unbalanced as he never is, and there’s nothing Lan Zhan can say that he hasn’t already.

“Ah, Lan Zhan, can I wear this?” Wei Ying asks, and there’s something in his tone that makes Lan Zhan look back at him.  He wasn’t aware of looking away.  

Wei Ying is smiling.  It’s a small smile, tentative the way it sometimes looks when he forgets to pout.  He’s curled his fingers around the ribbon.  It’s already crumpled as thoroughly as the one he wears in his hair, but then, he’s still holding it.  So it doesn’t matter.

“It’s yours,” Lan Zhan tells him.  “Do what you want.”

This time, finally, Wei Ying laughs.  “Lan Zhan, ah, Lan Zhan!” he exclaims, curled fingers almost disappearing into his sleeve.  “It’s very good of you to give me permission!  To use such a fine gift!  I’ll do my best to be worthy of it, I promise you this.”

It doesn’t make any sense, and it’s impolite to fight with a person to whom he just gave a gift.  In the absence of swords, he must depend on words.  They don't seem very helpful in this case.

“Oh, also,” Wei Ying says, like he wasn’t expecting a response anyway.  He rarely does these days.  “Will I need my sword today?  Are we demonstrating again?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t hesitate.  “Yes,” he says firmly.

Chapter Text

“Shijie,” Wei Ying hisses.  He taps carefully on the window frame and doesn’t call again.  It’s unreasonably early and there’s already people everywhere.  He has a story all ready if he’s spotted, but he’d rather not be.

There’s a flicker of movement inside, a quiet step, and then his sister is at the window.  “A-Xian,” she whispers.  It doesn’t sound scolding at all.  “What’s wrong?  Come in.”

He tucks himself inside, breathing a sigh of relief when she sticks a privacy talisman on the window behind him.  “Thank you,” he whispers.  “Thank you, you’re my favorite sister, I need your help!”

She smiles, waving at him to be quiet while she sticks up more talismans and checks the door.  That’s funny, he thinks, who is she expecting outside her door at this hour?  Anyone fun would use the window.

“All right,” she says, coming back to take his hand and study his face.  “Did you sleep?  What are you doing up so early?  Are you okay?”

“Kind of, mostly, I slept a little,” he says, because she’ll keep asking if he doesn’t tell her.  “But I’m not okay; I’m in crisis!  This is a crisis moment!  Shijie, you have to tell me what to do.”

“Does the crisis involve anyone being hurt or in imminent danger?” she wants to know.  She reaches up to touch his face, smoothing his hair back with her hand while she waits for him to decide.

“Probably not,” he says at last.  “I mean, it’s hard to say; if I get it wrong Lan Zhan might kill me?  But I don’t think anyone else is in danger.”

“Lan Wangji?” she says, patting his shoulder and turning him gently toward the table.  “What has he done now?”

And that, Wei Ying thinks, is why she’s his favorite person.  Not only does she know immediately that Lan Zhan’s done something, she also doesn’t assume any of it is his fault.  Which it isn’t!  He is absolutely faultless when it comes to Lan Zhan’s aggravating and very mysterious behavior!

“He gave me something,” he says, dropping down on the guest cushion.  He wants to wail, but he doesn’t dare--what if her privacy talismans get someone’s attention?  No one else can hear this.  “He gave me a present, shijie!  Why would he do that?  Is he making fun of me?”

She’s stopped with her hand on his shoulder, still standing beside him instead of going around the table.  “Lan Wangji gave you a present?” she says.  Her voice is neutral and kind and she’s definitely going to kill Lan Zhan if he doesn’t fix this.

“Yes!” he exclaims.  “But it’s okay, don’t worry, it was a nice present!  And no one else saw!  He wasn’t trying to embarrass me, I don’t think.”

She squeezes his shoulder, and when he looks up at her she lets her breath out in a sigh.  “Oh, A-Xian,” she says.  She kneels gracefully beside him, her robes falling exactly the way they’re supposed to.  “Why can't you leave him alone?”

“Why should I leave him alone?” he exclaims.  “He’s so good, he’s better than all those other Lans, don’t you think he needs some competition?  How will he improve if there’s no one to challenge him?”

Her huff sounds amused this time, more like a laugh than a sigh.  “Oh, I see,” she says.  “You’re doing this for his own good, then.”

“Yes, of course!”  He shifts over, making room for her on the guest cushion while he slides to the side.  “And for me!  Mostly for me!  I also need someone on my level; I can’t just settle for being better than everyone at Lotus Pier!”

“Why not?” she asks, leaning up against him.  “Don’t you want to be our First Disciple anymore?”

“What!”  He’s outraged, utterly outraged that this is even a question, but he can’t pull away from her when she’s hugging his arm like this.  “Shijie!  You’ll never have another First Disciple, because my loyalty is to Jiang Sect until I die!  You know that,” he chides, leaning down to rest his chin on her shoulder.  “And since I’ll never die, you’ll never have to replace me.”

“Okay,” she agrees, and he can hear her smile.  “So why do you have to be as good as Lan Wangji?”

He lets out a breath of air, stirring his hair more than actually moving it out of the way, but he doesn’t lift his head from her shoulder.  “Because I have to defend Jiang Sect from outsiders, of course.  I have to be better than anyone in the world, and then I’ll know you’re safe.”

She pats his arm and leans her head, very carefully, against his.  “I see,” she murmurs.  “All right then.  As long as you’re not planning to run off and join the Lans.”

“That’s a good joke,” he tells her.  “Me, join the Lans, who could imagine it!  With their thousands of rules?  I’d never survive!”

She laughs a little, and it’s calming, to sit with her and just be understood.  He doesn’t know why they have to separate men and women at Cloud Recesses.  There’s no one on the men’s side who can comfort him like this.

“But look,” he says, because they’ll have to go to breakfast soon and he has to sneak back to his side first and he still doesn’t have any idea what to do.  “Look at what Lan Zhan gave me!”  He produces the ribbon from inside his sleeve--he hasn’t dared to set it down once--and holds it out so she can see it.  “What does it mean!”

He sees her look down, and he sees her reach for it.  It’s okay, that was his first thought too, it always has been: they’re so pretty he just wants to put his fingers all over them.  But she takes his hand instead, cupping his fingers in hers and turning his wrist a little so the ribbon shines in the light.

“It’s a forehead ribbon,” she says.  “Right?  But not one of his; there aren’t any clouds.”

“No,” he says, which he isn’t disappointed about at all.  “I mean yes!  Exactly!  Why would he give me this?”

“Well.”  She’s definitely smiling, even if she hasn’t lifted her head to look at him.  She’s still watching how light hits the ribbon, glinting like it’s alive somehow, and if she asked he’d tell her he spent most of the night doing exactly the same thing.  “Is it possible he just thinks… you should be more restrained?”

He thought of that, he thought of that so many times, but it doesn’t seem right.  “I don’t think so,” he tells her.  “He didn’t say I should wear it, and that’s the whole point, right?  Wearing it is about keeping yourself under control, and not wearing it means… ah, you don’t have to?”

He realizes too late that he never told her how he knows that, but she just says, “Oh?  So he gave it to you, but not to wear?”

“Well,” he says, “he said I could wear it, if I wanted to.  I asked specifically because I didn’t know either!  And I still don’t know, because who ever knows what he means when he says things!  Can’t he use more than four syllables at a time?  It’s like being read to from a book!”

It’s just like that, actually, except that the person reading from the book stops after every sentence and doesn't give any clues about how to get the next one.

“He didn’t tell you to wear it,” she repeats.  “But he said you could.”

“Yes!” he exclaims.  “What am I supposed to do?  None of the students wear them!  Only sect disciples!  What if someone asks me why I’m wearing it!  What if he asks me why I don’t?  I don’t know what to do!”

“Do you… want to wear it?” she asks carefully.

“No!” he protests.  Then he thinks about what he just said, and he adds, “I mean, of course I don’t want to wear it.  Shijie!  Why would I want to follow Lan rules!  That’s not my question at all.”

“Oh,” she says, and he thinks she might be laughing at him now.  Silently, so he can’t see or hear it, but he still knows it’s happening, and he sighs even as she says, “A-Xian… can you tell me what he said exactly?  I’m having trouble imagining this conversation.”

He’s having trouble imagining it and he was there.  “I asked him if I could wear it and he said: it’s yours, do what you want!” he says.  “You know what he’s like!  He doesn’t say anything unnecessary. ”

“Do what you want?” she repeats.  “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know!” he cries.  “You see what I’m dealing with!  He’s impossible!”

“Well, what did he say when he gave it to you?” she wants to know.  “Exactly.  Word for word.”

“Nothing!” he exclaims.  “He didn’t say anything!  He just held it out and waited for me to take it!”

He does not deserve the doubt in her voice when she asks, “Are you sure he meant for you to take it?”

“That is a very cruel thing to ask,” he informs her.  “I will forgive you because you’re my shijie.  Also yes, I’m sure, because I asked the same thing!  Is this for me, I said, and he said yes!  He doesn’t lie, so he definitely meant for me to take it!”

“Okay,” she says, squeezing his arm.  “I’m sorry, of course you wouldn’t have misinterpreted something like that.”

He pouts, but not so she can see, because he absolutely would have misinterpreted something like that.  She’s very kind to say otherwise.  She’s his favorite person in the world.

“So he gave it to you,” she continues, and he silently agrees that this is worth repeating.  It’s honestly the most incredible thing that’s happened to him since coming to Cloud Recesses.  And he was recently sucked into a cave with a dead person and her magic bunnies.

Okay, no, it’s the second most incredible thing that’s happened to him.  Lan Zhan wrapping his own forehead ribbon around both their wrists is still the first.

“But he didn’t tell you what to do with it,” she’s saying.  “You’re worried that wearing it openly will make people… ask questions?”

Since she’s politely forgetting he said he didn’t want to wear it at all, he pretends it didn’t happen.  “No,” he says, staring down at the table.  “I think it will look like I’m mocking them.  It will, won’t it?  If a student puts on a forehead ribbon… especially this student.  I can’t do that to--”

To him, he thinks, but that’s ridiculous; he’s done much worse to Lan Zhan.  To them, he almost says instead, but no one would believe that, least of all him.  He could definitely mock one of the five great clans, an entire sect run on three thousand rules carved into stone.  He does mock them, all the time.  He enjoys it.

“It’s rude,” he finishes awkwardly, and his shijie is really the nicest person he knows because she doesn’t laugh at him even a little.

“But you don’t want him to think you don’t appreciate it,” she says gently, and he can’t say yes.  He can’t.  She doesn’t wait for him to say anything, because she’s truly the greatest person alive.  Even when she says, “So wear it.”

He doesn’t know what his expression does when he sags against her.  He doesn’t even know what he feels, let alone how it’s going to look, so he leans forward and puts his head on the table.  “Shijie!” he whines, grateful at least that it’s muffled by the furniture.

“That’s why he gave it to you, isn’t it?” she says.  “Really?  If they don’t mean anything when you’re not wearing them, then you should wear it.”

Maybe if he never leaves her room he won’t have to think about this anymore.  That’s something he could do, right?  He could become a hermit, like his mother’s teacher.  He’d never have to think about ribbons and caves and pretty people giving him gifts ever again.

“No one has to see it,” she’s saying.  “It’s about self-control, right?  Not about what anyone else sees or thinks, just about how you feel yourself.  So if you wear it, and no one else sees it, it still counts.”

Slowly, he lifts his head off the table.  Lan Zhan never cares what other people see him do.  He never wants credit, or praise, or any kind of attention as far as Wei Ying can tell.  None of the things he deserves.

“Even if no one sees it,” he says after a moment, “it still counts.  Shijie,” he adds, and he can't stop the smile spreading across his face.  “That's brilliant. ”

She smiles back at him, patting the hand that isn't holding the ribbon.  “Good,” she says.  “Tell me what happens.”

What happens is that Lan Zhan looks at him on the training grounds and his expression doesn’t change.  He saw Wei Ying in class, so he already knows.  It’s not a surprise that his hair is still tied back with a colorful Yunmeng ribbon and nothing else.

But when Wei Ying waves at him and whispers, “Psst!” before the first kid can bow, Lan Zhan seems lonely and lost.  It's probably his imagination.  He pulls up his sleeve anyway, just enough to show the edge of the ribbon he wrapped around his wrist.  

Lan Zhan doesn’t say anything, but Wei Ying is watching very carefully.  He sees those gold eyes soften and his lips part.  He watches Lan Zhan go from very far away to almost close enough to touch without moving at all.

That expression makes an entire sleepless night worth it.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan doesn’t use the word “disaster” lightly.  So if he were to describe anything about the day before, he would qualify it with “almost” or “nearly.”  He would additionally confine the description to his own conduct, which has limited repercussions.

It’s important to acknowledge that no one was hurt.  No injury was done and no irreparable insult was given.  So to call the result of his personal shortcomings a disaster is certainly too dramatic.

Almost a disaster, though.  Too near for reassurance, and he lacks confidence that he can conduct himself better today.  He must not fail to complete the disciplinary task assigned to him.

He should be taking his meal with the other students now.  Instead, he’s spending this period in quiet reflection.  With the comfort of meditation currently unattainable, he can at least attempt to calm his swirling thoughts with awareness and attention.

He doesn’t know what he expected would happen when he gave Wei Ying a sect ribbon.  He didn’t think through the possible consequences.  He didn’t consider alternatives at all: Wei Ying asked for it, and it was a simple enough request to fulfill.  

He hoped the gift might be some compensation for his own reticence.  He knows Wei Ying tries to provoke a reaction from him, and perhaps his response so far has been unsatisfactory.  Though he enjoys their physical competition, verbal exchanges are not a strength of his.  Action is more meaningful than talk of action.

So he gave Wei Ying a ribbon, and told him he could do whatever he liked with it.  This is… not strictly true.  He shouldn’t have said it.  He didn’t anticipate that Wei Ying would choose something simultaneously unorthodox and acceptable.  The latter is the greatest surprise.

In retrospect, he isn’t sure he’s ever correctly anticipated Wei Ying, careful attention to their patterns of behavior notwithstanding.

Most pressingly, he failed to foresee his reaction to Wei Ying’s wrist ribbon.  Seeing the Lan symbol of self-discipline on the same wrist he’d bound to his own in Lan Yi’s cave was… staggering.  Even now he can’t identify the feelings it instills in him.  It turned his mind decisively from teaching and has yet to relinquish his focus or concentration.

Yesterday’s swordwork instruction would not have gone ahead if Wei Ying hadn’t taken charge of the children’s forms.  

A tap at the door makes him look up and he is instantly--shamefully--ready to fight.  There is no enemy here at Cloud Recesses.  There is no likelihood of challenge when he’s alone: no one will come barging through the door, sword drawn and decorum to the wind, with an insatiable smile and a demand that he defend himself.

No one except Wei Ying.  He might be anywhere at any moment.  He has a propensity, intentional or not, for turning up where Lan Zhan is.

It is not Wei Ying at the door.  It’s his brother, letting himself in with a tray of food.  Lan Zhan steadies his breathing, willing his heart not to pound so loudly.  If just the thought of Wei Ying is enough to cause such disruption, he is in no fit state to teach a class by his side.  He is angry with himself and embarrassed by turns.

“I thought you might not eat,” his brother says, setting the food down across from him.  He doesn’t push anything out of the way to make room, but Lan Zhan is sure he would if he needed to.

There is no excuse Lan Zhan would make that isn’t already obvious: he prefers quiet, he prefers solitude.  Sometimes sect rules are not enough of a refuge.  Lan Huan knows this.  There is no need to say it.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Lan Huan asks.

Lan Zhan considers the tray.  There is more food on it than he requires, but his brother has not helped himself to the cushion on the other side of the table.  Lan Zhan pushes a dish toward him and waits.

Lan Huan sits down.  “Thank you,” he says.  “Would you like tea?”

Lan Zhan is nominally the host, so he reaches out to spark heat into the water and turn over a second teacup.  He meant to make tea for himself already.  He was distracted.

“I understand you spoke to Jiang Wanyin yesterday,” his brother says.

Lan Zhan looks at him, surprised by the observation.  He had encountered Jiang Wanyin in the evening, on his return from another futile effort to clear his mind and settle his thoughts.  “He spoke to me,” he says after a moment.

“About Wei Ying?”

The question is blunt but not surprising.  What else would they have to talk about?  He nods once, holding his sleeve back as he pours their tea.

“Did he threaten you?” Lan Huan wants to know.

He pauses.  Did Wei Ying’s younger brother threaten him yesterday?  He doesn’t recall that being the tone of their interaction, but he didn’t give it his full attention.  Jiang Wanyin spoke very ambiguously about respecting others and not making people believe things that aren’t true.  

He sounded stiff, but everyone sounds stiff compared to Wei Ying.  He sounded angry, but Jiang Wanyin is often angry.  Lan Zhan marked the one-sided conversation for further review, but only as a curiosity he might resolve when he is less… distracted.

“Not that I noticed,” he says at last.

His brother gives him a look he knows very well, not that it helps him understand the question:  “Would you like me to speak to Wei Ying?”

About what, Lan Zhan is almost ready to ask, when there’s another knock at the door.

This one doesn’t let itself in, but he’s been both lulled and primed: he recognizes the energy of Wei Ying’s presence without needing to see him.  He doesn’t tense, and his heart doesn’t race.  His brother is here.  Everything will be fine.

Wei Ying has also brought him food.  He laughs when he sees Lan Huan, and he waves brightly at Lan Zhan, careless and unconcerned.  Lan Huan offers to leave.

“No,” Lan Zhan says sharply.

“No, no!” Wei Ying agrees, “stay, I didn’t mean to interrupt!  Lan Zhan, I should have known you’d have people lining up to bring you things when you disappear!  How lucky I am to come second only to your brother!”

“Very lucky,” Lan Huan says, before Lan Zhan can come up with a single thought that isn’t, is he still wearing the ribbon?   “Those invested in my brother’s well-being are many and powerful.  We only welcome allies.”

“Ah, I’ll consider myself welcomed, then!” Wei Ying exclaims.  He beams at Lan Huan in a way that makes Lan Zhan want to say something just to take his attention back.  “I don’t change my allegiances, brother Lan.”

This has been a defining characteristic of Wei Ying’s friendships at Cloud Recesses so far.  Not that Lan Zhan has been tracking them with anything but academic interest.  Wei Ying’s first loyalty is to his family, and it is unwavering.  His second loyalty is to anyone he calls friend.  That list has not changed since their fourth day of study.

Enough time, Lan Zhan sometimes thinks, for Wei Ying to have met everyone on the mountain twice.

“Understood,” Lan Huan is saying.  “I'm glad to hear you say this.  I’ll be going now.”

You will not, Lan Zhan thinks, a little desperate, but he can’t voice the thought aloud.  

“Don't forget to return your trays,” Lan Huan calls just before he disappears.  “Wei Wuxian, help him!”

“I’m trying!” Wei Ying shouts after him.

“Do not shout,” Lan Zhan murmurs.  He is unsure whether he means for it to be overheard or not.  The reminder of rules is certainly more powerful for him than for Wei Ying.

It doesn’t matter when Wei Ying exclaims, “Who’s shouting?  I just came to make sure you didn’t miss the loquats today!  I know they’re your favorite,” he adds, crouching down across the table without quite taking the seat he hasn’t been offered.  “Should I go?  I can go; I really wasn’t trying to interrupt your lunch.”

He should go.  It’s only moderately defensible that Lan Zhan is eating alone.  It’s inappropriate for the two of them to do so together.

“Stay,” Lan Zhan says.

At least this time he recognizes what he’s doing as he does it.  He’s failing to consider alternatives or consequences.  He’s acting almost impulsively, and the immediate consequence is Wei Ying’s brilliant smile.  Later it will be a glimpse of ribbon under his sleeve.  

Lan Zhan can’t honestly say he’s less distracted this time.  He wonders, though, if there’s any chance of acclimatization.  Desensitization.  Can he become less affected by Wei Ying’s presence through increased exposure?

When Wei Ying puts more food in front of him, he thinks it’s only reasonable to try.

Chapter Text

There’s no children’s swordwork this afternoon, and Wei Ying has somehow managed to go an entire day without getting in serious trouble.  Nothing bad enough to replace one punishment with another, anyway.  Which means he has plenty of time to sneak around the mountain and search the forbidden area for signs of bunnies.

Lan Zhan basically promised him they’d be fine--that’s what that meant, right?  So he isn’t too worried, but everyone’s gotten used to him having the kids’ class right now and he won’t be missed.  It’s a good day to do some bunny reconnaissance.  

They had water, he reminds himself as he pushes through the undergrowth.  And their little headbands were still glowing even after Lan Yi disappeared.  Maybe they really didn’t need food.  Maybe Lan Zhan was right and they’d been coming and going from the cave all along.

But what if they didn’t need food before, when Lan Yi was alive, and now they do?  Even if she magically nudged them out of the cave, do they know how to forage?  What if those poor bunnies have been huddled outside Lan Yi’s cave for days, wondering when their friend is coming back?

He breathes in as deep as he can, trying to concentrate on air and the mountain and walking.  He isn’t going to make himself cry over lonely bunny rabbits.  He isn’t!  They’re fine, he reminds himself, Lan Zhan said so.  Lan Zhan doesn’t lie.

It would be more comforting if he thought Lan Zhan knew how to not be lonely himself, but they’re bunnies.  He’s sure they have some survival skills.  Probably more than Lan Zhan.  At least when it comes to sensible things like companionship and cuddling and being cute.

On second thought, Lan Zhan has the being cute part down.  It's just the rest of it he's still working on.  Hopefully he's working on it.  He let Wei Ying keep him company at lunch yesterday, so that's something.

He says he's in the habit of being alone.  Well, Wei Ying is in the habit of being with other people, but here he is: alone on the mountain, looking for bunnies.  No one has to be one way or the other all the time.

He’s looking where he’s putting his feet so he doesn’t think it’s the flash of white that gets his attention.  White could be anyone, after all, and he knows it’s Lan Zhan right away.  Speak of the warlord, he thinks happily.

He should talk about Lan Zhan more.  Or at least think about him more.  Maybe he really can be summoned with thoughts.  Wei Ying hasn’t tried that; it could be fun.  Especially if it turned out to be true!

He’s opened his mouth to shout a greeting when the figure in white turns.  It’s definitely Lan Zhan; he’d know that movement anywhere.  Wei Ying is too far to make out his expression, but he’s sure those eyes are glaring at him.  He hesitates just long enough to see the distant figure put a finger to its lips, and he grins gleefully.

Did Lan Zhan just shush him?  At a distance, in the middle of the woods?  More importantly, did Wei Ying just get invited to join him?  

He did!  That was absolutely an invitation!  Be quiet and you can be here, that’s what that means.  Otherwise Lan Zhan would have left, or shooed him away, or… something.

Well, he can be quiet.  Probably.  He can hunt, and that’s pretty much the same thing.

Wei Ying picks his way through the forest as carefully as he can.  When he looks up again he sees Lan Zhan drifting noiselessly toward him, and he has to be impressed.  He’s not actually levitating.  He’s just… really quiet.

Lan Zhan stops before they meet each other, and Wei Ying understands from his look that he’s watching something.  He’s marking the distance where Wei Ying will see it too, so Wei Ying makes his footsteps extra soft and creeps up to Lan Zhan’s side.

He ruins it with wordless excitement when he sees another flash of white: a tiny fluff of a bunny in the shadow of a nearby tree.  It vanishes into scrub the moment he makes a sound.  He starts to apologize and freezes when Lan Zhan, with no warning at all, puts a hand over his mouth.

“There’s more,” Lan Zhan breathes in his ear.  

And oh, wow, Lan Zhan is actually breathing in his ear.  He crowded close without Wei Ying even noticing, because who cares: close is fine, close is how people say quiet things in wide open spaces.  But the hand over his mouth is big and warm and oh, he’s making it damp by breathing on it, that seems rude, but he’s not the one who put it there?  And anyway, his ear is hot from a whisper he didn’t even understand.

There’s more?  More what?  Is he supposed to know what that means?  How is he supposed to concentrate when Lan Zhan has never stood this close to him without a sword between them?

He actually opens his mouth to ask: more what?   But his lips brush against Lan Zhan’s skin and he can’t speak.  He can barely breathe.  If he closes his mouth he’ll be kissing those fingers.

Then the hand is gone and he almost protests: because he’s dumb, okay, he can’t learn a lesson, and also because if he says something, anything, maybe Lan Zhan will cover his mouth again.

“Be quiet,” Lan Zhan whispers in his ear.  And right, that’s fine, whispering in his ear is a great way to communicate.  He’s definitely fine with that.

Except he can’t talk, how is he supposed to answer?  How is he supposed to share how totally fine he is with this situation?  He clenches his fists and then opens them, shaking out his fingers.  He’s just short of bouncing on his toes when he feels hands on his elbows, pinning his arms to his sides and anchoring him firmly in place.

“Can you not hold still?” Lan Zhan hisses, in the quietest, most judgmental whisper he’s ever heard.

One heartbeat to keep himself from laughing, another to keep himself from shouting.  Yes!  He can hold still!  If Lan Zhan makes him hold still, and he’s certainly doing a fine job of it!  He wants to say so, knows what will happen if he does.

So he shakes his head quickly: no!  No, he can’t hold still, he’s incapable.  If Lan Zhan wants him still, he’ll just have to stand there holding him forever.  Wei Ying won’t complain.

Okay, he might--

He’s looking at a bunny!  He widens his eyes, because he’s not allowed to say anything and he can’t move.  But that is definitely a bunny!  Under the leaves, not blending in at all, but motionless and easy to lose when he looks away.

There's another one!  It’s easier to spot them when he knows what to look for.  They’re very still, but they don’t look skinny or sick.  He can’t tell if their little heads are still sparkling or not, but these must be Lan Yi’s friends.  It’s too much of a coincidence for there to be two colonies of albino bunnies, even on a magical mountain like this.

“Lan Zhan,” he whispers, because he can’t not, but he does say it as quietly as he possibly can.  “They’re okay.”

There’s a long moment of silence, and he smiles at himself for expecting otherwise.  He didn’t ask a question.  He said something very obvious.  There’s no necessary reply to, they’re okay.

He gets one anyway when Lan Zhan murmurs, “Yes,” against his skin.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan doesn’t know what to expect.  This isn’t an unfamiliar challenge.  It is unusual that he feels he should temper his expectations somehow, and he doesn’t know whether caution or hope is more appropriate.

Should he expect not to see Wei Ying somewhere up ahead, so he won’t be disappointed if it’s true?  Or should he expect to see Wei Ying after all, so he can brace himself for that mercurial presence?

In the privacy of his own mind, he decides disappointment is worse than being unprepared.  No one but him will be affected by the result, and he is more willing to face uncertainty than regret.  So he reviews the reasons he is unlikely to encounter Wei Ying.

The far side of the mountain is forbidden, he reminds himself.  At least the area in the vicinity of Lan Yi’s wards: the same place they saw the rabbits yesterday, and the location to which he’s returning now.  He was instructed to monitor those wards in Lan Yi’s wake, though he doesn’t have specific permission to be there today.

Wei Ying has never had permission, and Lan Zhan has caught him there three times now.  But that’s no justification to believe today will be the fourth.

Wei Ying only wanted to know the rabbits are safe.  Now he does.  He doesn’t need to return.  The last time he was here Lan Zhan rudely violated his space, touched him without permission, and restrained him.  He didn’t seem to mind, but Lan Zhan is not a good judge of these things under the best circumstances.  

He found great personal satisfaction in the action, so his objectivity certainly can’t be trusted.  

Lan Zhan has come up with five valid reasons Wei Ying will not be here today.  He has only three acceptable counter arguments.  He can’t know or guess every factor that might contribute to Wei Ying’s absence.  Still, quantitatively, he has no reason to be disappointed.

When he sees Wei Ying after all, he realizes his mistake.  He isn't the only one affected by his lack of preparation.  Wei Ying likes to talk, and he hasn't thought of a single thing to say to him.

Lan Zhan stops, briefly entertaining the idea of turning back.  This was poorly thought out.  He is only arguably permitted in this area to begin with.  Wei Ying shouldn’t be here at all.  It would be better if they didn’t interact, and then--

Wei Ying looks up.  He’s crouched over something on the ground, a sheet of cloth or piece of paper, with a brush in hand and limbs going in every direction.  He can sprawl while standing up, but today he looks like he’s folded in on himself: contorted into some unusual but artistic shape, all his energy bent to brush and ink.

Concentrating, maybe.  For once.

Wei Ying raises his hand to wave, and Lan Zhan sees the black on his fingers before he notices the flicker of fur.  He’s startled the rabbits with his motion.  Was he… painting them?

It’s only right, then, that Lan Zhan should do as he’s indicated and join him.  Otherwise his subjects have been startled for no reason.

Wei Ying beams up at him as he approaches.  He waves again, in greeting instead of invitation.  Though there’s no sound, his mouth forms the words, Lan Zhan!

Some response is clearly expected, so Lan Zhan nods once.

Wei Ying reaches up to push his hair back and Lan Zhan almost grabs for his hand.  He manages not to move.  Wei Ying catches himself before he can smudge ink into skin, using the back of his hand instead and then tossing his head when that doesn’t work.

Lan Zhan very much wants to brush that strand of hair out of his eyes for him.  It’s why he stays standing.  The temptation is still there, but it isn’t practical.  He should go.

“Hey,” Wei Ying whispers, and Lan Zhan feels a tug on his robes.  He was trying not to look and now he has to: Wei Ying is still smiling up at him, head tilted all the way back and the brush in his stained hand.  He’s using clean fingers to play with Lan Zhan’s robes.

“Lan Zhan, sit down,” he adds, in a voice almost too loud to be considered a whisper.  “You’ll scare the bunnies!”

Lan Zhan doesn’t see any rabbits remaining in the vicinity, but he isn’t looking either.  He sits down: too close, the edge of his robes landing on Wei Ying’s, overlapping white on white.  Wei Ying smoothes out the part he wrinkled but leaves the rest.  He seems the opposite of offended, squirming closer and talking behind his hand as though it will keep the rabbits from hearing him.

“I was hoping you’d come,” Wei Ying says.  “Tell me the truth, Lan Zhan, did you come for me or for them?  I’m at least as cute as a bunny, right?  I know I am!”

He startles, the flinch irrepressible, and he doesn’t know why he’s surprised.  Wei Ying is shameless and wild and Lan Zhan has no reason to trust him.  He shouldn’t be here.

“Ah, ah, I’m sorry!” Wei Ying exclaims, no longer making any pretense at whispering.  “Don’t go!  I’ll behave!  Look, I’m painting!  I’m drawing the bunnies; we can just sit here quietly until they come back.  Okay?  Is that okay?”

He’s almost certain Wei Ying doesn’t know the meaning of quiet, but he’s grinding the inkstone while he talks and it keeps his eyes off of Lan Zhan.  It keeps his hands away from Lan Zhan.  And his pictures are very appealing.

They do manage to sit quietly for several breaths.  Wei Ying keeps his eyes on his work, not even looking around for rabbit models, but it isn’t long before he continues, “That means I’m right though, doesn’t it?  You think I’m cute.”

He can at least keep himself still this time.  Wei Ying didn’t whisper, so he doesn’t either.  “I don’t,” he says honestly.

Cute is not the word he would use to describe Wei Ying.

“Lan Zhan, why are you so mean to me!” Wei Ying cries.  There’s a smile in his voice and he doesn’t look up from his brush.  “Always correcting me!  Never saying nice things to me!  Is this how you treat all of your husbands?”

He closes his eyes.  The sound of the inkstone is strange in its familiarity, a domestic sound here in the middle of wilderness.  It’s comforting.  He understands what it means, and it holds Wei Ying’s attention.  Or he pretends it does, which right now is enough.

He feels a movement of air, but whether it’s Wei Ying turning to look at him or just moving his sleeve as he taps the inkstick and sets it aside, it’s hard to be sure.  Lan Zhan listens very carefully.  He hears the click of the brush handle and the swish of the brush hairs through ink and water.

He can hear the murmur of the river through the trees, but Wei Ying’s activities are too close or too meaningful to be drowned out.  He can hear brush strokes on paper.  He can hear leaves rustle as Wei Ying’s position shifts.  When he listens carefully enough, he can hear Wei Ying breathing.

No matter how long he listens, Wei Ying doesn’t speak again while his eyes are closed.  It’s a reprieve and a gift: his awareness narrows to the small movements he can hear, and his thoughts settle around what Wei Ying must be doing.  It’s a vision in his mind, and not a troubling one.

For the first time in days, his mind is clear and meditative.  

Chapter Text

Wei Ying can’t decide if this is the best or worst punishment Cloud Recesses has ever come up with.  It doesn't involve physical torture, so right there that puts it ahead of most of what the Lan Sect calls “discipline.”  They really have a terrible attitude about rules.

Unfortunately, constant daily exposure is also making him like Lan Zhan.  A lot.  Like, so much that maybe he'd rather see him smile than squirm.

So he's been handed one of the greatest opportunities for mischief, probably in the history of Cloud Recesses: a magical association with one of the Lan bloodline!  The whole mountain runs on magic and Lans!  Sure, they’ve updated some things to use talismans and charms instead of blood and spirit, but there’s plenty of foundational stuff they’ll never work around.  

And now he’s fake-married into the family!  He can go anywhere!  The women’s quarters let him in, the library has a forbidden wing (of course it does, this is Cloud Recesses, there's probably a forbidden closet somewhere), and when he goes over the wall at night the wards don't even go off anymore.  There are so many things he can get away with!

But what if he gets caught?  He would have laughed it off before (okay, he'll still laugh, that's not a question) but if someone figures out why it works they'll demand answers.  He can't tell them, and he doesn't know enough about the place to bluff convincingly.

He can't tell them because they'll want to know who helped him.  Lan Zhan’s been beaten enough for his mischief.  He can take it, apparently, but that's the thing, that's the problem.  That's what’s stopping him: Wei Ying doesn't want him to take it.

He doesn't want Lan Zhan to be hurt.  Not just because Lan Zhan has almost smiled at him twice now, and he'd really like to make it happen for real (what, it's a challenge, he likes challenges).  But Lan Zhan looks at those kids the same way he looks at the bunnies: like he wants them to be safe.  Like he wants them to feel safe.

And someday, Wei Ying thinks, it might be nice if Lan Zhan looked at him that way too.

Not that he would.  Lan Zhan obviously wants to protect people who need it, and Wei Ying doesn’t need protecting.  He’s going to be a great cultivator.  Everyone says so, even Madam Yu, even if she only says it to make Jiang Cheng work harder.  It’s still true.

He’s the best Jiang Sect has, and that’s not nothing.  But Jiang Cheng is the heir, and Wei Ying is just the kid they rescued from the dogs when he was little.  He’s good, he’s brilliant, but he’s not noble or anything.

He’s sure Lan Zhan wouldn’t care.  If it ever came up in conversation or whatever.  Lan Zhan acts aloof and old-fashioned, cold except when he’s fighting and rude except when he’s talking to children or animals.  But he’s nice, is the thing, he’s kind and careful and just.  Too just for his own good, really.

He wouldn’t care that Wei Ying comes from nowhere.  But Wei Ying’s met his family.

Well, his brother would probably be fine.  Lan Zhan’s brother gives him whatever he wants, no matter what he says.  Wei Ying thinks he and Lan Xichen should form some sort of club.  The Make Lan Zhan Happy Club.  It would be fun; they could have meetings about bunnies and loquats and his favorite shade of blue.

Right, so.  His brother would probably be fine.  But Lan Zhan’s uncle definitely hates Wei Ying, which is maybe a little bit, a very tiny amount, his own fault.  But mostly not!  Mostly Lan Zhan’s uncle is just boring and mean!

No one knows what his father’s like, since apparently he spends all his time in seclusion.  Which seems like a weird way to raise a kid, but Wei Ying’s parents are dead so it’s not like he knows.  He’d like to think they wouldn’t have left him alone if they didn’t have to?

All things considered, it’s probably better if he doesn’t try to meet any more of Lan Zhan’s family.

No that it matters!  He doesn’t need to impress Lan Zhan’s family!  He hasn’t even really impressed Lan Zhan, so he should definitely start there.  If there were anything to start, which there isn’t.

He rubs his thumb absently against the ribbon on his wrist while he wonders what Sect Leader Jiang would think of the second son of Lan.

Chapter Text

“Lan Zhan, would you ever think of marrying a man?”

He doesn’t freeze.  He carefully stops moving so that he doesn’t glare and his hands don’t shake.  He’s trying to train himself not to startle so visibly.  It’s a compromise between what he’s currently capable of and what he aspires to.

He wonders if becoming desensitized to Wei Ying is a hopeless task after all.  Logically it should not be: all sensation including emotion is finite, and therefore manageable.  But no matter what he prepares himself for, he has yet to reach the limits of Wei Ying’s shamelessness.

“Why,” he says at last, when he thinks his voice will be steady.  The fact that Wei Ying has waited so long for a response is significant.  He doesn’t know what the significance is.

“Why marry a man?” Wei Ying says with a laugh.  “Oh, I don’t know!  Same reason you marry a woman, I guess, except without the children?  Do you want children, Lan Zhan?  You probably do, the sons of Lan should have heirs.”

He breathes.  It’s a conscious effort.  

He can hear the shuffle of steps and the rustle of robes as Wei Ying slides around the practice studio on the edge of the training grounds.  It’s raining today, and Wei Ying pleaded for mercy on the children’s behalf: please let us train inside, Lan Zhan!

He knows the request was for the children, because he made training inside contingent on them spending half the session meditating.  Wei Ying hates meditating.  It’s one of the few things he’s objectively terrible at.  But he agreed, so they trained inside.

The children have gone, but the floor is still damp.  Wei Ying is drying it without being asked.  Lan Zhan doesn’t dare turn away from the practice swords to watch.

“Not, why marry,” he says, as evenly as he can.  “Why ask me?”

“Who else is here?” Wei Ying counters carelessly.  “And I’m curious, you must know everyone talks about you!  You’re fancy and beautiful and smart and not bad with a sword.  Your partner will be the luckiest person alive!  But you never even look at anyone, and I wonder why.”

Fury burns through the fear numbing his extremities.  The opposing reactions clash and tremble and flatten, like air in the wake of lightning.  He thinks his voice is very calm when he asks, “Are you mocking me?”

“Ah, no?”  Wei Ying doesn’t laugh this time.  It’s so unexpected that Lan Zhan doesn’t realize how taken aback he sounds until he adds, “I don’t think so?  I didn’t mean to!  Which part?  Everyone talking about you?  But they only say nice things, Lan Zhan!  Or respectful things, anyway, some people are afraid of you, isn't that funny?”

He puts down the practice sword he was inspecting for blemishes.  He wishes he could pick up his own sword and walk away, but he isn't done.  There can't be any cracks in the practice weapons, no weak points or rough edges to compromise a child’s training exercise.

“You're not,” he says, even though he knows he shouldn't.  This is a dangerous conversation.  He should ignore it like he ignores so much of Wei Ying’s inappropriate behavior.

“Why would I be scared of you?” Wei Ying sounds too distracted to be amused, and that does not bode well.  He's thinking.  Wei Ying is disconcertingly clever when it comes to interpreting other people’s reactions.

Wei Ying is clever at many things, but this is one Lan Zhan can rarely predict, given how little affinity he has for it himself.

“Lan Zhan, what did I say that--”  Wei Ying doesn't even finish asking before he guesses again.  “Is it because I said you never look at anyone?  And you don't like it when I talk about women, do you.  You always silence me, or you walk away!  Do you not like women, Lan Zhan?”

He doesn’t silence him or walk away.  He silences him and walks away, as he would like to do now.  This is a game designed to anger him.  Wei Ying hasn’t been so cruel since before the cave.

“Because that’s fine!” Wei Ying exclaims, the words suddenly bumping into each other in his haste.  “I mean, I wouldn’t have assumed--that’s why I asked!  I did ask, Lan Zhan, remember!  It’s just that you mentioned wives when you told me--oh, but you said… is that what you meant when you said it’s fine if you don’t have a wife?”

If this is supposed to confuse him, it’s working.  When have he and Wei Ying spoken seriously of marriage?  Before today?  Unless he suffered an unnoticed loss of both awareness and self-control at some point during the--

Oh.

“The alcohol,” he says flatly.

“Right, I’m sorry about that,” Wei Ying blurts out, still speaking at almost twice his usual speed.  “I meant to say it before, I meant to apologize, I really did: that was stupid, rude, mean, ah--I was a little drunk, could you tell?”  

Wei Ying doesn’t wait for a response before rushing on.  “If I could do everything about that night differently, I would, except for the part where you talked to me, and it sounds terrible now that I just said that out loud, but I really did like talking to you.”

He liked--

It doesn’t matter.  It makes it worse, because there’s only one thing Lan Zhan can say to that.  “I don’t remember.”

Wei Ying groans, hiding his face in his hands.  “Ah, don’t remind me!  Lan Zhan, please forgive this deranged simpleton who makes terrible decisions when he’s downed too much Emperor’s Smile.  This one apologizes profusely and endlessly and will understand if you never want to see him again.”

Lan Zhan finally looks at him, because no amount of sidelong glances will convey the degree of skepticism he feels at that statement.  “You will not.”

“I will!” Wei Ying protests immediately.  “I’ll totally understand!  I won’t accept it and I’ll follow you around apologizing forever until you have to change your mind just to shut me up, but I’ll understand the whole time!”

He doesn’t ask how that’s different from what Wei Ying does now.  The apologizing part, maybe.  It isn’t entirely new behavior, but it’s certainly recent.

“Unless you don’t want me to,” Wei Ying adds, after a pause Lan Zhan didn’t recognize until it was over.  “Ah, if there’s anything--any way I can make it up to you, just tell me.  Whatever it is, I’ll do it.”

His tone is too sharp when he says, “I don’t require reparations.”  It turns out he doesn’t like hearing Wei Ying apologize.  It’s as much a surprise to him as he supposes it would be to anyone else.

“Okay,” Wei Ying says quickly.  “So, wow, this conversation went a lot worse than I expected, and that’s my fault, none of this is you, obviously.  I’m gonna go before I screw up anything else.  Please think kindly of me if I die of shame before tomorrow, all right?”

As last requests go, it’s not particularly convincing.  “You have no shame,” Lan Zhan reminds him.

“I didn’t before, but maybe now I do!” Wei Ying protests.  “Maybe you’ve instilled in me an actual sense of shame, did you think of that?  Lan Zhan!  So skeptical!  Don’t you think people can change?”

Lan Zhan looks at him for a long moment.  Wei Ying immediately smiles, but the expression falls when Lan Zhan just keeps looking.  He fidgets irrepressibly.  Lan Zhan can hear the tap of his fingers against Suibian’s scabbard, and he regrets that they found no responsible justification for demonstrations inside.

When Wei Ying folds his hands in front of him instead, whether unconsciously or deliberately, he rubs his right thumb over his left wrist.  Lan Zhan looks away before he can reach for that wrist himself.  “I think some people don’t need to,” he tells the far wall.

“Don’t need to!” Wei Ying repeats, like the words are bursting out of him.  “Don’t need to change?  Aw, Lan Zhan, are you saying I don’t need to change?  I knew you could say something nice if you tried!  You should be careful, you know, I might start to expect compliments like this all the time!”

The damage, such as it is, has already been done.  Wei Ying knows, or will as soon as he stops to think about it.  The most Lan Zhan can do is make sure the disclosure is on his terms.  And that he remembers it this time.

“I will not marry a woman,” he tells the wall.

There’s a brief but unmistakable pause before Wei Ying asks, “But it isn’t the marrying part, right?  It’s the woman part?  You could marry someone who isn’t a woman…?”

It isn’t clear that this last is a question, but it’s easier to assume it is.  “Yes,” Lan Zhan says.

“What about your family?” Wei Ying wants to know.  He sounds neither sympathetic nor shocked, and his curiosity is likely genuine.  For all his arrogance, Wei Ying seems curious about everything.

“My brother is aware,” Lan Zhan says stiffly.  Lan Huan is the sect heir.  His future children would be the first to inherit that title, but Lan Huan isn’t likely to marry a woman either.  “We’ve agreed not to discuss it with anyone else until it's relevant.”

“Oh,” Wei Ying says.  And then, “Oh!  I won’t tell anyone, I promise!  I mean, if I got married it could be pretty much anyone, if that makes you feel any better!  Well, anyone who’d have me, which I know shouldn't narrow it down much, but I’m not around a lot of people who don’t care about titles.”

It does not, in fact, make him feel any better.

“Thanks for telling me,” Wei Ying continues, babbling with all his usual enthusiasm.  “I mean, I shouldn’t have asked, but Lan Zhan you’re so nice!  How am I supposed to stop myself?”

He is more than tired of this conversation.  “Practice,” he says shortly.  He turns back to the training swords and starts again.  Not because he can’t remember where he stopped, but because he can’t look at Wei Ying and he won’t retreat.

Wei Ying doesn’t answer. He’s so still for so long that Lan Zhan would think he’s left, but for the lingering energy and the vision in the corner of his eye.  Eventually he returns to cleaning the floor, and then to washing the washcloths, and then to dusting.   They’re both still there when the dinner bell rings.

“Hey, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying exclaims.  “Are you going to dinner?  I’ll walk with you if you want some company!”

He wants to ask what further entertainment Wei Ying could possibly derive from him today.  He’s aware this may be unfair, so he keeps his mouth shut and shakes his head no.  He does wonder, briefly, if there will be an argument over trays and companionship and working too much.

Wei Ying looks like he wants to start one.  But in the end he only says, “Okay, but.  I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”

The question is unnecessary.  Lan Zhan is being disciplined; he will be here.  Wei Ying is not (yet) shirking his discipline: he will also be here.

He nods anyway and Wei Ying’s face lights up.  “Great!” he declares.  “See you tomorrow, Lan Zhan!”

Lan Zhan waits until his figure has disappeared from the training fields entirely before he follows.

Chapter Text

He doesn’t know which bell is ringing by the time he’s awake enough to care.  The morning light in Cloud Recesses is dim and muted, but he’s gotten used to the diffuse glow before the clouds roll back in the middle of the day.  His tired gritty eyes appreciate it, as much as any part of his body appreciates being conscious right now, and he thinks it must be the breakfast bell.

Which sounds terrible: he’d be happy to sleep through it, except he’s so uncomfortable that getting out of bed couldn’t possibly make it worse.  He pushes himself up with a groan, aching and thirsty and generally disappointed with the world.  It’s not worse, but it’s bad in different ways.  He should really stop letting Nie Huaisang try to cheer him up.

He doesn't feel much better by the time he steps outside, but he doesn't realize how off he is until he mistakes Lan Zhan’s brother for him.

He's opened his mouth to say something (who knows what, certainly not him) when Lan Xichen smiles at him.  It's a small, polite smile, but this is absolutely not Lan Zhan and Wei Ying shouldn't be allowed out in public today.  He's going to make a huge scene and it won't even be on purpose.

For once, he does the right thing and shuts his mouth.

“Good morning,” Lan Xichen says at last.

That's it, but that's enough, it makes something in his brain engage automatically.  “Is it, though?” Wei Ying asks, and as soon as he tries to speak he yawns.  Like he only had enough air to stand, not stand and talk at the same time.  But talking is what he does.

“Because I'm pretty sure you're here about Lan Zhan,” he continues, “which means he's either upset because of me, or so upset about something else you're resorting to my very questionable distraction techniques.  Either way it’s bad news for him.”

Lan Xichen’s gaze is just a milder version of his younger brother’s constant challenge, and Wei Ying wonders if he should tell him: Brother Lan, you can’t intimidate someone whose life’s work is provoking Lan Zhan!   

Better that he doesn’t.  Lan Xichen probably knows, anyway.

“Is everything about you, honorable Wei?” he asks, with a cool and definitely false politeness.

Wei Ying doesn’t want to make an enemy of Lan Xichen, but he tried to apologize to Lan Zhan and it was refused.  Apologizing to Lan Xichen instead might make him feel better, but it won’t do anything for his brother.  “Honorable Lan,” he says, ironic and formal as he folds his arms.  “You’re standing at my door.”

“Yes,” Lan Xichen says after a moment.  “Perhaps that was a mistake.  Forgive me.”

He turns to go, and Wei Ying isn’t that proud.  He isn’t proud at all.  “Is he okay?” he says quickly.  “It’s okay if he’s angry with me, just--is he okay?”

Lan Xichen stops.  He doesn’t say anything, but he stops, and Wei Ying understands.  Prove it, he means.  Why do you deserve to know?

“Because he wants things,” Wei Ying says without thinking, “and no one knows what they are, and that’s terrible, because it means he has to figure out how to get them all by himself.  No one should be that alone, brother Lan.  Not if they don’t want to be.”

Lan Xichen looks over his shoulder, his gaze somewhere off to the side.  “Why do you think he doesn’t want to be?”

He’s muddled and sad and holding his left wrist without even noticing--until Lan Xichen turns around the rest of the way, looking down at his hands, and Wei Ying drops them hastily.  Lan Xichen doesn’t look up until he hides them behind his back instead.

“I don’t know,” Wei Ying admits.  Maybe if he could think he’d know what to say: he’s more disappointed in himself than the world after all.  “But I leave him alone when he tells me to.  I do, honestly, I swear it.”

Lan Xichen looks at him for a long moment, and maybe his gaze really is as intimidating as his brother's, sometimes.  “It isn't enough just to do what people ask of you,” he says.  “Being true to someone means learning what they can't say.”

He wants to say, I know!   But he doesn’t.  Not really.  Surely everyone can say how they feel if they try?  It’s just practice, like cultivation: the more you do it, the better you are at it.  Like Lan Zhan told him to practice… not asking him things, yesterday.

Lan Zhan told him to practice not asking, he thinks.  Wow.  What does that even mean?

And now maybe Lan Xichen is saying the same thing.

He wants to say, I can!  I will!  Tell me what he can’t say and I’ll learn all of it!   But if he can’t apologize to Lan Zhan through his brother, then he shouldn’t hear what Lan Zhan doesn’t say through his brother either.

“Okay,” he says at last.  “I don’t know how to do that, but I’ll figure it out.  Thanks for your advice, brother Lan.”

Lan Xichen just looks at him, so maybe they’re done.  Wei Ying bows.

Lan Xichen smiles.  “I’m not in the habit of saying mysterious things and walking away,” he says.  “My brother and I aren’t exactly the same, you know.”

It’s only a little bit funny, but the relief of it makes Wei Ying laugh.  “Lucky for me!” he declares.  “My poor heart couldn’t take it if you were!  What would I do with myself then?”

Lan Xichen’s smile widens, and it’s strange to see so much happiness on a face that’s so much like Lan Zhan’s.  Or… not strange, exactly.  Sad?  

It’s such a contrast, is all.  It makes him want to know what would make Lan Zhan smile--not like that, not necessarily, just… at all.  Even if his expression didn’t really change, it would be nice to look in his eyes and know that something had amused him as much as Lan Xichen looks amused now.

“I do like you,” Lan Xichen says.  It’s sudden, but he makes it sound smooth.  Everything Lan Xichen says sounds smooth, just like everything Lan Zhan says sounds important.  “I hope you’re the person he thinks you are.”

He wants to ask, who does he think I am?   But Lan Xichen can’t tell him that, not really.  Wei Ying wouldn’t believe him if he did.

Of course, if what he’s saying is true, Lan Zhan might not be able to tell him either.

There’s other ways than talking, though.  Right?  Like…

It takes him a moment, and he blames that on how terrible he feels.  But his sister shells lotus seeds for him.  She looks for him when he goes missing, and she gives him hugs without him having to ask.  She opens her window for him even when it could get her in more trouble than him. 

She talks to him, sure, but even if she didn’t he’d still know she loves him.

And love is hard, right?  It’s a hard emotion to talk about, let alone not talk about.  Whatever Lan Zhan thinks about him, it has to be easier than love!

“Ah,” he says, when he realizes Lan Xichen is still in front of him.  Has he been here the whole time?  Doesn’t he eat breakfast with everyone else?  Wei Ying knows he’s seen him in the dining hall before, although admittedly the sea of white is a little confusing.  

“I think anyone could do worse than trying to be half as good as your brother expects us to be,” he tells Lan Xichen.  “Are you going to tell me how he is, or should I go find him and see for myself?”

“He’s at breakfast,” Lan Xichen says.

Which means he won’t talk, Wei Ying knows, but isn’t that what they were just saying?  That he doesn’t talk anyway?  If Wei Ying is supposed to figure out his silences, why not practice over food?

“He seems fine,” Lan Xichen adds, “so he could be going through almost anything.  I know the two of you argued yesterday.  I just stopped by to pile on some guilt, really.”

Wei Ying perks up.  This is the kind of banter he understands.  “Did you!” he exclaims, careful not to question their “argument.”  He wants to know what Lan Xichen knows.  He doesn’t want Lan Xichen to know what he knows.  So he’ll take a stalemate and be happy with it.

“But you were going to leave as soon as I came out!” Wei Ying continues.  “Because I wasn’t good enough to guilt, am I right?  And now you think I am!  I’ve earned this guilt, graciously provided by Lan Zhan’s closest and dearest family, so I’m grateful for it!”

Lan Xichen smiles again, and Wei Ying thinks smiling Lans will make him dizzy if this keeps up.  “You’ve earned it,” Lan Xichen agrees.  “By accepting it.”

The pause afterwards is even longer than the one in the middle, and Wei Ying is sure Lan Xichen does like to say mysterious things and walk away.  He isn’t going to be the one to ruin a dramatic exit, so he waits.

After even more silence, Lan Xichen says, “He does talk.  If you let him.”

He didn’t know there was going to be more advice!  Wei Ying suddenly feels much more patient.

“More if you don’t try to make him,” Lan Xichen adds.

“Oh,” he says involuntarily.  He sighs at Lan Xichen’s curious look.  “Well, that’s all I do, isn’t it.  Try to make him talk.  I can’t help it; he’s too interesting!”

“You do talk a lot,” Lan Xichen says, but it doesn’t sound like a reprimand.  “He seems to like it.  I’m sure if you tell him why you want him to talk too, he won’t be offended.  As long as you don’t ask him to do it.”

Practice not asking, Lan Zhan had told him.  Which is strange, but… maybe doable?  No, definitely doable.  Doing something makes it possible, after all.  The more you do it, the better you are at it.

Wei Ying doesn’t want to get a lot better at not asking questions.  But maybe, around Lan Zhan, he could get a little better at it.  Enough that Lan Zhan would have room to talk if he wanted to.

“I’ll try it,” he says out loud.  

Lan Xichen nods at him.  “I’m sure I don’t have to tell you what he does say is worth hearing.”

Wei Ying grins back at him.  “Brother Lan,” he says with the greatest sincerity.  “I doubted it the first day we met, but I promise you: I’ll never make that mistake again.”

Chapter Text

He wasn’t surprised the first day.

He was disappointed and hurt, and angry with himself for feeling anything at all.  Wei Ying is not his husband, no matter how he jokes.  If he truly never considered the possibility that Lan Zhan is physically uninterested in women, then he’s not as observant as he thinks he is.

Lan Zhan was and is disappointed by this revelation.  But he wasn’t surprised by the quiet that came with it.  Not at first.  To see that consistently outrageous behavior subdued in the wake of their discussion was both understandable and expected.

Wei Ying is very… sensual.  He reaches for everything, eager to touch and hold and experience things at the closest possible range.  He eats and drinks with an almost embarrassing amount of enjoyment, and he lives in his body like he wants to become part of everything around him.  Lan Zhan sometimes wonders if his constant words are only curiosity, or an attempt to extend his senses in some socially permissible way.

Lan Zhan is his opposite in this, as in so many things.  He does not reach out.  He prefers separation.  Physical contact is distracting, food and drink a necessity.  The goal of cultivation is ultimately to free himself from these requirements.

But this is not how Wei Ying perceives the world, and perhaps Lan Zhan’s admission unsettled him.  Perhaps he questions their previous interactions in light of this information.  Perhaps he regrets his scandalous teasing.  Perhaps he sees Lan Zhan differently now, less favorably or at least less intimately.

Perhaps he removed the ribbon he's been secretly wearing on his wrist.

Wei Ying’s unusual restraint on the first day after their discussion was upsetting.  By the second day it's unbearable.  Their shared swordwork class is a nightmare of formality and avoidance.  Wei Ying is kind to the children and he still laughs with them when they giggle at his inevitable antics.  But he doesn’t try to coax Lan Zhan to join them, doesn’t tease him or interrupt him or ask five questions for every other sentence he utters.

He smiles at Lan Zhan, but he doesn’t grin or shout or swing his arms wide with enthusiasm.  He just listens, and nods, and acts like the respectful disciple he’s never been.  He is a model student.

Lan Zhan resents it bitterly.

Wei Ying stayed after the children left the day before, and Lan Zhan expects he will again today.  He doesn’t know why he stays if it’s only to clean and tidy without talking.  Lan Zhan is capable of doing these things alone.

Lan Zhan waits long enough for the children to bow.  For them to turn and leave the training grounds.  For them to be too far away to overhear when he says, very quietly, “Why don’t you speak.”

Wei Ying looks at him in surprise.  “Do you want to talk?” he says.  “About what?  I mean, something in particular, or just, ah, anything?  I’m good at anything!  But I also like specific things if you have something in mind!”

Lan Zhan looks at him, offended by his obvious discomfort when called on to interact.  Wei Ying is never uncomfortable.  Was never uncomfortable.  If they’ve broken over this, it’s the most agonizing possible confirmation that there was something there to break.

“Okay,” Wei Ying says, studying him more closely than usual.  “Should I guess?  I mean, you said not to ask but it’s a habit, sorry!  And, I mean, if you want to tell me, I’m definitely listening!  But you don’t have to.  I can guess--or not guess!  Should I just be quiet?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t understand a word he’s saying.  Which is more typical than he’d like, but Wei Ying said, you said not to ask.   Is he acting strangely because of something Lan Zhan did?  Something that wasn’t the conversation they had two days ago after all?

“Don’t be quiet,” he says at last.  It’s not something he ever thought he’d say to Wei Ying.  He doesn’t understand why it’s necessary now--does he think Lan Zhan doesn’t want him to speak?

Wouldn’t he be justified in such an assumption?

“Lan Zhan!” he exclaims, opening his arms wide as he beams.  “Mark your words!  You just told me not to be quiet; you know what that means, right?  I have so many questions!  You should think before you give reckless permission like that!”

The words both relax and puzzle him, because here is the reaction he expects from Wei Ying.  Yet even this stops too soon: Wei Ying says he has questions, but he isn’t asking them.  He’s quiet again, even after Lan Zhan told him not to be.  He’s watching… waiting for a reaction?

“Ask,” Lan Zhan says.  He doesn’t know what else he’s supposed to say.  Even when they first met, when Wei Ying still paused after every question, he didn’t wait for answers that didn’t come.  

“Ah, but you said I should practice not asking!” Wei Ying protests.  “I’m only trying to make you happy, Lan Zhan, it’s very hard for me.  Just trying to understand the smart things you say!  And then you tell me I shouldn’t ask questions; how can my poor brain keep up with all of this?”

“I didn’t,” Lan Zhan says sharply.  “Stop pretending to be stupid.”

“Lan Zhan, I’m not pretending!” Wei Ying cries.  He’s dramatic enough for an audience to applaud, and Lan Zhan does not appreciate his self-deprecation.  “I want to know everything about you and I can’t even ask to see if you’ll answer?  Even you should see that’s unreasonable!”

“I told you,” he says, as deliberately and patiently as he can after an entire class of children and Wei Ying, “to ask.”

“But I asked you two days ago!” Wei Ying exclaims.

“I answered,” Lan Zhan retorts, without waiting for the rest of it.  He’s sure there is a rest of it.  He doubts it will make more sense than what he’s heard so far.  “What about this has made you quiet?”

“Nothing!” Wei Ying says.  “I mean, except for the part where you seemed upset with me!  You didn’t want to talk about it, right?  And then I made you?  I didn’t mean to!  You ignore all my other questions; why didn’t you ignore that one?  You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to!”

“I didn’t,” Lan Zhan snaps.  To suggest that he has been consciously coerced into revealing himself to anyone, let alone Wei Ying, is offensive.

“You didn’t?” Wei Ying repeats.  “You wanted to tell me?”  

As usual, he latches onto the response Lan Zhan thought him most likely to ignore, but it doesn’t matter.  It doesn’t change the answer.  “Yes,” Lan Zhan says firmly.

“Why?” Wei Ying wants to know.

If his reluctance somehow caused Wei Ying’s two-day retreat into stilted and unusually proper behavior, then this is a mistake he can avoid making again.  “Because you’re wrong,” he says.  It’s easier than he expected.

“Me!” Wei Ying says with a laugh.  “Wrong!  How bold of you!  Tell me what I’m wrong about, Lan Zhan, I want to know!”

It isn’t hard with Wei Ying careless at his side, expecting so little and pretending to be ready for so much.  “You said I don’t look at anyone,” Lan Zhan says.

“You don’t!” Wei Ying declares.  “Don’t try to fool me; I know you!  I watch you all the time!  Every time I look at you in class, you’re either looking straight ahead or--”

He stops abruptly, and Lan Zhan waits.  He wonders if Wei Ying didn’t think it through until he heard himself about to say it aloud.  He wonders if he really didn’t notice, until now.  Maybe even now he’s trying to come up with some other explanation.

“Or,” Wei Ying says at last,  “You’re looking at me.”

Lan Zhan is careful not to respond until he remembers that Wei Ying somehow decided he wasn’t supposed to ask questions.  “Yes,” he says unnecessarily.

“Okay, so, can I just clarify something?” Wei Ying says.  “The other day we were--I was talking about your future cultivation partner!  When I said you don’t look at anyone, I meant, someone you might want to--someone you’d be interested in!  Not someone who annoys you into looking at him!”

“I know,” Lan Zhan agrees.

Wei Ying stares at him, and Lan Zhan thinks it’s worth the awkwardness and the embarrassment to see him honestly speechless for once.

“But then--” Wei Ying starts.  He can’t seem to continue.

“I look at you,” Lan Zhan says.  In case it’s somehow unclear.

Wei Ying’s mouth is open, and he does not look anywhere near as clever as he usually does.  “You look at me,” he repeats.  “And you wanted me to know, because…”

Lan Zhan waits.

“Ah,” Wei Ying says at last.  He’s reaching for Lan Zhan’s sleeve and there’s no telling what he might do here in plain sight, under a mountain of watchful eyes.  “Lan Zhan, does that mean I can…”

He steps back just before Wei Ying’s fingers would have touched his robe.  It’s harder than opening his mouth was, harder than answering Wei Ying’s questions.  It’s harder than waiting for his response.  But it’s the right thing to do.

“Do you not want,” Wei Ying begins.  He looks desperately uncertain.

“We’re in public,” Lan Zhan reminds him.

“Oh!”  For some reason, this seems to restore Wei Ying’s enthusiasm.  “Right!  Okay!  But Lan Zhan, you just admitted you’re interested in me!  What am I supposed to do?”

Lan Zhan considers that as objectively as possible.  He’s thought about the answer in great detail.  Most of his thoughts have been inappropriate to the situation at hand.  

“Two days ago,” he says instead, “you offered to accompany me to dinner.”

Wei Ying brightens, and Lan Zhan thinks these last few days were worth it after all.

Chapter Text

So began the dining hall wars.  

Wei Ying hadn't really thought about what it would mean to arrive at dinner with Lan Zhan, but of course they should sit next to each other.  Right?  It would be weird otherwise, to show up with someone (maybe in the middle of a conversation!) (they weren’t, but that’s not the point) and then ignore them as soon as you arrived?

Not that anyone’s supposed to be talking during meals, so even if they were having a conversation it wouldn’t matter.  Lan Zhan always sits with his family, and Wei Ying always sits with his family--mostly, except when he’s mad at Jiang Cheng, or Nie Huisang is hiding something they might get in trouble for.  So in retrospect, Wei Ying was probably meant to wave and let him go.

He didn’t.  Lan Zhan walked with him all the way from the training grounds, and he said six whole sentences on the way, and it never once occurred to Wei Ying that they were done.  Of course they weren’t done!  There was food!  There were two empty seats next to shijie and he had Lan Zhan with him, so it worked out perfectly.

He thinks he remembers Lan Zhan pausing, just inside the doors, but Wei Ying definitely didn’t drag him or anything.  He might have knocked the back of his hand against Lan Zhan’s elbow.  He might have whispered, “Hey, Lan Zhan, over here!”  He might have caught his eye and smiled… or he might not!  Who can remember things like that when Lan Zhan was standing right there, looking graceful and superior and not at all like someone who would willingly sit next to Wei Ying at dinner.

But he did.  He followed Wei Ying, and he took the empty place at the end of the table while Wei Ying scrambled into the one beside it, beaming proudly at his sister and sticking his tongue out at Jiang Cheng’s incredulous expression.  The rest of the meal was a torturous attempt to stay quiet while his siblings made faces at him and Nie Huisang threw notes at him and Lan Zhan ignored them all.

It was the best meal he’d ever eaten in the Cloud Recesses dining hall.

Well, not the food.  But the company.

He wasn’t thinking about it the next morning at breakfast--he wasn’t thinking about anything, it was too early--but maybe he looked around absently for Lan Zhan when he stumbled into the dining hall and found his sister more by instinct than alertness.  It was fine, she always saved room for him.  He smiled at her in thanks, then squeezed his eyes shut and tried to open them more decisively while Jiang Cheng whispered something to her from across the table.

He wasn’t staring at anything in particular.  He was just stretching his eyes.  If his gaze happened to settle on the Lans near the front of the room, and he happened to notice that Lan Zhan, who usually got an end seat because he didn’t like people reaching across him, today was squeezed in between his uncle and his brother at the very middle of the table, well.  Wei Ying kept watching.  Because it was different!  He notices when things are different!

Lan Zhan looked up, very calmly, and caught his eye from across the room.  He didn’t look away.

Wei Ying wanted to make his smile sympathetic, because wow, the Lans were being weird today.  But mostly he was so happy to see Lan Zhan that he couldn’t make his smile look like anything else.  Lan Zhan didn’t smile back, but he did nod once, and Wei Ying couldn’t do anything but grin stupidly at him.

It was possible that Lan Zhan’s brother smiled too.  It was pretty likely that Lan Zhan’s uncle glared, and probably tried to subtly curse him at the same time.  Wei Ying didn’t care then and he doesn’t care now.  Lan Zhan has made him impervious, invulnerable to all Lans except him.  It’s the best magic there is.

By lunch time, Wei Ying has figured out what he didn’t understand first thing in the morning: Lan Zhan’s family is making a statement.  A “don’t sit next to our second jade” statement.  Don’t invite him to sit with you, they’re saying, and don’t try to sit with us.  Whatever you do, don’t make a fuss at mealtime.

Wei Ying is thinking about making a fuss.

He thinks about it until the children’s class that afternoon.  Then all he cares about is Lan Zhan: watching Lan Zhan, talking to Lan Zhan, crossing swords with Lan Zhan.  The kids love it when the two of them demonstrate every ridiculous grip or guard or wildly impractical offense.  Wei Ying is happy to play up anything that gets him Lan Zhan’s complete attention.

He would also be happy not to have an audience for Lan Zhan’s complete attention.  He doesn’t know how likely that is, after yesterday.  We’re in public, Lan Zhan said when he pulled away.  Implying that if they weren’t “in public”... he might not have?

Wei Ying is the first to admit he didn’t see yesterday coming.  I look at you, Lan Zhan said.  Which, of course he does, Wei Ying goes to a lot of trouble to make Lan Zhan look at him!  Literally since the day they met, it’s been Wei Ying’s ongoing mission to make Lan Zhan look.  To make him react.  To be the one who’s there when Lan Zhan loses his composure.

And he has been!  Objectively speaking, he’s been very successful!  He’s seen Lan Zhan snap, yell, lash out, drink, and almost smile.  (Okay, he’s not proud of the drinking.  He’s very proud of the almost-smiles.)

It’s not enough.  Even yesterday wasn’t enough, and that’s… a little scary, honestly.  He never stopped to think why he wanted Lan Zhan’s attention.  Only recently did he even think about what kind of attention he wanted: that smiles are better than shouting, and Lan Zhan whispering in his ear is better than him slurring his words over a drink.

He likes it when Lan Zhan is nice to him.  Wei Ying just never really expected he would be, so he doesn’t know what to do now.  He doesn’t know how to make Lan Zhan keep reacting in this one specific way, instead of any way Wei Ying can possibly provoke.

He’s good at learning things, though.  He can definitely learn this.  He just needs more information, and more experience, and as much exposure to Lan Zhan as humanly possible.

Also if it’s possible to touch Lan Zhan, that would be… well.  He can’t know, but he’s pretty sure it would be really great.

The kids hang around forever after their class is over.  Like, to the point where he thinks maybe someone bribed them to stick around, to keep him and Lan Zhan from being alone between “punishment” and dinner.  It’s something he can imagine Lan Zhan’s uncle doing.

It’s a ridiculous idea in real life, though.  He knows it is but he can’t help thinking about it when one of the kids asks how they put away the practice swords and then all of them want to know and they trail after Lan Zhan like baby bunnies all the way to the studio on the edge of the grounds.

Wei Ying doesn’t seriously think about not following them.  He pretends he’s not going to, just in case they really are being paid off.  But Lan Zhan looks at him over their little heads, and Wei Ying is just as helpless as they are.  He leans against the doorframe while Lan Zhan patiently shows each child how to inspect their own practice weapon.

Then Lan Zhan tells them all at once, “That’s correct.”  He efficiently collects each weapon and looks at the door.  “Please demonstrate for Master Wei how to properly exit the studio,” he says.  “Do not forget to bow before leaving the training grounds.”

The children all bow eagerly, and Wei Ying tries not to stare (or laugh!) as Lan Zhan returns the gesture.  Wei Ying gets out of their way before doing the same, and every last one of them files solemnly out of the studio without another word.  He watches, a little suspicious and a little morbidly curious, until they reach the edge of the training grounds and bow again before turning back into playful children.

Playful children who trot away without a backwards glance.

“Wow,” he says, staring out at the empty field.  “That was impressive, Lan Zhan.  Did you just--”

The back of his neck prickles and he can feel a tingling warmth in his shoulder blades.  Between one heartbeat and the next, it’s distinct enough to make him stop talking even before the voice in his ear murmurs, “Close the doors.”

Wei Ying swallows, and he reaches out very carefully to close the doors.

Lan Zhan is standing right behind him when he turns around.  Wei Ying probably can’t breathe and definitely doesn’t care.  He didn’t imagine this.  Maybe a little.  But he didn’t think it would happen and he has no idea what to say or do.

“I would like to kiss you,” Lan Zhan tells him.  “May I?”

“Yes,” Wei Ying blurts out.  This is not a hard question.  This is an easy question with a very obvious answer.  “Yes, oh yes!  Please,” he adds, just in case politeness counts.  This is Lan Zhan, so it might.

Lan Zhan doesn’t smile, but he does lift a hand to Wei Ying’s face, laying long fingers over his lips.  He moves them right away, turning the hand to cup his jaw, and Wei Ying feels a thumb brush against his bottom lip instead.  He opens his mouth out of surprise more than anything.

That’s the moment Lan Zhan leans in, pressing warm, soft lips against his own.  It’s strange and sweet and Wei Ying has no idea what to do, so he holds still and lets Lan Zhan kiss his bottom lip.  Then the top one.  Then Lan Zhan’s mouth covers his and they’re breathing each other’s air, and he didn’t know any of it would feel this overwhelming.

Oh, Wei Ying thinks as he pulls back.  

Maybe his priorities are off, but he’s feeling sort of dazed so he doesn’t think it’s his fault.  Lan Zhan’s going to sit at the Jiang table this evening.  And every evening.  

His family can have him in the morning, but Wei Ying definitely gets him at night.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan is good at many things.  One of them is thinking ahead.  His recent impulsive actions have been out of character, but this in and of itself is not disturbing.  The more significant challenge lies in how it affects his ability to plan appropriately.

These are the circumstances: he watches Wei Ying.  He wants Wei Ying.  He’s waiting for Wei Ying to decide how much of that interest he returns.

They are technically, by the old rules of the mountain from the early days of the Lan sect, married.  In some sense of the word.  Nothing is binding without consent, which Wei Ying was incapable of giving at the time.  And no family today would legitimize a ceremony performed without its approval.  

The oldest wards of Cloud Recesses quietly recognize Lan Zhan’s actions, but there is nothing official or defensible about them.

Other actions could be taken to rectify this.  Lan Zhan could propose: with words and gifts and kissing, as Wei Ying requested.  Or he could… somehow do the opposite.  He doesn’t know how to dissolve a bond that wasn’t freely given and shouldn’t be recognized in the first place, but someone in the sect does.

Lan Zhan doesn’t want to, but it would be inappropriate to let the connection persist if Wei Ying chooses someone else.  As he might.  I could marry pretty much anyone, he said.  If they’d have me.

Wei Ying must eventually leave Cloud Recesses.  Lan Zhan has a limited number of days to convince him that an arrangement between them could be mutually beneficial.  And, pending success, to determine Wei Ying’s willingness to commit to such an arrangement long term.

He is aware of both the significance of his goal and the time constraints surrounding it.

There is no one in the courtyard when he knocks on Wei Ying’s door after evening meditation.  He and Lan Huan traded pre- and post-curfew patrols so he could visit at an appropriate hour.  Wei Ying is expecting him.

It’s still a relief to see the door open and to be met with Wei Ying’s bright smile.  It does nothing to calm his heart, but it reassures his mind.  These days are new and strange and uncertain, but not every aspect of the experience is unpredictable.

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying exclaims.  “You came!  Come in, I made something for you!”

Lan Zhan follows him inside, uncertain all over again.  Are gifts expected?  He hasn’t courted anyone before, but that isn’t an acceptable justification.  Perhaps he studied the wrong aspect of these traditions.

“Here!” Wei Ying says happly, brandishing a piece of paper with all his usual pride.  “See?  In memory of the night we met!”

It’s instantly recognizable: the moon over rooftops, full as it was the night Wei Ying first came to Cloud Recesses.  It’s beautiful.  He supposes he’s biased by the symbolism, but he doesn’t think that matters.

Wei Ying pushes it closer to him and he lifts his gaze in surprise.  “Take it,” Wei Ying urges.  “It’s for you!  I can’t buy you things, Lan Zhan, you have too much money for that.  You have to let me make you things instead!”

“You don’t have to,” he says, with some difficulty.  He wants nothing more than to accept what Wei Ying gives him.  

Nothing except the certainty Wei Ying gives it freely.

“I don’t have to what?” Wei Ying asks.  He says it kindly, not impatiently, and he doesn’t let his hand fall.  He just stands there, holding out the picture… waiting.  “I don’t have to make you things?”

That’s not it, and Lan Zhan shakes his head no.  “Give me things,” he says.

“Give you--”  Wei Ying’s already started to repeat it when he seems to understand.  “Oh!  I don’t have to give you things!  I would argue with you, because of course I do, you should always give the person you’re courting pretty things!”

His eyes snap to Wei Ying’s again: dark and laughing even when he isn’t, and those eyes are every confidence Lan Zhan doesn’t have.  The word “courting” sounds very different out loud than it did in the privacy of his thoughts.  They’re courting.  He is courting Wei Ying.

Wei Ying is courting him in return.

“But you’re not wrong,” Wei Ying continues cheerfully.  “I don’t have to, no one has to!  I just want to!  Please accept this humble gift, freely and very hopefully given to someone who deserves much more!”

He takes it quickly then, concerned that Wei Ying will find his manners lacking in light of this declaration.  “I don’t want more,” he murmurs.  It doesn’t seem like the right thing to say, but it’s true.  He wants this.

“Ah, that works out well then,” Wei Ying says with a grin.  He seems pleased when Lan Zhan looks back at him, but he blinks when their eyes meet.  “Oh, but I’m a terrible host!  Lan Zhan, do you want some tea?  You must, you always drink tea.  But is it because you like it or because you’re polite, I wonder--”

He’s dropped down beside the table, pushing paper and brushes aside, and Lan Zhan doesn’t want any tea more than he wants to see what else Wei Ying’s been drawing.  “Wait,” he says.

Wei Ying looks up, still carelessly shuffling half-seen lines and subjects out of the way.  Lan Zhan steps closer and kneels beside him, putting a hand on his wrist when he doesn’t stop.  “I want to see.”

Show me, he thinks fiercely, but surely stating his preference is more appropriate than a command in this situation.  Show me everything.

Wei Ying is very still, and he has a moment to wonder if he shouldn’t have touched him.  Perhaps it’s too presumptuous of him.  He doesn’t mean to impose his will.

Even as he lifts his hand, though, Wei Ying is turning his over.  He pulls back his sleeve, and Lan Zhan couldn’t have forgotten but he’s still… shocked.  It’s the only word he has to describe how he feels at the sight of the sect ribbon on Wei Ying’s wrist.

Shocked.  Possessive.  Pleased.

Wei Ying is not his, but seeing his gift on Wei Ying’s body is a tumultuous thing.  

Wei Ying makes a sound and he looks up, catching that gaze on his mouth before it rises to meet his.  Wei Ying’s eyes are wide and dark and not at all apologetic.  “Lan Zhan,” he says.  “Dear Lan Zhan, I hope it’s not too rude of me to say, but I’m living for the moment when you kiss me again.”

Lan Zhan slides their fingers together and lifts them, pressing his lips to the ribbon on Wei Ying’s wrist.  He hears a sharp breath but no protest, so he puts his mouth on the back of Wei Ying’s hand.  He cups that hand in his and turns it over, pressing a kiss to Wei Ying’s palm.

“Oh, wow.”  The gasp is enough to soothe his racing heart, if not actually slow it down.  “That’s--okay,” Wei Ying says, “sure, yes, no complaints here!”

No complaints, he thinks.  He must do this carefully, properly.  This is the part he studied, because he thought it would be the most important to Wei Ying.  He should have known Wei Ying would surprise him with gifts and tea instead.

Still, he doesn’t seem displeased.  He said he has no complaints, and it’s appropriate to kiss during these early encounters.  Surely this is considered early, despite the history of their acquaintance?  Lan Zhan doesn’t know.  He expects too slow is better than too fast.

It’s also polite to ask.  He forgot to ask.

“May I,” he begins, but it seems awkward to ask for permission to kiss now.  He could specify where he wants to kiss, but the possibilities tangle on his tongue.  He only means to kiss Wei Ying’s mouth, if he’s allowed, but if he were to ask for anything… 

“Yes,” Wei Ying says breathlessly.  “Please, yes, I want you to.”

He doesn’t think that’s conclusive, given the incomplete nature of the question.  He will hold to the intent of it, regardless.  Wei Ying’s mouth is very appealing.

Reluctant to let go of the fingers clasped in his, he puts his other hand on Wei Ying’s face and strokes his thumb along the cheekbone.  Wei Ying’s skin is as soft under his fingers as it felt against his lips.  They’re very close when movement makes him hesitate, but Wei Ying’s hand only finds his and cups it gently against his cheek.

It’s the first time Wei Ying has touched him while they kiss.  

Lan Zhan lets the warmth ground him, guide him, help him find the place where their mouths meet.  He feels Wei Ying lean into him, fingers curling around his.  His kiss is bright and breathtaking but the rest of him is so distracting that Lan Zhan fears for his own focus.  

He could wind up dazed, even helpless if he isn’t careful.  The feel of Wei Ying under his hands is both welcoming and addictive.  He must learn to manage this if he is to retain control--and control comes with measured exposure.

Having his hand pressed against Wei Ying’s beautiful face is a boon, since it lets him ease back while limiting Wei Ying’s ability to follow.  Wei Ying allows the restriction, eyes blinking slowly open as he stops trying to pursue the kiss.  His lovely, lazy smile does nothing for Lan Zhan’s resolve.

“That was very nice,” Wei Ying whispers, and he doesn’t sound like he’s joking.

Lan Zhan draws in a deliberate breath.  They’re so close he thinks he can taste Wei Ying in the air trapped between them.  “I didn’t mean,” he says, very carefully, “show me your wrist.”

Wei Ying only looks at him.  “What?”

Lan Zhan wants to kiss him again.  And again.  And again, because this is the way it should be: Wei Ying looking lazy and loved in ways Lan Zhan has never seen, while Lan Zhan holds him and keeps him safe.

“Just now,” he says, because lifelong commitments aren’t built on pleasures of the flesh, nor on fleeting desires and wistfulness.  “I meant, show me what you drew.”

Marriage is built on shared work and mutual interest.  Their work is shared, and increasingly so these days.  Their interests could overlap more than they do.  

Wei Ying doesn’t look any less confused, but his voice is still relaxed and easy when he says, “You want to see what I drew?”

“Yes,” Lan Zhan says.  “And how.  Can you teach me?”

Wei Ying’s sudden smile looks happy and fond at the same time.  “Lan Zhan,” he says, squeezing their hands together between them.  “Tell me what you want and I’ll do anything you ask.  I promise you.”

Chapter Text

“It’s not that the food is bad,” Nie Huaisang says, swinging his feet against the decorative bridge in the courtyard that was definitely not meant for sitting on.  “It’s more that other food is better.  Almost all other food in the world, in fact.”

“The food is terrible,” Wei Ying agrees, holding the sweet up to the sky so he can admire the light coming through it before he pops it in his mouth.  “You’re a lifesaver, brother Nie.  I would waste away without you!”

“It’s the other way around, of course,” Nie Huaisang says with a smile.  “Without your hunting and the lady Jiang’s cooking, where would I be?  I’ll tell you: I survived here without you, but I didn’t enjoy it!”

Wei Ying laughs, slinging an arm over his shoulders when he holds out the packet of sweets again.  “Likewise!” he exclaims, taking another one and rolling it between his fingers.  “Why does everyone go on and on about Cloud Recesses?  Without the company, I can’t think of a thing to recommend it!”

He sees Lan Zhan before he finishes the sentence, and he wants to be wrong even when he knows he’s not.  He’s not wrong.  That’s really Lan Zhan, just happening to pass by a courtyard he has no reason to be near this time of day, and the worst part is he’s probably doing it to be nice.  He’s probably doing it because he knows Wei Ying might be here.

And he is here, loudly mouthing off about Lan Zhan’s home, because he’s stupid.

“Ah!” Wei Ying cries, because he isn’t one to walk a road halfway.  “Speaking of company!  Lan Zhan!  Hey, Lan Zhan!  Hi!  Lovely afternoon, isn’t it?”

Lan Zhan pauses.  Not to glare, which is totally what Wei Ying would do if he overheard someone complaining about Lotus Pier, along with maybe throw something.  Lan Zhan just stops, and looks at him, and then he nods.

Wei Ying actually sits up, surprised and pleased and even more embarrassed now.  Lan Zhan just acknowledged him!  He’s been yelling after Lan Zhan since he got here: from the roof, across the courtyard, on paths and in the library.  Anytime he sees Lan Zhan he shouts hello.  It’s a game now, he doesn’t even mean anything by it… which is why he has no idea what to do when he gets a response.

“Brother Wei,” Nie Huaisang hisses.  “He just nodded at you!”

“Well of course he did!” Wei Ying exclaims, loudly enough that Lan Zhan won’t have to work to overhear.  “We’re the best of friends!  Why just last night he visited me in my room!  Can you guess what scandalous things we did there?”

He doesn’t have to look to know Lan Zhan’s staring at him, but he does anyway because it’s worth turning his head to wink.  Nie Huaisang looks when he does, probably missing the wink altogether.  “No, what?” he says.

“We painted,” Wei Ying tells him with great satisfaction.  “Using calligraphy brushes!  I’m sure someone so refined had never heard of such a thing, but he’s very good at it!  Would you like to see?”

Before Nie Huaisang can do more than nod eagerly, Wei Ying calls, “Lan Zhan!  Can I show him your flower?”

He wasn’t going to; he has no shame of his own but from now on it’s his sworn mission not to embarrass Lan Zhan more than strictly necessary.  Or at least, not more than he already does as a matter of principle, because obviously Lan Zhan likes that about him.  Right?  

Lan Zhan came by his room last night and sat down next to him and kissed him.  It wasn’t a dream, he’s pretty sure, he’s been carrying around the flower Lan Zhan drew all day just to remind himself.  None of it would have happened if Lan Zhan didn’t like the way he acts at least a little.

Lan Zhan isn’t staring at them from the other side of the courtyard anymore.  He’s walking toward them, calm and deliberate and smooth, and he doesn’t look upset.  Which… probably doesn’t mean much, really.

He stops just before the path turns, looking at where they sit on the curved bridge over white stones.  He’s far enough away that they don’t have to look up at him, and close enough that the words are easy to hear when he says, “You have it?”

Wei Ying is staring.  Of course he is.  He doesn’t even think about it at first; who wouldn’t stare at Lan Zhan’s pretty face and robes and long fingers curled around the scabbard of his sword?  He’s lovely and dangerous and all Wei Ying can think about is that mouth, a breath away from his while their hands tangled together.

Nie Huaisang bumps his elbow, and he blinks.  “Yes,” he says.  “I mean, of course!  Lan Zhan!  You are my very first and most talented art student!  How can you think I wouldn’t treasure everything you do?”

He pulls Lan Zhan’s drawing out of his robes and waves it around with a flourish.  He holds it toward Lan Zhan as proof, but when Nie Huaisang practically falls off the bridge trying to get a look at it, he turns the paper toward him.  “See?” he says, still watching Lan Zhan.  “Beautiful!”

“You taught him to paint lotuses?” Nie Huaisang asks.

“It’s a magnolia blossom,” Wei Ying tells him, “although I understand how the difference might be subtle to the untrained eye.  And no!  I didn’t need to teach him because he has natural talent!””

“Ah,” Nie Huaisang says, tapping his fan thoughtfully.  “Well, I suppose that’s to be expected.”

“It is!” Wei Ying agrees.  “Lan Zhan, won’t you join us?  Are sweets forbidden at Cloud Recesses?  Not that we have any, it’s a purely speculative question.  Asked for purposes of--”  

He glances at Nie Huaisang, and at the same moment they both say, “Education!”

Wei Ying grins, but when he looks over at Lan Zhan he knows he isn’t going to get away with it.  He only has a moment to brace himself before Lan Zhan asks, “Do you dislike Cloud Recesses?”

He sounds so… not cold.  Not aloof.  Not curious, exactly, but… earnest?

Like he cares about the answer, Wei Ying realizes.

Oh, wow.  He not only insulted Lan Zhan’s home, but he did it in a way that Lan Zhan took seriously.  Because of course he did.  Of course Wei Ying said it, and of course Lan Zhan listened.

What if he always has, Wei Ying wonders?  What if Lan Zhan’s listened to everything he’s ever said?  He never acted like he did, but he never acted like the kind of person who knows how to kiss either.

And Lan Zhan definitely knows how to kiss.  Which is a question Wei Ying really wants to ask, but he can’t do it in public and somehow he keeps getting distracted in private.  Whose fault is that, anyway?

“No!” he exclaims, when he realizes what he’s been distracted from this time.  “No, I love Cloud Recesses!  I was just telling brother Nie, wasn’t I?”

“Well, actually,” Nie Huaisang says apologetically, because some people are better at lying than others.

“Yes!” Wei Ying says, before he can go anywhere with that.  “That’s right, I like Cloud Recesses a lot.  Do you like it here, Lan Zhan?”

Lan Zhan hesitates like he suspects some kind of trick, and that makes Wei Ying feel worse.  Especially when Lan Zhan nods anyway.  Like he thinks he might get mocked, but he’s decided it’s worth the risk.

The way Wei Ying's family does, sometimes. It's unexpectedly familiar, and Wei Ying doesn't know what to do about that.

“Good,” he says aloud.  It’s softer than he meant it to be, but… Lan Zhan.  “Good.  So do I.”

Lan Zhan gives him a look that makes his opinion much more obvious than his words.  “I heard you,” he says.

“What,” Wei Ying says quickly, “complaining about Cloud Recesses?  I didn’t hear that!  Brother Nie, did you hear that?”

“Um,” Nie Huaisang says.

“Yes,” Lan Zhan says.

Of course he does, Wei Ying thinks.  He’s unreasonably fond of this open, honest, too-earnest Lan Zhan.  “Okay,” he says, before he can think better of it.  “Well, you can’t be wrong.  So I must be!

“I’m sorry I complained,” he continues.  “After all, look who I’m with!  Lan Zhan!  Nie Huaisang!  If Cloud Recesses has people such as these, it must be very special indeed!”

“You did say the company was good,” Nie Huaisang offers helpfully.  “Which it is!”

“It certainly is!” Wei Ying agrees.  “There are wonderful people here!  And cute children!” he adds, because that’s not nothing.  The kids’ swordwork instruction has been the highlight of his day for weeks now.  

“Also bunnies,” he continues.  “And lanterns!  And swords, too, let’s not forget.  And--”  His mind is just free associating now, one good thing after another, and he’s very lucky that he stops himself before he says, lan headbands!

“Sweets,” Lan Zhan says unexpectedly.

Wei Ying stares at him.  Lan Zhan just looks back, serene and unruffled.

Too good for this world, Wei Ying decides.  It’s the only explanation.

“Lan Zhan,” he says aloud.  “Come here.”

And he does, is the thing.  He walks to the bottom of the bridge and then, when Wei Ying waves him closer, he steps onto it.  It leaves him standing over them while he studies the courtyard from a slightly elevated perspective.  

Wei Ying doesn’t care about the symbolism of it all.  He just reaches up and takes Lan Zhan’s hand, uncurling his fingers and putting the sweet in them before he pats them closed again and lets go.  “There you are,” he says cheerfully.  “I have no idea where that came from!”

Lan Zhan lifts his hand to look while Nie Huaisang sighs.  “Brother Wei,” he says, holding out the packet of sweets again, “you are worth the years you take off my life.  I’m mostly… at least half-sure.”

Wei Ying is too busy watching the sweet disappear into Lan Zhan’s mouth to reply.

Chapter Text

The kissing made him overconfident.  He thought it was going well: he’s kissed Wei Ying several times now, and each time was not only enjoyable but exciting, making him eager to try again.  Wei Ying’s enthusiastic agreement seemed to indicate his behavior was welcome.

So after one of the children struck Wei Ying accidentally, the practice sword catching between his shoulder blades and refusing to bounce off, Lan Zhan thought he could offer some comfort.  In the privacy of the practice studio, of course.  After the children had left.

...When it was suddenly much harder to express interest in Wei Ying’s physical condition without feeling awkwardly obvious about his intentions.

Until Wei Ying grumbled about it, his good-natured complaints about the solidness of practice weapons and the strength of “kids these days” a welcome opening.  Lan Zhan thought he sounded appropriately concerned when he replied, “How is your back?”

“Ah, it’s fine,” Wei Ying said, waving it off.  But his hand went to the back of his neck, then down as far as he could reach while he rolled his shoulders and made an uncomfortable face.  “I should learn to spin faster, is all.  Those kids are quick!  You’d think I’d be used to it, anyway, what with getting punished for the--”

Lan Zhan does not think about punishment.  It’s a cause for reflection, not the subject of it.  He understands the pain, however, and he has never wished it on anyone.

He wishes it on Wei Ying… less.  Less than not at all?  It must be possible, since he’s sure it’s true.  He isn’t sure how.

“It’s fine,” Wei Ying repeats, swinging his arms around and shrugging his shoulders again.  “Hey, Lan Zhan!  Here we are in the practice studio!  Alone, and no one coming to look for us!  If I close the doors and ask very nicely, will you kiss me today?”

He hasn’t failed to kiss Wei Ying since the first day, even when he has to find reasons and locations other than this to do it.  He is envious of Wei Ying’s ability to simply ask.  It firms his resolve to make this new effort.

“Yes,” he says.  “May I look at your shoulders first?”

Wei Ying clearly understands the request, a grin lifting his hopeful expression into something more real.  “Really look?” he teases.  “Can I push my robes down and feel your hands on my skin, Lan Zhan?  Because no injury, no matter how grievous, could matter after that!”

Lan Zhan does not say, That won’t be necessary.   He does not say, A child hit you once with a stick.   Instead he holds Wei Ying’s gaze and says, “If you must.”

After asking in the first place, this is his second mistake.  It’s consistent and expected and he doesn’t know why he can’t back down from any challenge Wei Ying issues.  He’s only becoming more stubborn as Wei Ying becomes more audacious.

It’s a dangerous combination, but he doesn’t realize the full extent of it until Wei Ying sweeps his hair forward over bare shoulders to reveal angry red and purple under broken skin.  He was injured.  It’s not fine.  Lan Zhan’s palms tingle with both outrage and intent.

“It can’t be as bad as that,” Wei Ying says.  He sounds amused, and Lan Zhan wants to--

He wants to push him down and press healing into his body without permission.  He wants to wrap him in even more robes and never let anyone touch him.  He wants more than he can do, more than he’s allowed, and he doesn’t know why he asked for something he has no way to control.

“Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying is saying, “what, have I permanently marred my natural beauty with a moment’s carelessness?  It really feels fine!  It’ll heal by tomorrow--and you know what would make it feel better in the meantime,” he adds, a smirk in his voice that Lan Zhan has no patience for.

He puts his palm on Wei Ying’s back.  Skin to skin, with no warning or request.  Wei Ying stops talking and Lan Zhan pulls in a breath.  Ask, he tells himself.  Don’t do.  Ask.

“May I,” he says, forcing the words out past the choking desire to simply smooth away the damage and then reassure himself it's gone.  With his mouth.  “Strengthen your spiritual energy.  For purposes of healing.”

“Ah,” Wei Ying says, sounding taken aback.  “Yes?  No!  You don’t need to do that, it’s fine!  I’m sure it’s fine.  Don’t worry about it.”

“I want to,” he says quietly.  He wants to so much.

“Oh.”  Wei Ying sounds more surprised by this than he did by the suggestion itself.  “Okay?”

Lan Zhan chooses to interpret this as permission.  He lifts his free hand too, pressing them side by side against Wei Ying’s back, and he closes his eyes.  Not because he needs to.  Just because seeing Wei Ying is, as always, making it difficult to concentrate.

He gathers patternless energy behind his palms, gives it form and meaning and direction.  He lets it spill into Wei Ying’s skin, careful not to reach too far: he doesn’t need their energy interacting, Wei Ying pulling on him in yet another way he doesn’t know how to resist.  He stays as separate as he can and simply pushes.

Wei Ying groans.  It isn’t a pained groan, but Lan Zhan comes very close to yanking his hands away.  Are you all right, he thinks, glad he didn’t voice the question when Wei Ying makes that sound again and shoves back against his hands.

“Oh,” Wei Ying says belatedly, like he’s only just remembering he knows how to talk more than any ten people Lan Zhan sees in a day.  “Wow, that’s beautiful, that’s amazing, Lan Zhan, do you do this for everyone?  This is the best massage I’ve ever had and you’re not even moving; I don’t know how to deal with this!”

“No,” he manages.  He’s barely successful when it’s Wei Ying; he certainly can’t put his hands on anyone else like this.  The fact that he must be doing it wrong is mitigated but not dismissed by Wei Ying’s praise.

“No, there’s no one else?” Wei Ying guesses, but he doesn’t wait for the answer.  “Then I’m singularly lucky!”

Lan Zhan would ask but Wei Ying is talking.  He did ask to be kissed.  He didn’t specify where.

Lan Zhan gives in, leaning forward to press his mouth against the now-glowing skin between Wei Ying’s shoulder blades.  He can feel magic and power under his lips.  He’s aware of Wei Ying straightening, tensing, trying to push back against him again, and he doesn’t think the gesture is meant to be unwelcoming.

“Okay,” Wei Ying is saying breathlessly.  “I mean, at this point I’m only talking because if I don’t I’m going to make noises that are a lot more embarrassing than whatever words come to mind when you’re--ah, doing that, just like that, you understand!”

Lan Zhan didn’t ask for this and Wei Ying isn’t saying it’s all right.  Still he wants more: it isn’t enough, he’s restless and unsatisfied and he can’t be still.  He wants to push deeper, to feel Wei Ying’s energy welcome his.  He wants to kiss his way down Wei Ying’s spine, pulling the robes away as he goes.  He wants his arms around this body and both of them hidden somewhere more private than this studio.

He wants.  He can’t.  He thought because he could kiss he could do this too, but kissing has rules.  It has limits.  He understands the behaviors that are acceptable and the words he can use to negotiate them.

He doesn’t understand this at all, and he tears himself away before he can make it worse.

Chapter Text

If Wei Ying had tried to guess which of them would melt down over their make-out sessions first, he definitely would have guessed himself.  Because come on: kissing Lan Zhan!  That doesn’t even sound like a real thing!  It sounds like something he made up to distract people from whatever he’s really doing!

It would distract a lot of people, he thinks.  But there’s not as much distance as there used to be between the outrageous things he says and the delightfully scandalous things they do, and this is the second jade of Lan he’s talking about.  He’s already darkened Lan Zhan’s reputation enough.

So of course he isn’t going to tell anyone, but that doesn’t mean he wants there to be nothing to tell!  He wants secret meetings on the other side of the mountain, and sort-of secret meetings in his room at night, and all the stolen moments after their beginning swordwork classes in the afternoon.  He wants to talk to Lan Zhan and fight with him and lean over his shoulder when he’s drawing pretty, perfectly symmetrical flowers.  And he wants to kiss him.

He wants to kiss Lan Zhan so much he can’t stand it.  It’s all he thinks about when he can see Lan Zhan’s mouth, and it's all he daydreams about when he can’t.  Or, not all he daydreams about, but at least the most vividly realistic thing he daydreams about and that counts for a lot.

The unfairness of Lan Zhan getting to touch (and kiss!) his bare shoulders when Wei Ying couldn’t even look at him is outweighed by the fact that… well.  Lan Zhan did touch and kiss his bare shoulders.  He put his hands all over Wei Ying’s back, and he pressed bright, powerful energy into his skin without so much as a talisman, and that’s Wei Ying’s new favorite fantasy because it’s real.   It actually happened.

Lan Zhan actually let him pull his clothes off (at least a little) and touched him very deliberately (even if it was sort of medicinal) and put his mouth on skin that definitely doesn’t hurt anymore and probably never will again.  Ever.  

Then he pushed him away and maybe had a very Lan Zhan-like panic attack, which was somehow both the cutest and most disturbing thing Wei Ying has ever seen.

For future reference, touching Lan Zhan when he’s already freaked out about touching is a bad idea.  Now he knows.  Also, he’s quieter when he’s upset about something, which is legitimately terrifying.  

Wei Ying has two ways of making people feel better.  One is talking and the other is touching.  Neither of them works on Lan Zhan.  But the worst part is, he wouldn't have even known something was wrong if Lan Zhan hadn’t been touching him when it happened.

Of course, Lan Zhan touching him is probably what made it happen in the first place, but in the future!  If Lan Zhan gets upset in the future and it’s not about him!  Hopefully it won’t be about him.  But how will he know?

Watch for him to be really quiet?  Touch him all the time to see if he’s less okay with it than usual?  Do all the things Lan Zhan hates just to make sure he can tolerate them with his usual level of resignation?

His strategy yesterday had been to do the opposite of everything he wanted to do.  Not that he hadn't tried the things he wanted to do first, but when Lan Zhan looked like he might actually break, Wei Ying had two choices: leave him alone and get someone else, or pretend to be someone else himself.

He wasn't about to leave someone who looked like that alone, least of all Lan Zhan, so he pretended he was Lan Xichen.  He does talk, if you let him, Lan Xichen said.  More if you don’t make him.   So he let Lan Zhan stand as far away from him as humanly possible without leaving the practice studio--and he didn’t leave, so that had to mean something--while Wei Ying cleaned everything he’d cleaned the week before.  

Except the practice swords, which Lan Zhan eventually went over to and started to inspect.  Because that’s what he does, after the kids leave.  Wei Ying didn’t talk to him, and he tried not to look at him, but after a while it started to feel more like… something they always did, instead of something they were just pretending to do.

Wei Ying didn’t dare say anything else until the bell rang for dinner and he saw Lan Zhan go very still out of the corner of his eye.  “Ah,” he said, but quietly and without looking directly at Lan Zhan.  “I guess it’s dinner time!  I’ll go; they’ll notice if neither of us is there.  Unless you want--?”

He didn’t quite ask, but Lan Zhan said, “No,” anyway.  He said it, out loud, and his voice sounded normal, so maybe that was good?  

Wei Ying wanted to ask: desperately, achingly, he wanted to know if Lan Zhan was all right and what happened and what he was supposed to do.  But talking hadn’t helped, and silence had, so he didn’t ask.  He just nodded, and made himself walk toward the door instead of toward Lan Zhan.

“Wei Ying.”  

He stopped.

“Thank you,” Lan Zhan said quietly.

Wei Ying tried to take a deep breath, but it caught and he just nodded, because he didn’t know what to say anyway.  

He didn’t know--why didn’t Lan Zhan want to touch him?  Was that what it meant, that he got so upset after seeing Wei Ying’s skin he couldn’t talk?  But he hadn’t seemed upset at first, and they’d been kissing for days--he’s pretty sure Lan Zhan wants to touch him.  But maybe he doesn’t… want to want it?

He said he wouldn’t marry a woman.  He said he could marry someone who wasn’t, and marrying usually meant--but maybe not for him?  Maybe he only liked… some kinds of touching?

Wei Ying did wonder a couple of times if it could be him, specifically.  If he was the problem somehow.  But he didn’t make Lan Zhan do anything.  He doesn’t even kiss him without being kissed first.  And Lan Zhan had said, I look at you.

Wei Ying went to dinner because he had to.  No one had yelled or even stared suspiciously at them for all the time they spent together between beginning swordwork and dinner, but if they both started skipping dinner it would be a lot more obvious.  

He pretended not to see the second seat his sister had saved for him, for them, taking the one beside her and giving her his best everything’s fine! smile.  Which of course meant she stared at him worriedly the whole meal while he kept smiling and no one was actually happy.  He made faces at the looks Jiang Cheng gave him: they were all obviously variations of, did you kill him or what?   

Jiang Cheng also glared everyone away from the empty seat Wei Ying was trying to ignore, since the only thing he liked less than Lan Zhan sitting with them at dinner was the rest of the Lans forgetting that Lan Zhan sat with them at dinner.  It was very comforting to have a brother like Jiang Cheng.  

He walked all the way back to the training grounds afterwards, but there were regular disciples there and the practice studio was lit up and busy at the edge of the field.  Lan Zhan wouldn’t be in the middle of all that, so he turned back.  He skipped evening meditation, but his shijie snuck over to keep him company and he managed not to cry on her shoulder for once in his life, so maybe that means he’s growing up or whatever.

Even the next day, he’s not sure if that’s a good thing or not.

He is sure that it doesn’t matter if he can’t do whatever with Lan Zhan.  Which probably means no, he’s not growing up at all, but at least he isn’t sulking today.  He’s confronting his problems head-on.

By sneaking around to Lan Zhan’s back window first thing in the morning, because he’s married to a Lan, after all.  He can go where he wants!  

And what he wants, more than anything, is to know that Lan Zhan is okay.

...Seeing him with his hair down and his robes loose is a nice bonus, though.  Wei Ying closes his mouth on a greeting he thinks better of, setting his fists on the windowsill and resting his chin on them while he watches: just Lan Zhan, in the middle of his music.  Creative and pretty and peaceful.  There’s probably nothing nicer in all of Cloud Recesses.

He watches for so long that he finally realizes Lan Zhan knows he’s there.  It makes him smile.  And that, interestingly, is when Lan Zhan looks up and catches his eye.

Wei Ying waves from the open window.  “Hey, Lan Zhan!” he calls in a voice almost entirely unlike a whisper.  “Good morning!  Your music is almost as lovely as you!  How did you know when I smiled, Lan Zhan; do you have a special mirror that shows you everything while you play?”

Lan Zhan continues to look at him for a long moment.  He doesn’t say anything, but finally he looks at the place across the table from him.  When he looks back at the window and waits, Wei Ying beams.

“Come in?” he says.  “Does that mean come in?  Is it okay if I sneak in and listen to your music from such a privileged vantage point, Lan Zhan?  Surely the honor is too great!”

Lan Zhan looks down again, but this time when he looks back he says, “Come in.”

Wei Ying scrambles in through the window, which he’s good at partly because the windows here are much bigger than Lotus Pier and partly because he’s always been very motivated.  Never more so than now, when he’s on one side and Lan Zhan’s on the other.

Not for long, and he takes the invitation as far as he dares, bounding over to the table and sprawling to one side of it instead of sitting down across from Lan Zhan.  It’s an intermediate step: he’s skipping the opening step because he listened for a long time and apparently Lan Zhan knew he was there all along.  Besides, he can always double back.  It’s pushing forward that’s hard.

A true sword doesn’t advance until others retreat, Lan Zhan says.  And okay, he has to make space, he gets that.  But they can’t both be constantly making space.  They have to be in the space too, or what’s the point?  If they both retreat, they’ll just spend all their time… not with each other.  Running away.

Someone has to give chase, and Wei Ying is always willing to step up and be that person!

“Thanks, Lan Zhan,” he chirps, putting his elbow on his bent knee and resting his head on his hand.  “This is very beautiful, what you’re playing.  Do you play it every morning?”

Lan Zhan looks at him, but he doesn’t say, sit properly.   He doesn’t say, why are you here?   He just looks, and then he says, “Yes,” and it actually takes a moment for Wei Ying to realize he’s answered the question.

“Do you!” he exclaims, sitting up a little straighter.  This is the opposite of being glared back to an appropriate distance, and Wei Ying takes advantage of it to scoot closer under cover of rearranging his body.  “Can you teach me to play, do you think?”

He didn’t plan to ask that.  It just slipped out, and he doesn’t want to take it back.  

Especially when Lan Zhan continues to look at him: not ignoring him or silently warning him or anything.  Just looking, like he sees him.  And then Lan Zhan says, “Yes.”

Right now Wei Ying doesn’t even care how early it is, because this is definitely the best part of the day.

Chapter Text

Wei Ying spends a day and a half not asking why he got upset in the practice studio.  

It is not, Lan Zhan thinks, because he doesn’t care.  He expects it’s the opposite: Wei Ying cares a great deal.  He seems aware that Lan Zhan has no idea what to say, or even how to respond when questioned.  He stopped asking when it made everything worse, but he certainly didn’t stop wondering.  He’s thinking through the possibilities.

Lan Zhan is likewise aware that his reaction is not Wei Ying’s responsibility.  He knows this won’t matter, and only partly due to significant self-interest: Wei Ying wants to be touched.  Crucially, he wants to be touched by Lan Zhan.  So he wants to know what stands in the way of it.

But Wei Ying is also kind and curious and insatiably driven to help others.  If he decides there’s something he can do to make Lan Zhan happier, it will take more strength of will than Lan Zhan has to stop him.

He must not let it come to that.  He will not let Wei Ying shoulder this burden alone, especially when it should be his own to bear.  He doesn’t know what to say, but words are how Wei Ying understands the world.  So he will find them.

It’s easier when he’s surrounded by familiar things.  It’s easier when there’s something else to focus on, something he knows better than himself.  And it’s easier when he’s desperately motivated by the close and forgiving proximity of exactly what he wants.

That doesn’t make it easy, but Wei Ying has given up pretending he’s not leaning against him while Lan Zhan patiently manipulates his fingers on the strings.  He’s warm and relaxed and the comforting scents of sleep and mischief cling to him in equal measure.  He’s awake, and he is possibly paying attention.  Whether it’s to the instruction or to their tangled fingers is unclear.

Lan Zhan knows he doesn’t rouse before breakfast without extenuating circumstances: the pillow creases hadn’t faded from his cheeks by the time he snuck in the back window again, leaves in his hair and laughter in his eyes.  At this hour Wei Ying’s very presence is flattering.  Yet still he offers more, and Lan Zhan will take everything he’s allowed.

“Toward you,” he murmurs, when Wei Ying’s thumb slips.  It’s easier, he reminds himself: concentrate on the strings, their sound, a body for once slow and relaxed against his.  “I like this.”

“What?” Wei Ying says, because of course he’s always listening.  Of course it wouldn’t be that easy.  “Lan Zhan, did you say you like this?  You mean the instrument, right?  But not when I’m playing it, I bet!  Or using it, because what I’m doing isn’t really playing, is it--”

If he’s awake enough for endless chatter, he’s awake enough to manipulate the strings correctly.  Lan Zhan reluctantly lets go of his hand and puts his own beside it instead of on top of it.  “Do what I do.  For a reward.”

“A reward!”  Wei Ying moves as though he’s going to sit up, and Lan Zhan is disappointed for the moment it takes him to see through the feint.  Wei Ying is only shifting to sit more solidly against him, his posture terrible but the slide of his body very welcome.  “Why didn’t you say so before!  Dear Lan Zhan, what’s my reward?”

“I want to kiss you,” Lan Zhan tells him.  It’s not a request, but he’s certainly seeking permission.  “One kiss for each instruction correctly carried out.”

“Ooh,” Wei Ying says with a laugh, shifting against him again.  “I like it!  Okay!  Tell me to do something!”

Lan Zhan has no intention of telling him.  He flicks his finger against one of the strings and waits for Wei Ying to mimic the action.  He’s easily distracted, so it’s a moment before he remembers: do what I do.

Wei Ying does it.  Poorly.

“Adequate,” Lan Zhan decides.  It’s much more important that he kiss Wei Ying than it is that Wei Ying actually learns to play.  He presses his face into the wild, ruffled hair he’s been trying to ignore and kisses Wei Ying’s temple.

“Mmm,” Wei Ying says.  “Apology accepted.”

He presses his thumb against a string, and this time Wei Ying is quick but so inept he can’t excuse it.  “No,” he says.

Wei Ying does it again without waiting for additional instruction, and Lan Zhan tells him, “No,” more firmly.

Wei Ying, of all the irritating responses, laughs.  “Lan Zhan!” he says.  “Are you impatient with me?  Because it sounds like you find my effort lacking!”

“I want to kiss you,” Lan Zhan reminds him.  “Your lack of effort is making it difficult.”

“How rude of me!” Wei Ying exclaims, resettling his body in a way that has him--unmistakably now--sitting in Lan Zhan’s lap.  His left hand strays to Lan Zhan’s knee, which he pats fondly.  “What if I put my effort into something else?”

“No,” Lan Zhan repeats.  He doesn’t know how to play Wei Ying’s games.  He does know how to give lessons.  “Do what I do.”

He presses his thumb to the string again, and this time Wei Ying imitates him exactly.  The sound it produces is not comparable, but mechanically his actions are beyond reproach.  Lan Zhan kisses lower and further this time, lingering just under his eye.  He takes in the scent of Wei Ying’s skin and the flutter of eyelashes against his cheek.

“Oh,” Wei Ying breathes.

Lan Zhan wraps an arm around him to steady him while he unfolds his legs.  Wei Ying falls into place between them like he’s been trying to get there all along.  He has been, Lan Zhan is sure.  Lan Zhan leans into him so he can reach the strings with both hands, pressing his entire front hard against Wei Ying’s back.

“Oh!” Wei Ying says again, loud and pleased and so unashamedly close.  “Lan Zhan, I approve of this teaching method!  Please tell this eager student what he can do to learn more!”

He plucks another string, modified this time by his other hand, and Wei Ying repeats it immediately.  Perfectly.  Like it really is as simple as applying himself.

Lan Zhan considers asking him to turn his head, but in the end he buries his face in Wei Ying’s neck and kisses him until he can’t remember the question at all.  It is, he thinks, an excellent solution.  Especially when Wei Ying squirms deliciously against him, caged by his arms and trapped between Lan Zhan and the strings.

He doesn’t act trapped.  He feels barely restrained, like he might slip away at any moment.  Like he could escape from anything: any challenge, any difficulty.  Any love or desire.  Any person who tried to hold him.

He wants to keep kissing forever.  He knows this is impractical, and also, Wei Ying was wrong again.  So Lan Zhan pulls back just far enough to whisper in his ear, “I didn’t mean the music.  Or the instrument.”

“What?” Wei Ying mumbles.  He’s tipped his head to one side, like he’s inviting Lan Zhan back to his neck.  “Now?”

“Before,” Lan Zhan says.  “You asked what I like about this.  It’s you.”

There’s a pause, and then Wei Ying exclaims, “Lan Zhan!  The nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me; of course it would come from you!”

He doubts this is true, but he silently vows to try.  Wei Ying praises him often enough.  He will find a way to return the favor.

Chapter Text

The thing is, Wei Ying knows he's lucky.  He doesn't need someone like Jin Zixuan to remind him.  He doesn’t have an entourage or a title or robes with actual gold woven into them, but he has a home.  He has a brother and a sister.  

And right now, here at Cloud Recesses, he has Lan Zhan.

So there’s no reason for him to be upset when he arrives early at the training grounds and finds Lan Zhan in the middle of the Jin circus.  He has his sword out: easy, natural, the way Lan Zhan always looks with a sword except when he’s actively wielding it.  Then he’s focused and shining and deadly.

He isn’t for the Jins.  Wei Ying bites his lip to keep from calling out, from shouting and running and five other forbidden things at the same time.  Stop, he tells himself.  Breathe.   He wraps his fingers around his left wrist and squeezes hard, because he promised.  He promised himself: no more getting Lan Zhan in trouble.

Making a scene with any of the Jins would be bad.  Calling out Jin Zixuan would be the worst.  Especially here, with swords already drawn and Lan Zhan looking like justice personified.  Lan Zhan will try to stop him.  Wei Ying will be furious.  The next punishment won’t be adorable children and stealing kisses before dinner.

Wei Ying hasn’t been beaten in weeks, but more importantly, Lan Zhan hasn’t been beaten.  Lan Zhan hasn’t so much as knelt.  Kind, strong, perfect Lan Zhan has been a model student who fools around with Wei Ying when no one’s looking.  

That’s how it’s going to stay.

Wei Ying breathes, sliding his hand into his sleeve and digging his fingers under the ribbon when Jin Zixuan lifts his sword.  You’ll be furious, he reminds himself.  Don’t be furious.   But Lan Zhan says it’s easier to do than to not do, and saying “don’t” is a reminder, not a solution.

Wei Ying thinks he could use a lot of reminders right about now, but for Lan Zhan’s sake he tries to think of a solution.  What can he do that isn’t being furious?  He can’t leave.  He shouldn’t leave; he’s supposed to be here.  And here's Jin Zixuan, sticking his stupid face where it isn’t wanted--which is everywhere--crossing swords with his Lan Zhan.

Lan Zhan is his to fight.  Jin Zixuan has terrible footwork and wouldn't have made it as a disciple if he wasn’t the Jin heir.  He doesn’t deserve to attack Lan Zhan.

Lan Zhan almost disarms him, and Wei Ying smirks.

That’s what he can do.  Instead of being furious, he can be proud.

But Jin Zixuan smiles too.  Wei Ying can see it from here, and what does that gaudy bird have to smile about?  He can’t smile at Wei Ying’s sister, the best and purest person in the world, but he can smile when Lan Zhan almost knocks his own sword out of his hand?

Although, Wei Ying admits to himself, on a list of the best people in the world, obviously Lan Zhan would have to be… well, somewhere on there.  Near the top.  He deserves smiles too.  It’s just--Jin Zixuan.  Ugh.  What good is he?

Then Lan Zhan nods, which is almost as infuriating as him getting in Wei Ying’s way would be, because his nods are for Wei Ying. He worked to earn that acknowledgment!  What’s Jin Zixuan done, other than being glittery and rich and bad with a sword?

Lan Zhan sheaths his blade, and Jin Zixuan’s First Disciple bounces on her toes until he puts his away too, and then she dances in close and they’re all--congratulating him?  Is that what Jins look like when they’re happy?  Probably?

They don’t hang around, which is good because children who are actually supposed to be on the training grounds are on their way, but they do walk past Wei Ying as they leave and that’s… not quite as bad as watching them surround Lan Zhan, but close.  He bows, but only because he can keep his fingers on the ribbon when he does it.  Breathe, he thinks.

Be proud, he thinks in the next instant, when Jin Zixuan gives him the smallest possible bow in return, and Wei Ying reminds himself that he just watched Lan Zhan be so much better at everything than this fussy golden boy.  So much better, he thinks, baring his teeth in something that’s not anything like a smile.  At everything.

He waits for the last of them to pass him before he turns to glare after them, making faces they don’t see but can probably feel, given the strength of his loathing.  Stupid Jins.  Being golden and fancy and noble.

When he finally turns back, he finds Lan Zhan almost beside him, long strides quiet and a neutral expression on his face.  And wow, it’s a tragedy that he didn’t get to watch Lan Zhan walk across the field, that he let anything be more important than Lan Zhan coming for him.  Even if he’s only doing it to make sure Wei Ying doesn’t follow them and start trouble.

He’s done that once or twice.  To be fair.

“Hi,” he says, and he didn’t mean to sound… like that.  He meant to be cheerful!  Because he’s meeting Lan Zhan!  If only he hadn’t been reminded of Jin Zixuan on the way.

“Hello,” Lan Zhan says after a moment.

Wei Ying stares at him in surprise.  That, right there, is almost enough to make him forget Jin Zixuan exists.  “Lan Zhan!  Did you just say hello to me?  Did you just reply to my greeting with your own, which is completely unnecessary?  We’re both here!  We both know we’re here!  What do we have to say hello for?”

Lan Zhan looks at him, and his expression doesn’t change.  He looks very… non-judgmental.  “You’re upset,” he says.

Wei Ying feels all the effort go out of him in a rush.  “Yeah,” he admits.  He’s making a face, and he didn’t mean to.  He didn’t mean to act all downtrodden.  “Stupid Jin Zixuan.  What’s he doing here?”

“Training,” Lan Zhan says.  Because of course he was, and it’s none of Wei Ying’s business.  It’s nice of Lan Zhan to say that much, really.  Then he adds, “He fears losing his sword.  He asked for my recommendation.”

Wei Ying scoffs.  “Did you recommend he not try to fight anyone?” he demands.

“I did not,” Lan Zhan says evenly.  

Wei Ying presses his lips closed.  Lan Zhan is very polite.  More polite than Jin Zixuan.  More everything than Jin Zixuan.  But--

He’s like them, isn’t he.  Like the Jins.  A little.  He’s important and respected and so smart.  So practiced.

So beautiful.

Wei Ying doesn’t care, really, but Lan Zhan fits with the Jins.  A tiny bit.  Just at a distance, and only if you don’t know any of them, but still.  They’re all… powerful.  In a way Wei Ying will never be.

“I don’t want you to be upset,” Lan Zhan says.  It’s abrupt and awkward and probably the most touching thing Wei Ying has ever heard.  Until he adds, “Can I help.”

It’s stiff, and it doesn’t quite come out as a question, but it’s Lan Zhan.  Asking if there’s anything he can do to make Wei Ying feel better.  Which is not only new and unbearably sweet, but also a great opportunity.

“Yes,” Wei Ying says.  “Yes, you can!  Lan Zhan, you can tell me that you like me better than Jin Zixuan.  That’s true, right?  I think you like me that much!”

Lan Zhan turns to face him, considering him with all the weight of that inscrutable gaze.  Wei Ying isn’t nervous.  Lan Zhan might fit in with the Jins--a tiny bit, and only from a distance!--but Wei Ying knows him and knows what he’s not.  He’s not a liar.  And he likes Wei Ying a lot.

“I like you,” Lan Zhan says at last, “better than Jin Zixuan.”

Wei Ying beams at him, because it’s a stupid thing but it makes him feel better, and Lan Zhan gave it to him.  Just like that.  He’s opening his mouth to say so, or thank him, or just anything, when Lan Zhan continues.

“I like you,” he says, slowly and deliberately, “better than anyone.”  And that’s the moment he really hesitates (which is good because Wei Ying is not going to cry, he’s not ) before he adds, “Except my brother.  You’re equal in my estimation.”

Okay, it’s possible his eyes are hot with tears, and he needs a strong breeze or maybe a few moments alone, but how is that his fault?  He doesn’t deserve this!  Lan Zhan doesn’t lie, but no one could blame him for keeping things to himself.  Or being ambiguously non-specific for the sake of politeness and harmony in Cloud Recesses.

But then Lan Zhan mentioned his brother, and Wei Ying knows.  He knows this is the absolute truth as far as Lan Zhan’s concerned, because if it weren’t--if this were a joke--why bother with exceptions?

Exceptions are what make things true, and Wei Ying knows what he has to do.  A truth for a truth.  It’s the least he can do and the most he has to offer.

“Except for my sister,” he says solemnly.  He’s only joking the littlest bit by leaving out Jiang Cheng.  “I like you better than anyone too.”

The softening of Lan Zhan’s serious expression into something gentler and more pleased is very much like a smile.

Chapter Text

He stands by the fountain outside the dining hall, ostensibly studying the play of water and light.  It’s a meditative locus of great value on a heavily traveled path.  Lan Zhan is not meditating.

The location offers a comprehensive view of those entering the dining hall, as well as plausible deniability should someone assume he’s waiting for a particular audience.  He is, of course.  But in his experience, few people are willing to question him when he stands still and fixes his gaze on something.

Jiang Yanli arrives significantly before the lunch hour, as expected.  She is in company, which he did not foresee.  There is no obvious reason this should change his plans.  He steps around the fountain and pauses by the path as they approach.

They too pause, clearly surprised, perhaps expecting him to cross in front of them.  

“Lady Jiang,” he says, bowing carefully to her and then to her companion.  “Lady Luo.”

Jiang Yanli hesitates just long enough that they bow together, greeting him with, “Honorable Lan,” at the same time.  He wonders if that hesitation was training, intentional decorum that kept them from speaking over each other, or if she was surprised to be addressed.

“Lady Jiang,” he says again.  “May I speak with you.”  It’s rude to ask without warning.  He knows this, and she is Wei Ying’s sister.  Efficiency is not the only consideration.  

“I apologize,” he adds carefully.  “For interrupting your--conversation.”  Were they conversing?  They had been smiling when he first saw them, but not speaking.

“Of course,” Jiang Yanli says quickly.  She looks at Luo Qingyang, who nods.  The Jins’ First Disciple gives him a look that’s beyond reproach when she bows again.  But he sees her touch Jiang Yanli’s arm before she continues, and she looks back at them before disappearing into the dining hall.

Lan Zhan does not invite Jiang Yanli to precede him.  He does not require so much privacy they must leave the area, and she would have no reason to grant it if he asked.  He does step back toward the fountain, pacing to the far side and waiting for her to follow.  The noise of the water will prevent casual eavesdropping.

When Jiang Yanli stops across from him, she folds her hands and waits politely.  He doesn’t know her well; they’ve interacted only briefly and never alone.  But it seems she isn’t much like her brother at all.

“I wish to formally court Wei Ying,” he tells her.  “He values your opinion over all others.  I humbly request your advice and assistance in presenting a successful suit.”

Jiang Yanli studies him a moment too long, and he wonders if some part of his explanation caused offense.  He thought it covered the facts, his request, and his reason for making it of her.  Perhaps it was too concise.  Or perhaps it was too much at once: should he have made sure she understood his intentions before asking her to be complicit?

“Honorable Lan,” she says at last.  “Please understand, there’s nothing more important to me than my brother’s happiness.  If this is something he wants, then of course I’ll help.”

Lan Zhan considers this.  The unspoken warning is twofold: he must know Wei Ying’s mind before he proceeds, and if Wei Ying says no, she won’t intervene.

“I share your priorities,” he tells her.  “And I appreciate your reservations.  I wouldn’t have approached you if I didn’t believe Wei Ying is… interested.”

She smiles at him.  The expression seems neither warm nor friendly.  “I hope you can forgive me, but my brother is interested in many things.  And many people.  I’d hate to see someone take advantage of his curiosity.”

Wei Ying likes him better than anybody, he reminds himself.  Wei Ying gave him a courting gift.  Wei Ying’s sister may know him, but she is not like him.

“As would I,” he tells her evenly.

Jiang Yanli studies his expression, and he wonders what she sees there that makes her nod.  “All right,” she says.  “What kind of advice are you looking for?”

“Will the Jiang family stand for him,” he says.  He doesn’t care, except in that it affects both the politics and the logistics of his offer.  And… Wei Ying thinks they won’t.  Lan Zhan thinks he would like it if this turns out to be untrue.

“Yes,” Jiang Yanli says without hesitation.  “Of course.”

Her reaction is the opposite of Wei Ying’s, when Lan Zhan tried to awkwardly and noncommittally steer the conversation that way.  “You’re certain?”

“I am,” she says firmly.  “I won’t mislead you; my mother will be swayed by your name and your title.  But my father loves A-Xian as much as any of us, and he’ll make sure he’s honorably married as a Jiang ward.”

“Even to a man,” Lan Zhan says, because they must be clear on this.  “There will be no bloodline heirs.”

Jiang Yanli gives him an expression that’s probably far less skeptical than this deserves.  “Were you planning to marry into our family, honorable Lan?  Forgive me for assuming otherwise.”

He… was not.  But this assumption was largely influenced by Wei Ying’s conviction that he had no family who would want them.  Lan Zhan’s family will not be pleased, but it won’t cast them out.

“I will discuss it with Wei Ying,” he says quietly.  They both have brothers.  The question of heirs is not solely their responsibility. 

“Good,” Jiang Yanli says.  “You should also know that A-Xian has promised to be our First Disciple forever.  If he joins your family, I hope you won’t separate him from his sect.”

Forever, Lan Zhan thinks.  This sounds like something Wei Ying would promise.  

But will he promise it to Lan Zhan?

“In the event of our marriage,” he begins, and has to pause.  Saying it aloud is terrifying and liberating at the same time.  “All of his oaths and obligations would become mine as well.  We will ensure they are met together.”

“In the event of your marriage,” she repeats.  She sounds almost as wondering as he feels.  “I’m sorry, honorable Lan, this may take some getting used to.  But I’m very happy for you both.”

He didn’t anticipate congratulations.  It seems far too early for such a thing.  But if Wei Ying’s sister thinks they are deserved, he won’t argue.

He nods instead, hoping it conveys some of his appreciation.  There are many other things he’d like to ask, but they’re not directly relevant to the task at hand.  He puts them aside.

“Are there more family members,” he says carefully.  “Or other interested parties, who might object?”

“No,” Jiang Yanli says.  She shakes her head for emphasis.  “Me and A-Cheng just want him to be happy.  I’m sure our parents will tie our clan to yours on his behalf.  As far as I know, there isn’t anyone else.”

He nods again.  Wei Ying agreed on this point: there isn’t anyone else.   If Wei Ying is amenable, Lan Zhan plans to change that before the year turns over.

“Thank you,” he says belatedly.  “I appreciate your advice.”

She says nothing for a long moment, but he doesn’t feel the burden of silence.  

Finally she says, “You know, at first I was worried you were going to ask me questions about A-Xian.  Then I was offended you asked about everyone but him.  But now I think you might know everything about him already, and you’re only asking about what you don’t know.”

He considers this: its superficial meaning, and the cost of sorting through it more deeply.  “Not,” he admits reluctantly.  “Everything.”

Wei Ying’s older sister smiles at him.  Her fond look is more familiar and more reassuring than he expected.  “If you’re as intent as he is,” she says, “it's only a matter of time.”

Chapter Text

He hangs on Lan Zhan’s window at a stupidly early hour and wishes he’d come earlier.  He wishes he’d come in the middle of the night, when he realized he wouldn’t sleep and he could have made Lan Zhan suffer by being awake with him.  Or at least made him blush, and stare, and not know what to say to someone perched on the end of his bed in the dark.

(He thought about it, he really did.  What would happen if he snuck up on Lan Zhan while he was sleeping?  He’s pretty sure it would be a lot more awkward and angry than his fantasies, and right now he’s worried about ruining pretty much everything, so.  He didn’t.)

He wishes he’d come the night before, when he first heard what happened and could have been manic and shameless as usual.  He could have said everything all at once and demanded to know what Lan Zhan meant.  Then today he could already be apologizing.

But he didn’t, so now he’s at Lan Zhan’s window watching him be soft and musical, and Lan Zhan isn’t wearing his forehead ribbon.

What’s happening?  What does that mean!  How can he shout at Lan Zhan now and beg forgiveness later if Lan Zhan is--if he’s--?  What does it mean!

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan says quietly.  He doesn’t look up, but he sounds gentle and fond and the expression that’s almost a smile is all over his face.  “Come in.”

Wei Ying doesn’t know if he’s melting or melting down.  “Lan Zhan,” he hisses.  “You talked to my sister!”

Lan Zhan lays his hands over the strings, silencing the notes that lingered in the air.  The almost-smile disappears, but he doesn’t look up.  “Yes,” he says after a moment.

“About courting!” Wei Ying whispers, as loudly as he can.  Which is probably ridiculous, why is he whisper-yelling at Lan Zhan from his window when Lan Zhan just told him to come in.  But he can’t.  

He wants to, but he can’t, just look at him.  Lan Zhan is barely even dressed, his pretty hair pulled back only enough to keep it out of his face: he looks relaxed and tousled and touchable.  And he isn’t wearing a ribbon!  What is Wei Ying supposed to do?

“Should I not have spoken to her?” Lan Zhan says at last.  He’s lifted his gaze enough that he’s staring at the floor between them, and oh, Wei Ying has already messed this up.  Lan Zhan always looks at him when it’s important.

He climbs in the window because why not, staying away isn’t helping.  And he can’t quietly shout everything he’s thinking from outside.  He just has to make sure he doesn’t get close enough to accidentally fall into Lan Zhan’s lap and kiss him senseless for being so sweet and so confusing.

“You told my sister you want to court me,” Wei Ying says, in what he hopes is a mostly reasonable tone but probably sounds somewhere between hysterical and stupid.  Since that’s how he feels.  He’s sitting on the floor halfway from the window to the table--right where Lan Zhan was looking, but of course isn’t anymore.

“I do want to court you,” Lan Zhan tells the table in front of him.

He manages to stop himself from saying, no, you don’t.   That would be rude, and--

That would be rude, he tells himself.  Don’t say it.

He doesn’t want to say it, but someone has to do something.

“You can’t just court someone!” he bursts out.  “Courting means it matters, like you’re serious!  Lan Zhan!  Courting means you want to get married someday!”

Lan Zhan has taken his hands from the strings and folded them in his lap.  He looks cold and still and perfect as he gazes at the instrument in front of him.  “You gave me a courting gift.”

“What!  What are you talking about, when!”  Wei Ying wants to throw himself at the table where Lan Zhan is looking but he knows it won’t help.  Without even moving, Lan Zhan’s eyes will just suddenly--be somewhere else.

Not moving doesn’t help either, because Lan Zhan doesn’t answer.

Then Wei Ying sees it: the painting he did for Lan Zhan that first night, of the full moon over the rooftops where they met.  It’s propped up on the music stand beside him, covering two whole sheets of music.  He sees it every morning while Lan Zhan holds his hands and gently trains his fingers, but he didn’t think--

When he looks back at Lan Zhan, he’s turned his head.  Not staring at the picture, not the way Wei Ying was, but acknowledging its presence.  How it’s in the way of whatever he was working on, how it’s bright and out of place against those yellowed pages, how he doesn’t just let it stay… he put it there.

He’s carefully arranged and centered that piece of paper with its one crooked building and the faint line where the ink ran out and the place where Wei Ying had to add a curve that doesn’t exist because the black was too dark otherwise.  Even the moon didn’t come out quite the way he wanted it to--especially the moon--but these things never do.  That’s just what it means to practice: do your best so you can do it better next time.

And sometimes, someone like Lan Zhan appreciates it anyway, but he doesn’t mention it because he thinks--

“I said you should give the person you’re courting pretty things,” Wei Ying says, before he can stop himself.  “When you came over the first night, when you and your brother switched chores--did you do that on purpose?  You came to see me on purpose?  You weren’t just killing time?

“I really did paint that for you!” he adds quickly, because Lan Zhan looks--well, distant, but also sort of horrified.  Like he’s in pain and Wei Ying is making it worse.  “I was being cute when I said I was courting you, that’s what I do, I make jokes--Lan Zhan, I never meant… you don’t have to!”

“I think you should leave,” Lan Zhan says.  The words are even but his voice is rough and Wei Ying has never heard him sound like that.  Ever.

“No,” he says desperately, “Lan Zhan, I’m sorry!  You don’t have to--do you think I would tell anyone?  I won’t!  And shijie won’t either!  She gave me the whole lecture, about reputation and responsibility and I really understand!  I do!  I never thought you would actually--”

His voice breaks, and he didn’t expect that, but it’s all stuck in his throat and he has to catch his breath.  He feels cold and his heart is pounding and everything he’s saying is making this worse, somehow.  He’s saying it wrong.  He can tell, how did he ever think he wouldn’t know when Lan Zhan got upset?

The thing is, his sister really did warn him about his reputation.  His reputation, not Lan Zhan’s.  Which is just… it doesn’t make any sense.

How much do you trust him? she asked.

With my life! he said.  Shijie!  Lan Zhan is perfect and just and extremely trustworthy!

A-Xian, she sighed.  If you let him court you, and then… what if it doesn’t work out?  If something goes wrong.  If he changes his mind.  He’s Lan Wangji, a perfect twin jade of Lan.  Just and trustworthy and… and irreproachable.  

Of course he is, Wei Ying agreed.  But I already told you, he’s not courting me.  There’s a misunderstanding, I’ll talk to him.  I promise!

I know, she said.  I know you don’t think he’s courting you, but he thinks he is, and he’s going to tell everyone.  Then you’ll be the person Lan Wangji is courting.  And if he stops, for whatever reason, you’ll be the person Lan Wangji was courting.  Forever.  Do you understand?

Yes, he told her.  So he could be the person who was courted by the great Lan Wangji, what was bad about that?  For him, anyway.  It would be a lot worse for Lan Zhan to be courting him than it would be for Wei Ying to have been courted by him.

Yes, I promise, I understand, he said anyway.  I’ll talk to him!

And here he is, talking to Lan Zhan and making the worst possible mess of everything.  He only wanted Lan Zhan to know he doesn’t have to be all honorable about it: Wei Ying is fine with sneaking around and kissing where no one can see and pretending he’s doing scandalous things to Lan Zhan so no one will suspect it’s true.  He never expected anything else.

Lan Zhan is looking at him at last.  

Of course he is, because now Wei Ying is choking on his own words and his eyes are watering in a way that’s going to be a lot more obvious if he has to rub them to keep tears from falling.  Ugh.  Why is he always the worst around Lan Zhan?  He’s so good at talking and being charming and then Lan Zhan looks at him and nothing is enough anymore.  

Nothing except more of whatever Lan Zhan will give him.  He presses his lips together to keep from saying it.  To keep from making this worse by begging: for Lan Zhan to forget it, for him to forgive it, for him to do anything that means Wei Ying can keep stealing kisses and watching him paint and curling up in front of him while he pretends to learn music.

“You told me,” Lan Zhan says quietly.  “That you like me.”  He’s staring at Wei Ying like he can see everything inside him, like he can judge it and fix it and maybe even ignore it if none of that works.  “Better than anyone else.”

“I do!” Wei Ying exclaims.  “Yes!  Exactly!  That’s why I don’t want you to court me!  I mean, I do, obviously, but you can’t--”  No, he’d decided it was rude to tell Lan Zhan “no” or “you can’t,” why didn’t he listen to himself?

“You shouldn’t,” he says quickly, “you shouldn’t court me, because look what happens when you get caught with me, Lan Zhan!  You get in trouble!  You always get in trouble, and it’s my fault, and I decided I’m not doing that anymore.  I’m not going to get you in trouble.  I didn’t even make fun of Jin Zixuan the other day; weren’t you proud of me?  That was because of you!”

Lan Zhan is staring at him.

A lot, Wei Ying thinks after a moment.  He’s staring a lot, and that’s fine, that’s what Lan Zhan does.  Staring means he’s interested, and interest means he’s--

“I think,” Lan Zhan says slowly.  “Your sister was right.”

Right?  Right about what?  Everything, probably, she always is, except this time some of what she said seems a little mixed up.  He’s not sure he wants her and Lan Zhan to agree.  He doesn’t know how to feel about that.

“It seems I should have asked your permission first,” Lan Zhan is saying.  He’s getting up, smooth and flowing even in his loose robes, paying no attention to the hair that drifts over his shoulder or the ribbon that’s still missing.  Wei Ying can’t look away, can't think about anything else, and maybe that’s why he doesn’t know what Lan Zhan is doing until he kneels down on the floor in front of him.

“Wei Ying,” he says, very calmly.  Too calm for the shock Wei Ying feels and the sudden urge to look over his shoulder.  “Perhaps I have not made my intentions clear enough: I wish to marry you.  I do not wish to court you out of a sense of honor or obligation, but out of a genuine desire to see us wed at the end of it.  You’ve stated your objection that my courtship of you will bring me trouble.  Do you have others?”

“I--”  This isn’t a moment to hesitate, he gets that.  He understands!  He knows what this is, what it means, even if he doesn’t understand why.  “No?” he says, very carefully.  He’s sure that’s the right answer, but he still plays it over and over again in his head, just to make sure it came out the way he meant it to.

No.  He doesn’t have any objections!  None!  He never had any, and he can’t even remember what he was supposed to be warning Lan Zhan about.  

“Will you allow me to choose my own trouble?” Lan Zhan continues.  He looks away for a moment, wearing something so much like a frown that Wei Ying can't answer, and then he adds, “Provided I share it with you, as the burdens of any partnership are shared?”

Oh, he just went somewhere else while Wei Ying is stuck on the fact that Lan Zhan is kneeling in front of him with no Lan ribbon on his forehead.  “Yes?” he guesses.  

When Lan Zhan looks back at him he tries again.  “Yes!  Yes, of course!  Lan Zhan, how could I ever say no to you?”

“The process is straightforward,” Lan Zhan informs him.  “You say no.  I refuse to accept it.  I follow you around, providing endless counter arguments, until you change your mind.”

Wei Ying can't help laughing, because yes, that sounds exactly like what he threatened to do.  “Well, if that's how it's going to be,” he says.  “It's inevitable, isn't it!  I could save us both a lot of trouble and just say yes now!”

Lan Zhan is right there in front of him, watching him like the most important thing he’s ever wanted.  “You could,” he agrees quietly.

“Ask me again,” Wei Ying tells him.

“Wei Ying.”  It’s his name, but it’s not a warning.  It’s not impatient or exasperated or anything except warm and promising.  

“May I court you,” Lan Zhan says.  “Formally and publicly.”  He reaches out to touch Wei Ying’s hand and adds, “With the understanding that, if you and I prove compatible, we will marry.”

Wei Ying makes a face, pushing his hand forward so his sleeve catches on Lan Zhan’s fingers.  “Compatibility’s a high bar, don't you think?”

Lan Zhan smooths his fingers over the ribbon on his wrist without looking.  “No.”

“Could we aim for maybe liking each other?” Wei Ying insists.  “Enough that we work around the rest?  We can do that, right?  You’re good at working around me.”

That almost-smile is back, finally-- finally --and this time it’s so obvious that Wei Ying wonders when he’ll have to give up and admit that Lan Zhan has possibly been smiling at him for real for weeks now.  “Acceptable.”

“Yes,” Wei Ying says quickly.

…Lan Zhan definitely, unmistakably, one hundred percent smiles at him for that.

Chapter Text

He wakes up the day after they leave.  The ache in his heart has turned the whole world gray and colorless.  He has no purpose.  There’s no one to yell his name or block his sword or take his hand.

He is alone.

He wakes again and reality is cold and terrifying as he hovers on the edge of disbelief.  It didn’t happen.  It hasn’t happened.  But it could--it will-- if he does nothing to stop it.

Lan Zhan dresses quickly and tightly, in case he can hold himself together with cloth and ribbon.  There's nothing else, so he must do what he can.  He's hesitating by his sheet music when Wei Ying’s whisper warms the air.

“Psst, Lan Zhan!”

He closes his eyes in relief and desperation.  What brings Wei Ying back, and what can keep him from going?  Will speaking to their families really be enough to hold someone who claims no relations but his siblings?  Does the answer, whatever it may be, excuse his reluctance to try?

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Wei Ying calls, abandoning all pretense at quiet with the concern in his voice.  “Can I come in?”

He nods without turning, hearing Wei Ying’s practiced scramble and soundless thump as he lands on the floor.  It’s more a displacement of air than a sound and Lan Zhan waits, hoping it will come much closer.  He doesn’t expect the hand on his arm, or how his own body betrays him by turning into it.

“Oh, wow,” Wei Ying murmurs.  He’s soft again, apparently stricken by whatever he sees in Lan Zhan’s expression.  “What happened?  No, wait, if you only answer one question do this one first: can I hold you?”

He nods again and it’s enough.  It’s arms around him and that vibrant body pressed against his.  It’s all the color in the world, even with his eyes closed, and he knows others will come looking for those stolen colors if he tries to hoard them for himself.

He should be overjoyed by Wei Ying’s presence.  He feels resentful of the rest of the world instead.  It’s wrong and unbalanced and very distracting.

“Do you want to tell me?” Wei Ying mumbles.  “I mean, I want to know what made you upset, but if there’s anything that helps, I want to know that more?”

It’s nothing.  It’s everything.  It’s not even having Wei Ying, and still being afraid of losing him.  It’s the end of instruction and the time he wasted and the feeling that every day has too little of Wei Ying and too much of everything else.

“I'm concerned,” he says aloud.  “About time.”  It makes no sense, and he wonders if Wei Ying will pretend to understand anyway.

“Okay,” Wei Ying says.  “Then it doesn't exist!  Time is dead to me.  What else?”

Dead to him.  As though he could make things stop mattering by pretending they don't exist.  What an appealing thought.  “A dream,” he admits.

“Was it a bad dream?” Wei Ying wants to know.  “Nightmares are also dead to me!  And personally I hate them, so thanks for giving me another reason.  Lan Zhan, we should work on having fewer nightmares together!  It would be good for us, right?  For the sake of our cultivation!”

He breathes carefully, fisting his hands in Wei Ying’s robes and deciding he likes being able to say ridiculous things every now and then.  Especially if this is the reaction.  “How,” he says.

“Close observation and physical comfort,” Wei Ying tells him.  The words are formal but Lan Zhan can hear the way he’s smiling.  “Don’t worry, I’m an expert!  Tell me the next time you think you might have a nightmare and we can try out my clever techniques!”

Wei Ying isn’t pulling away.  Lan Zhan still wants him to come back.  “Tonight,” he says.

“Aw, Lan Zhan!”  The disappointment in Wei Ying’s voice is alarming until he continues, “It’s terrible!  Just awful to think you think you might not be able to sleep tonight because of nightmares I happen to have extensive experience warding off!  I’ll definitely be here before nine to teach you all of my secrets.”

It’s too much to ask if he’ll stay after nine, to demonstrate those same secrets, so Lan Zhan does not.  He is still buoyed and reassured for the rest of the day.  Even when Lan Huan comes to watch the end of the beginning swordwork class, and joins them in the practice studio afterwards.

“Do you have a plan?” he asks Lan Zhan, while Wei Ying sprawls on one of the benches and waves.  Apparently he only does actual work when Lan Zhan alone is watching.

Lan Zhan shakes his head wordlessly.  The days are passing, and he has not yet presented his suit to the effective head of his own family.  

Lan Huan sighs.  “Neither do I,” he admits.  “But you’ll have my help, of course.  And my congratulations.”

It’s a moment before Lan Zhan can say, “Thank you.”  Then he adds quietly, “I apologize.  For leaving the burden of the bloodline to you.”

This of all things makes his brother smile.  “Oh, that’s much too optimistic,” he says.  “One of us will have to adopt.”

Lan Zhan looks to Wei Ying instinctively, and he’s aware of his brother doing the same.  His not-yet-officially betrothed is using a fire talisman to burn characters into the end of the bench he’s stretched out on.  He seems more focused on this petty vandalism than he is on their conversation.

“Probably me,” Lan Huan says mildly.

Chapter Text

He didn't actually mean to sleep with Lan Zhan.  He didn't!  It was a complete accident!

He didn't really mean to leave by nine either, but that was only out of real, honest concern for Lan Zhan and his nightmares (that Wei Ying had never heard about before but was willing to assign mythical importance to in his mind).  And his intense curiosity about when, exactly, Lan Zhan would kick him out.  Also his desire to see Lan Zhan in sleeping robes.  

And to maybe kiss Lan Zhan in his sleeping robes.  If not actually in his bed?  That was possible, right?  Like--a good night kiss, or something?  He could make that seem innocent, probably.

Anyway, whatever, there were a lot of reasons he wanted to stay.  He didn’t admit most of them even to himself in case Lan Zhan read his mind somehow, which he definitely shows signs of being able to do, and some of them were less realistic than others.  That’s okay though, it’s fine, Wei Ying doesn’t discriminate on the basis of realism.  

So the point is, when he’s tucked up against the wall on the inside of Lan Zhan’s bed, a blanket behind him like a pillow and Lan Zhan sleeping--actually sleeping!--beside him, he’s still planning to get up and leave.  He’s imparted his wisdom and gotten, honestly, a lot more kisses for it than he deserves.  Not that he’s complaining!  Completely the opposite!

But helping Lan Zhan fall asleep and sitting there watching him sleep are totally different things, and just because Lan Zhan didn’t kick him out doesn’t mean he’s been invited to stay.  It’s after nine, but curfew isn’t enforced right away.  And when it is, it’s just to send students back to their rooms, so it’s no big deal if that’s where they were going anyway.

He’s definitely going to leave.  He just wants to take a deep breath, and maybe another one, and then secretly and gleefully roll around in the thought that he’s in Lan Zhan’s bed.   Yeah.  That’s the best.  Objectively, as Lan Zhan would say.  It’s the best thing ever.

He lets his head fall back against the wall, and maybe he closes his eyes, but he’s grinning.  He’s actually grinning, and no one falls asleep when they feel this kind of elation.  It’s welling up in his chest, threatening to spill out of his throat, and he presses his lips together to keep from making a sound.

But he has to grin.  It’s a war inside him, between happiness and the effort it takes to stay quiet, and he doesn’t dare open his eyes and look at Lan Zhan because then he’ll definitely laugh.  So he holds still, and tries to breathe, and at some point he wakes up from, like, the most comfortable doze ever.

In the dark.  In Lan Zhan’s bed.  He’s sitting in Lan Zhan’s bed, and he fell asleep, and he has no idea what time it is.  He has to go.

But it’s so nice.  He can’t even see Lan Zhan, but he can feel the heavy, comforting weight of his presence.  He imagines he can hear him breathing.  The bed is so warm, and so cozy, and he’s with Lan Zhan.  He should appreciate this.

He has to slide down the bed to get out of it anyway.  He stretches his legs out and puts his arm down and then, just for a second…  He puts his head on his arm and pretends that he’s sleeping in Lan Zhan’s bed.  It’s the best feeling in the world.

When his arm starts to hurt, he knows something’s wrong.  He tries to roll away and bumps into the wall and his arm is caught.  He’s not lying on it.  It’s wedged into something and stuck somewhere.  Did he fall asleep sitting up again?

He opens his eyes and stares, but he doesn’t see any light.  He doesn’t hear anyone yelling at him.  It feels like he’s in bed.  It feels like--

Someone is holding his arm.  He sucks in a breath, because Lan Zhan is holding his arm.  So tightly it woke him up, and he can’t pull his hand back.  Something is wrong.

“Lan Zhan,” he whispers.  Breathes, maybe, because what if they’re in trouble, or--

The grip on his arm tightens, but there’s no other reply.  Okay.  He’d know if Lan Zhan had moved, right?  He didn’t.  Didn’t even turn his head.  Didn’t whisper anything back, because he’s asleep.  

They’re both asleep in his bed, because Wei Ying is the worst almost-fiance ever and couldn’t make himself leave after Lan Zhan let him whisper all sorts of silly advice about relaxing and falling asleep happy and fantasizing really hard to program your brain before you let it take over your dreams.

“Wake up,” Wei Ying whispers, reaching over to cover Lan Zhan’s hand on his arm.  He should sit up, but he doesn’t want to startle Lan Zhan any more than he has to.  “Are you having a bad dream?  Lan Zhan, wake up.”

The hand on his arm doesn’t let go.  Wei Ying stops trying to pull away and rolls into him instead, because it’s fine.  He’s here.  And it’s the least he can do after falling asleep here in the first place.

Lan Zhan doesn’t respond to his voice but he responds to the pressure, abandoning his proper sleeping pose to roll onto his side and press their bodies together.  And oh, Wei Ying thinks.  Oh, that’s going to be embarrassing, but right now it’s just.  So nice.

“Lan Zhan,” he murmurs.  “Nightmares are stupid, remember?  They’re dead to us.  We don’t care about bad dreams, only good ones.  And you should wake up, because this is the best dream ever.”

He feels it when the hand on his arm relaxes.  He hears it when Lan Zhan’s breathing changes.  He waits until he can’t wait anymore, and then he says carefully, “Lan Zhan?”

“Wei Ying.”  It’s immediate, and it doesn’t sound sleepy.  It doesn’t sound angry, or upset.

It mostly just sounds relieved.

“Yes, that’s right, that’s me,” Wei Ying whispers, hoping he didn’t totally misread Lan Zhan’s… not being angry.  “I’m here!  And I’m sorry I fell asleep.  I’ll go; you can--”

“Please stay,” Lan Zhan says quietly.

And Wei Ying knows what that means.  “Did you have another nightmare?” he asks, making a face.  So much for the tricks of nightmare evasion.  

“Yes,” Lan Zhan says without hesitation.  “I dreamed you weren’t here.”

What?  Is he really awake?  It’s exactly the kind of sweet, romantic thing Lan Zhan would say (it turns out, and who knew! not him until a few days ago) but it also sounds very… coherent.  Who talks like that when they wake up in the middle of the night?

“But I am,” Wei Ying says, because he is.  That part is true whether Lan Zhan is awake or not, and wow, what a possibly problematic surprise.  He might as well enjoy Lan Zhan not being upset about it at first?

“I want you to stay,” Lan Zhan whispers.  Actually whispers, like this is the thing that’s too much to let someone else overhear.  If anyone was going to overhear them talking in his bed in the middle of the night.

“Ah, I can?” Wei Ying offers carefully.  He tries to make his voice hushed without copying Lan Zhan, without making it sound like he’s mocking him.  “If you want?”

Lan Zhan doesn’t answer.  And that’s… well.  Like him.  Maybe he nodded, a tiny gesture Wei Ying can’t see in the dark.  Or maybe he’s just staring, and Wei Ying is supposed to know what that means without words.  

Maybe he’s asleep again.  That’s okay, mission accomplished, right?  Not having a nightmare anymore.  That’s good.

“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan says, very softly.

He’s awake.  There’s something in his tone, something--just the way he says it.  The million ways Lan Zhan says his name are a language all their own.  And somehow, suddenly, Wei Ying knows.

This is important.

“Which family pays the bride price,” Lan Zhan murmurs.

Wei Ying stares at where he thinks Lan Zhan’s face is.

“You said they wouldn’t stand for you,” Lan Zhan reminds him, when Wei Ying is… no closer to knowing what’s going on than he was before.  “Your sister says they will.  So we could join your family, if you like.”

“What?” Wei Ying says.  Because he thinks some response is required, if only to show he’s still awake.  “I don’t--what?”

“When I speak with my uncle,” Lan Zhan says.  “Should I say I want to propose?  Or you do?”

Okay, so, whatever’s going on in this conversation is probably consistent?  Wei Ying thinks?  Does that make it more or less likely that Lan Zhan is awake and asking something meaningful?

“I don’t want you to leave,” Lan Zhan whispers again, and oh.   That’s his nightmare, his bad dream: that Wei Ying has left.  

Not the bed.  Him.  

The person doing the courting is the person who proposes, eventually, and Lan Zhan wants to court him.  Which means, technically, Wei Ying will be a Lan.  But not really.   It’s not like he was ever even a Jiang and he lived with them most of his life, so who cares if Lan Zhan calls it marrying into his family or not?

...Lan Zhan’s family, probably.  But that’s fine.  Wei Ying doesn’t have one, except his brother and sister, and he never really thought about it until now but the last thing he wants--almost the last thing--is Lan Zhan having to kneel for Madam Yu.  

For, like… ever.

“I won’t join the sect,” Wei Ying whispers, “I can’t, I promised Jiang Cheng, and my shijie, I’m their First Disciple and they’re my… my… them.  But Lan Zhan, I don’t want you to leave your family.  And I don’t mind joining it if you’re willing to have me.”

It’s probably not going to be Lan Zhan’s willingness that matters, but everyone knows Lan Qiren won’t want him.  Wei Ying’s going to need a lot of Lan Xichen to make up for Lan Qiren.  He’ll have to start some kind of tally sheet, a balanced ledger of one versus the other.

“Much more than willing,” Lan Zhan murmurs.

Wei Ying rethinks the ledger.  If he gets Lan Zhan, surely that’s more than enough.

That’s everything he could ask.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan sits across from his uncle and wishes he could stand.  Lan Huan is standing.  Lan Huan claimed he isn’t part of this discussion and is only here to provide moral support.

Lan Zhan thinks his brother might be a traitor.

“Is this a joke?” his uncle demands.

That’s all he says.  It’s offensive and Lan Zhan would like to ignore it: that he’s spoken at all should be proof enough it isn’t a joke.  But an elder’s question requires an answer.

“No,” Lan Zhan says.

His uncle is not appeased.  “What reason could you possibly have for wanting to marry Wei Wuxian?”

There are answers to this that matter to Lan Zhan, and answers that will matter to his uncle.  They are all true.  He has thought carefully about how to present them.

“He’s a ward of Jiang clan and the First Disciple of their sect,” Lan Zhan says.  “A formal cultivation partnership between our clans will strengthen both, during a time when Qishan Wen overreach threatens us all.”

Two of the five great clans will not be enough to stand against Wen Ruohan.  But three might be, and Jiang Yanli is engaged to Jin Zixuan.  Both are respectable cultivators who could tie their clans together with marriage, shared practice… and an heir.

He and Wei Ying will have no heir.  But their cultivation is exceptionally strong, and his uncle will not be blind to the level of power they might attain together.  Though it’s an unbalanced comparison, none of the clans now could rival them as they will be.

“Wei Ying himself is a strong cultivator,” he says, in what is not only a notable understatement but also a difficult subject with his uncle.  “He is skilled in traditional practice and innovative where no traditional option exists.”

Wei Ying has promised that his questions about forbidden practices are only questions, and Lan Zhan believes him.  This is how his mind works.  Asking is not the same as acting.

Taboos aside, they are interesting questions.

“I value his challenge,” he says.  “I value his quick thinking and his kindness, and I seek your leave to court him.”  He puts his hands together and bows carefully.  “Uncle.”

“Innovative,” his uncle repeats.  It sounds derisive.  Lan Zhan does not look up.  “He asks too many questions.”

Eyes on the table, Lan Zhan says, “Asking questions is not forbidden.”

“Talking back to your elders is,” his uncle snaps.

It’s been a long time since Lan Zhan was last reminded of that.  He isn’t interested in pointing it out, or in arguing anything that is unrelated to Wei Ying.  His uncle expects obedience above all, and in return, he indulges their weaknesses and emotional displays to whatever extent he can.

Lan Zhan does not begrudge him a reactive rebuttal.

“I suppose you support this,” he’s saying, and Lan Zhan looks up in time to see his uncle glaring at Lan Huan.

His brother nods.  “I do.”

There’s a long pause.  Then his uncle adds, “And?”

He can hear the faint smile in Lan Huan’s voice without turning to look.  “Uncle, in times like these, we’re all stronger together than alone.  If Wangji has found someone to be that strength with him, I believe only good will come of it.”

This apparently is a step too far, and his uncle exclaims, “Only good!”

Lan Huan is also prepared.  “Wei Wuxian hasn’t caused any trouble since Wangji was punished,” he says.  He doesn’t support corporal punishment, a secret only Lan Zhan is privy to, yet he can still say, “It had exactly the deterring effect you intended.  They’re both learning.  Together.”

Lan Zhan looks down at the table again, because Wei Wuxian hasn’t been caught for any trouble since then.  It’s not the same thing.  He has no intention of mentioning it.

“Hmm,” his uncle says.  

That’s all.  There’s nothing Lan Zhan can ask or say that would be appropriate at this point.  So he endures in silence.

“I don’t have time to negotiate anything so preposterous with Sect Leader Jiang,” his uncle declares at last.  “We will employ the services of a matchmaker, the results of which will be strictly conditional.  Negotiation in good faith, acceptable exchange, the compatibility of the involved parties.

“ Compatibility ,” he says again, as though this might be incomprehensible.  “Your charts, your conduct, your future plans.  There will be no indiscretions.  There will be no liberties taken.  By anyone!  

“Everyone involved will behave with decorum and restraint at all times,” his uncle adds.  “Especially Wei Wuxian.  Is this understood?”

All Lan Zhan hears is, you may marry Wei Ying.

Chapter Text

Like so many things, gossip is forbidden at Cloud Recesses.  And like so many students, Wei Ying and Nie Huaisang don’t care.  Are they supposed to rely on elders to tell them what they need to know?  They’d never learn anything!

Anyway, it isn’t really gossip if it’s true, right?  This is true and relevant and not mischievous at all.  It’s not even a casual discussion of someone else’s private life!  It’s a very important and serious discussion of his life.

Not that Nie Huaisang knows that, which right now Wei Ying finds hilarious.

“It must have just happened,” Nie Huaisang is saying, “if it’s not even official yet.  The other family hasn’t agreed to open negotiations.  But who would refuse the Lans?”

“No one,” Wei Ying says, stretching one leg out and kicking his foot to the side.  The morning mist never cleared today, and it’s blowing dampness around every corner.  They’re backed up against a wall on one of the walkways: only a little drier than the courtyard itself, but at least they’re not getting dripped on where the water collects enough to slide off the roof.

“No one!” Nie Huaisang agrees.  “So they must have only just made an offer, don’t you think?  Maybe it’s someone very far away!  Do you think they’ve met?”

“Ah, I’m sure they’ve met,” Wei Ying says with a lazy smile.  “Lan Zhan strikes me as a very reasonable person.  Concerned with compatibility!  I’m sure he wouldn’t agree to marry someone without meeting them first.”

“Reasonable,” Nie Huaisang repeats, like it’s a foreign word.  “Brother Wei, your opinion of Lan Zhan has really changed!  Can you imagine when you first came here, calling him reasonable?  You must have said just the opposite a hundred times or more!”

He laughs, because that’s true.  He definitely said that.  And in retrospect, it’s definitely true!  Lan Zhan was and is terribly unreasonable, because he’s trying to court Wei Ying!  What reasonable person would do that?

“Well,” he says aloud, “I came here to learn something, didn’t I?  And if the only thing I learned is that the twin jades of Lan truly live up to their reputation, well.  I guess I have Master Lan to thank for that!”

Nie Huaisang lifts his fan to cover his snicker, because of course it sounds like Lan Qiren never taught him anything.  But Wei Ying knows who had to give Lan Zhan permission.  He honestly can’t imagine how it happened.  He hopes it didn’t involve hours of kneeling and promises and embarrassment Lan Zhan has never deserved.

“You know,” Nie Huaisang says, “I can’t decide.  Is it harder to imagine the person Lan Wangji would agree to marry?  Or the person Master Lan would allow him to marry?  No one is good enough for him, after all.  I’m sure they both think so.”

“No,” Wei Ying protests, turning his head to pout at him without otherwise moving.  “Obviously they don’t!  And anyway, Lan Zhan isn’t as stuck up as all that.  I think he’d give anyone a chance.  To see if they could prove themselves.”

“No, no, no,” Nie Huaisang says.  “There we disagree!  I think he’d give no one a chance; he must have been forced into this.  And it must be someone very powerful for his uncle to do it in the first place.  Why him and not his brother, I wonder?”

“Why wouldn’t he give anyone a chance?” Wei Ying counters.  “He’s not mean under all that formality.  He’s kind and generous!  I think if he saw that someone wanted a chance with him, he’d give it to them.”

“Lan Wangji?” Nie Huaisang says, like he needs to make sure they’re talking about the same person.  “Why would you think that?  You’ve said it yourself; he doesn’t even look at anyone.”

“Ah, that’s not true,” Wei Ying declares.  “I admit, I was wrong about that.  It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes.”  He shakes his head philosophically, letting it rock back and forth against the wall behind him.  “Sometimes being wrong is what makes you see the right way after all.”

“That’s right!” Nie Huaisang says.  He sounds so enthusiastic that Wei Ying looks at him again in surprise.  “He looks at you, doesn’t he!  You’re practically friends now; has he told you anything about this?  Brother Wei, are you keeping secrets from me?”

“Me?” Wei Ying scoffs.  “Would I keep secrets?  From you?”

“Yes,” Nie Huaisang says, so that’s good.  They understand each other.

Wei Ying smiles at him.  “I promise you, I haven’t heard anything about a girl.  Not here or anywhere else.”

Nie Huaisang isn’t stupid, for all he likes to pretend sometimes.  “A boy, then!” he exclaims.  “That’s why it has to be the younger brother and not the older one; there won’t be a child.  It must be a purely political alliance!”

“Ah, so practical!” Wei Ying chides him.  “You’re not romantic at all!  Nice boys can fall in love, the same as nice girls!”  

Even bad boys can like someone, he thinks.  Better than anyone else.

“Do you mean to tell me,” Nie Huaisang begins, and then immediately hides behind his fan.

Wei Ying sees him at the same time: Lan Zhan, walking across the courtyard toward them.  He knows where they hang out, now.  He’s probably always known.  His robes are pretty and magical in the mist, easing the edges of a person who’s so much softer than he looks.

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying calls, even though he obviously doesn’t have to.  “Lan Zhan, over here!  Come sit with us if you want!”

“If you want?” Nie Huaisang repeats, but quietly and mostly behind his fan.  Like that’s the surprising part, not Wei Ying yelling at Lan Zhan in the first place.  

Which, okay, fair.

Lan Zhan comes and sits with them.  He doesn’t greet them, but neither does he hesitate to settle on the walkway beside Wei Ying.  On the opposite side from Nie Huaisang, and close enough that their spread robes overlap.

Not quite close enough to touch, which is--not fine, but Wei Ying has no idea what “no indiscretions” means.  Maybe Lan Zhan does?  Is there any chance he can follow Lan Zhan’s lead long enough to keep his uncle from taking back permission?

Wei Ying is worried that any answer other than “yes” means he doesn’t care enough.  But he knows himself, and the answer is very probably “no.”  When has he ever been able to follow someone else’s example?  For more than a few days?  Or longer than it took the novelty to wear off?

Never, that’s when.  

“Lan--honorable Lan,” Nie Huaisang says quickly, and Wei Ying has to grin.  

It’s not that he wants people to go around using Lan Zhan’s birth name all the time.  Really.  It’s just that he likes saying it himself, because it makes Lan Zhan look at him.  And now he likes what it says about his familiarity with Lan Zhan that people around him are trying not to pick it up from him.

“It’s good to see you,” Nie Huaisang is saying.  Like he’s always been able to make idle conversation with Cloud Recesses’ best student and clan prodigy.  “If I may, ah, offer my humble congratulations--”

Lan Zhan looks at him and Nie Huaisang pauses with a nervous laugh.  “On your impending courtship!” he finishes quickly.

Lan Zhan looks at him next and Wei Ying holds up his hands.  “It wasn’t me!” he exclaims.  “I told you, Lan Zhan, everyone talks about you!  Of course you must have expected someone to have heard you’re… not available anymore?”

“Gossip is forbidden,” Lan Zhan says.  Pointedly, but not angrily.  Like… he was answering a question?  Instead of just quoting the rules?

“But facts are for sharing,” Wei Ying counters.  “Not that I have any!”

“I knew it!” Nie Huaisang bursts out.  “Honorable Lan, did you tell my friend your happy news already?”

Lan Zhan looks past Wei Ying at Nie Huaisang.  “There was no need,” he says.

“That’s right!” Wei Ying says, before he’s really thought that through.  “I told you!  He didn’t tell me anything about a future wife!”

Lan Zhan’s gaze flicks back to his, golden and… and amused?  Does he think this is funny?  Does he like Nie Huaisang, or the two of them together--he really doesn’t have any friends, and it hits Wei Ying at the strangest times, what is that like?

“You already knew,” Lan Zhan says, and that’s all.

About his future wife?  But then Wei Ying’s brain catches up, and wow, he could argue that one but not without sounding like a monumental jerk.  Because Lan Zhan didn’t tell him about his future wife; he told him about a future wife.  And how there wouldn’t be one.

“Aha!” Nie Huaisang exclaims, sounding greatly satisfied.  “Brother Wei, you’re caught between us now!  What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Oh, I see,” Wei Ying says with a laugh.  “So this is how it’s going to be!”  When he turns his head all he can see is Lan Zhan staring back at him.

Game on.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan is not entirely familiar with the practice of having friends.  He understands the concept: there’s expected to be some level of relationship between acquaintance and family.  He assumed classmates occupied that social space.

Almost immediately, though, careful observation of Wei Ying made it clear that some classmates are likable while others are not.  The unlikable ones are still classmates, while the likable ones might become friends.  What observation did not make clear is how people are sorted into one group or the other.

He still doesn’t know.  Wei Ying is of little help, since Lan Zhan does not consider him a friend.  Unless…

Wei Ying is still a classmate.  Lan Zhan’s desire to court him aside, one relationship does not negate the other.  Perhaps that’s true of friends as well?

Perhaps if he asked, Wei Ying would be able to help him understand.

It’s still strange to think he can simply… ask Wei Ying things he’s curious about.  He spent a long time being wary of Wei Ying’s unpredictable behavior, guarded against his challenges, and filled with too many questions to give any one of them priority.  Even if he could ask.

Which he can, now.  Because Wei Ying waits.  He listens.  He cares what Lan Zhan doesn’t say.  These might be characteristic of a friend as well as a partner; Lan Zhan doesn’t know.

Even if Wei Ying is both, though, it seems ironic that it’s rumors of their betrothal that convinced the other students they’re friends.  Admittedly the identity of Lan Zhan’s desired partner doesn’t seem to be in circulation--which is just as strange, since who in the sect would know one but not the other?  And who among their classmates wouldn’t guess?

You don’t look at anyone, Wei Ying said.

He can’t stop looking.  He knows he’s been warned, knows his uncle will count any lack of propriety in his behavior against their conduct as potential partners.  But he can’t--it’s impossible not to follow Wei Ying with his eyes.  And he knows, he sees it everywhere: he’s not the only one.

Maybe that’s why they don’t assume.  Wei Ying genuinely didn’t seem to notice until Lan Zhan told him, but the other students--maybe their motives in watching are innocent, so they assume his are too.  Nie Huaisang watches Wei Ying, after all, and he is Wei Ying’s friend.  He seems convinced Lan Zhan is the same.

There are other students Wei Ying calls friends who nod at Lan Zhan now, where they hadn’t before.  People who only bowed, or pretended not to see him so they didn’t have to.  There are students Wei Ying teases, tutors, and talks to in the courtyards between classes.  Some of them smile at Lan Zhan now, and some of them wave.  None of them look smug or shocked or confused… because they think he’s Wei Ying’s friend.

Wei Ying finds this very funny, which is the only reason Lan Zhan has not decided it’s offensive.  Why wouldn’t he court Wei Ying?  The question weighs on him in a way its corollary (why would he accept a mysterious long-distance match he might or might not have met with no warning or explanation?) does not.

Because it isn’t what they think of him that matters.  It’s what they think of Wei Ying.  And Lan Zhan is starting to think the entire student population of Cloud Recesses is either very stupid or very blind.

“Hey Lan Zhan!”  Wei Ying’s step on the walkway is light, and he isn’t satisfied only to approach.  He puts a hand out for balance he doesn’t need and bounces onto the railing, beaming at Lan Zhan from a perch that puts him much closer than he might have stood.  

“Hi!” he adds, completely unnecessarily.  But it’s not as loud as usual, either.  Like he knows he’s interrupting and made a deliberate decision not to startle.  “How are you?  Are you frowning?  What’s wrong, did Lan Qiren only call on you nine times instead of ten?  Have a heart, Lan Zhan, other people want to show off too!”

Of course, Wei Ying’s version of subtle is comparable to anyone else knocking down doors, but Lan Zhan recognizes the courtesy nonetheless.  “I don’t want to show off,” he says, instead of pointing out that boasting is forbidden.  “Wei Ying, are we friends?”

“Yes!” Wei Ying exclaims.  “Of course we’re friends!  Why am I sitting here admiring you and teasing you and hoping you’ll look at me if we’re not friends?”

He shouldn’t frown, but he wants to.  “I thought it might be something else.”

“Yes!” Wei Ying repeats, his hand making an abortive grab for… something.  Some part of Lan Zhan, he thinks.  He’s sorry Wei Ying stopped himself.  “That too!” he’s saying.  “But Lan Zhan, we were friends first, weren’t we?  The best partnerships are built on friendship!”

Wei Ying ducks his head then, leaning forward, and it’s so convincing that Lan Zhan follows his gaze to see what caught his attention on the walkway.  The motion puts their heads very close together, and Wei Ying murmurs, “Built high and strong, with lots of romance and kissing and soft, fluffy bunnies to shore it up.”

Lan Zhan lifts his eyes without lifting his head, because if he commits to looking up he’ll have to pull back.  He manages to catch Wei Ying’s eye just as they are: very close.  He thinks they could press their mouths together and still not look more obvious than they do already.

“I’m just kidding about the bunnies,” Wei Ying whispers.  “We don’t need them.  But they’re cute.”

“We need the rest of it,” Lan Zhan murmurs.

“Yes!” Wei Ying declares again, but even his agreement is muted.  Maybe he’s gotten quieter.  Or maybe Lan Zhan’s heart has gotten louder.  “Lan Zhan, are you going to kiss me here?  In the courtyard?  Because that could be one of my very favorite memories.”

He sighs, very softly.  “No indiscretions.”

“Boring,” Wei Ying breathes, and Lan Zhan can feel it on his skin.  

He makes himself straighten up, taking a step back.  “Talk to me when you want to stop pretending we’re friends,”  he says.

Wei Ying gapes at him, but his expression must be right, because Wei Ying throws his head back and laughs.  “Lan Zhan!” he exclaims.  “Oh, Lan Zhan!  You think you’re so funny!  Well, let me tell you this: one, you are!  Two--”

He pauses, very deliberately, and grins at Lan Zhan.  “I’m ready when you are.”

Lan Zhan considers this latest challenge and wonders how many people have to witness an indiscretion for it to count.

Chapter Text

Wei Ying is a fast learner.  Which is good, because he has a new subject and not much time: how to discreetly show affection for a Lan, in front of other Lans, in a way that makes it clear they’re more than friends without getting them in trouble.  It's a challenge, and he likes challenges.

Luckily, he’s been observing Lans for as long as he’s been at Cloud Recesses.  It’s impossible to avoid.  He hasn’t been looking for this exact thing, but when he starts paying attention it’s easy enough to pick up.

He leaves breakfast early so he can be in class before anyone else.  He even gets there before Lan Qiren, which is a first.  Maybe for anyone.  He waves cheerfully when Lan Zhan’s uncle arrives and glares at him, but otherwise he keeps his eyes on his own desk.  He waits for Lan Zhan because doing things no one sees isn't the point.  They've done plenty in secret already.

Lan Zhan doesn't pause when he walks in, but he notices.  Of course he does; he notices everything.  Wei Ying smiles at him, but he doesn't get up until Lan Zhan sits down.  Then, very calmly, he walks to the front of the room and kneels next to Lan Zhan’s desk.

He’s careful not to put his back to Lan Zhan’s uncle.  There are three other students in the room with them now.  Wei Ying pulls his sleeve back--not the one with the ribbon under it--and pours a little water into the inkstone on Lan Zhan’s desk.  He takes Lan Zhan’s inkstick and uses it to draw the water up before grinding it against the stone.

It's an easy, familiar movement, but the quiet scrape of stick and stone sounds loud in the silent room.  Wei Ying peeks at Lan Zhan while he's working.  Just to see, to make sure--he's not totally wrong about this?

Lan Zhan is staring at him with wide eyes and a terrifyingly vulnerable expression.  Like Wei Ying has just done something so right that Lan Zhan is afraid it isn’t real, or that he’s going to take it back.  Which means this is so much more important than he realized.  He could mess it up without even knowing.

Wei Ying looks back at the inkstone and concentrates, because who messes up ink?  No one.  It’s fine.  He just has to put the inkstick down and get up without tripping, which he is absolutely capable of doing.  He’s fine.

Lan Zhan is still watching him when he stands, and Wei Ying winks because that’s the kind of person he is.  It makes Lan Zhan look down again, quickly, like he’s hiding something.  His ears are pink, and Wei Ying doesn’t even want to laugh.  He wants to coo over his adorable, embarrassed Lan Zhan.

He manages to restrain himself--not a strength of his, so go him--and walks back to his seat without a word.  And oh, hey, there’s Nie Huaisang.  Since when does he show up early?  Wei Ying grins at his fan, then schools his expression before he sits down and faces forward again.

No one says a word.  Wei Ying uses the rest of the time before lecture starts to make his own ink and doodle on a piece of paper he definitely doesn’t plan to take notes on.  Lan Qiren won’t like it, but it’s quiet.  He’s not bothering anyone.  He’s pretty sure Lan Qiren has a long wish list for his behavior that starts with those two things, and today apparently they’re enough.

He’s disappointed but not surprised when Lan Zhan is asked to stay after class (so they can't leave together, Wei Ying is sure).  He's prepared.  He has the doodle in his hand, and he takes a couple of steps forward like he’s getting out of someone’s way, and look!  There he is by Lan Zhan’s desk again!

He slips the doodle onto Lan Zhan’s desk, pats it once (it’s a very cute doodle), and smiles at Lan Zhan before he skips back down the aisle to Nie Huaisang.

“What was that?” Nie Huaisang hisses from behind his fan.

Wei Ying beams at him, then gives in and glances back quickly.  Lan Zhan is carefully putting the painting of two bunnies (one with a little white headband, the other with a dark ribbon tied around its ear) on top of his notes where it’s perfectly visible to anyone who looks.  Lan Qiren looks furious, but if Lan Zhan likes it then it’s a win.

“It’s a picture of bunnies,” Wei Ying says, following Nie Huaisang outside.  “I like drawing bunnies.  They’re fluffy and cute, just like me!”

“You gave Lan Wangji a picture of bunnies?” Nie Huaisang squeaks.  “Brother Wei, why!”

“Because I’m delightful, that’s why,” Wei Ying says cheerfully.  “Why, do you want a picture?  I’ll do one for you!  Not bunnies, though, only Lan Zhan gets bunnies.  Those are the rules.”

Nie Huaisang is staring at him, but that’s not unusual.  “What rules?”

“The ones I just made up!” Wei Ying tells him.  “What’s for lunch today?”

Lan Zhan has been (tacitly, possibly grudgingly) allowed to continue sitting with Wei Ying at dinner.  He’s still clearly expected to eat with his family at breakfast and lunch.  But!  They’ve let him go back to his usual end seat, so he’s not totally (presumably protectively) surrounded.

So if Wei Ying just happens to have a loquat in his hand, and he happens to take the long way around to the seat his sister saved for him, it’s easy to slip the fruit onto the table next to Lan Zhan’s elbow and keep walking.  Giving each other food is one of the few Lan displays of affection that’s completely normal, even if they’re mostly careful not to look at each other while they do it.

Wei Ying figures the entire Lan table is glaring at him when he sits down, so he does the smart thing and smiles at his sister and makes a face at Jiang Cheng and ignores everyone else.  For several moments, even!  By the time he looks back, the loquat is tucked in next to Lan Zhan’s bowl and Lan Xichen is pushing another one at him.  Because he’s a good brother, Wei Ying thinks proudly.

By the end of the meal, Lan Zhan has five loquats and no one at his table is glaring at Wei Ying at all.  Which is… weird, but not bad?  They knew he liked them, right?  Of course they did, he’s their family.  Their Lan Zhan.

Lan Zhan, who has never admitted to Wei Ying that he likes loquats.  Or bunnies.  Or children, or swordwork, or the paintings Wei Ying gives him.

But they know him.  They’ve known him a lot longer than Wei Ying.  Wei Ying’s family knows what he likes to eat; of course Lan Zhan’s does too.  Maybe it’s just “give a loquat” day and no one told him.  He was just lucky!  To be the first to celebrate it!

He’s making dinner plans when he gets to the training grounds that afternoon, but he has to stop for the children.  Well, for Lan Zhan and the children.  Mostly for Lan Zhan.  It’s hard to watch him and think about anything else at the same time.  Maybe he should try meditating with Lan Zhan again--staring at him might help him focus?  

On something, not nothing, but it would be better than everything.  Plus he’d get to look at Lan Zhan, so whether it works or not there’s no real downside.

He’s waiting for someone to show up at the end of the children’s instruction, either to steal Lan Zhan away or just to conveniently chaperone, when the last kid runs off the field and he’s watching her go from inside the practice studio.  Next to Lan Zhan.  Who’s standing very close, and definitely not inspecting practice weapons.

Wei Ying turns his head, because if he turns his whole body he’s going to throw himself at Lan Zhan and it will just be embarrassing for both of them.  But he’s not going to lie.  “Lan Zhan, I want--”

“I want to kiss you,” Lan Zhan says at exactly the same moment, and Wei Ying laughs with giddy relief.

“Me too!” he exclaims.  “So much, you don’t even know--”

Lan Zhan interrupts him.  “Close the door,” he says.

Wei Ying doesn’t think about it, just does it, and then Lan Zhan shoves him into the closed door and his hands are on Wei Ying’s arms and his face is so close.  “Yes,” Wei Ying whispers.  “Yes please!”

Lan Zhan kisses him before he can finish saying please.  It’s lovely and warm and considerate, but his hands are so tight on Wei Ying’s arms that Wei Ying can feel him shaking.  His mouth is gentle, but his body is tight and tense and there’s something wrong.  This isn’t--he doesn’t--

Wei Ying doesn’t know what it is, but he knows what he wants, and maybe that would help?  “You can get closer,” he mumbles.  Lan Zhan doesn’t stop kissing him even when he talks, but it’s soft and constant with a hitch in his breath that sounds like--

“If you want to,” Wei Ying whispers, getting his hands on Lan Zhan’s hips and tugging playfully.  “You can, come here, I want you to.”

Lan Zhan makes an actual sound and pushes into him, his whole body pressing Wei Ying up against the door.  And oh, that’s nice, Wei Ying thinks, letting his eyes close just for a moment.  That’s very nice; he wants Lan Zhan to push him into things and press their bodies together all the time.  With kissing or not.

Then he feels Lan Zhan’s mouth on his neck and he thinks: oh, with kissing.  Definitely with kissing.

Chapter Text

He appreciates what Wei Ying is trying to do.  Lan Zhan wants people to know they’re courting, and Wei Ying has found a way that won’t threaten his uncle’s reluctant tolerance of the situation.  He’s made it clear to Lan Zhan’s family, along with any resident sect member who cares to notice, that they're together and happily so.

It doesn’t seem to have made any impression on the other students.  Lan Zhan isn’t ignorant of other clans or the world beyond Cloud Recesses.  He knows many people and families are more demonstrative than the Lans of Gusu, both physically and verbally.

He knows too that he and Wei Ying have opposing reputations.  Wei Ying is unusually demonstrative, and he is unusually reticent.  For as long as Wei Ying has been at Cloud Recesses he’s tried to provoke Lan Zhan, and Lan Zhan has mostly tried to resist.  It’s likely no surprise that Wei Ying might broaden his efforts while Lan Zhan chooses not to protest.

Especially since their classmates now believe them to be friends.  Lan Zhan never expected this to be as frustrating as it is.  Wei Ying will be his, and he would like it to be obvious to everyone around them.

He uses the hilt of his sword to knock on the door in front of him.

The person he’s looking for might not be here.  Wei Ying is hosting a talisman study session for their classmates, to which Lan Zhan was invited but regretfully declined.  This is more important.  

Unless Wei Ying’s brother is also at the study session, in which case Lan Zhan will have to decide how dangerous it is to interrupt a gathering that almost certainly involves numerous violations without warning.

Jiang Wanyin opens the door.  He stares at Lan Zhan for a long moment before he bows.  A little.  But he does bow, and he didn’t have to.  The location and the hour clearly mark this as an informal visit.

Lan Zhan bows in return, careful that his gesture is not more shallow, but also not obviously deeper than the one he received.  Jiang Wanyin is both observant and temperamental.  He is also very dear to Wei Ying.

“May I speak with you,” Lan Zhan says.  “About Wei Ying.”

Jiang Wanyin scoffs.  “You think you have to tell me who it’s about?”  He isn’t holding his sword, and it looks awkward when he folds his arms without it.  “Talk.”

Lan Zhan knows Wei Ying’s brother less well than he knows his sister, which is significant.  He does not expect Jiang Wanyin to like his request.  He is less clear on whether or not it will be approved, or what he might do to better his chances.  He doesn’t think reassurance is the right place to start.

So he starts with the most important part.  “I want Wei Ying to wear Lan Sect colors,” he says.  “If he wants to.  With the understanding that it has nothing to do with his sect affiliation, and everything to do with his association with me.”

Jiang Wanyin’s expression changed a great deal in a short period of time, but Lan Zhan is unable to interpret what it means, so he waits.

“You’re kidding,” Jiang Wanyin says at last.

He’s careful not to react.  He’s baffled and impatient and saying so will not improve the situation.  “You are not the first to think so,” he says instead.

Jiang Wanyin scoffs in a way that could be angry or amused.  “I bet,” he says.  “You already ask my sister?”

Lan Zhan blinks.  “Not about this.  Should I?”

Jiang Wanyin shrugs, arms still crossed over his chest.  “He doesn’t listen to me.  I don’t know what you need my permission for; it’s his life.  He’ll do whatever he wants anyway.”

“Wei Ying has been very clear,” Lan Zhan tells him.  “He will not leave Jiang Sect, nor would I ask him to.  You are his future sect leader.  I’m seeking your approval in order to avoid misunderstandings.”

“And if I don’t give it?” Jiang Wanyin counters.  “You’ll, what.  Just give up?”

Lan Zhan considers that for a moment.  “I will ask Wei Ying,” he says at last.  “Whether or not he thinks I should try again.  And if so, what I might do to convince you.”

“Of course you will,” Jiang Wanyin mutters.  “Let’s just pretend I said yes, so we can all keep pretending you care.”

Lan Zhan stares at him.  “If I intended to offer regardless of your answer, I would not have asked at all.”

Jiang Wanyin gives him a strange look.  “Wait.  Does he not know about this?”

“If he knew,” Lan Zhan says, “I expect he would even now be demanding gifts and--”  It’s too much, far too much, and he stops himself just before he says “kisses” to Wei Ying’s brother.  “And the appropriate colors,” he mutters.

Jiang Wanyin scoffs again, but it’s less aggressive this time.  “Yeah,” he says.  “No kidding.”

There’s a pause while Lan Zhan tries to find an appropriate response, and then Jiang Wanyin says, “Look, I know what you think of me, but I’m telling you this as a favor: I’m only the sect heir by blood.  My father loves Wei Wuxian like nothing else.  If he could make him the heir instead, he’d have done it already.  So don’t go fucking around with my brother’s sect alliance and expect our family to look the other way.”

This is… useful information, but Lan Zhan is aware it would not be polite to say so.  

“Wei Ying claims two people in this world as family,” he says at last.  “One is his older sister, and the other one is you.  My uncle is negotiating with your father.  I’m negotiating with you.  Allow Wei Ying to wear blue and white, and I will do whatever you require to mitigate the appearance of divided loyalties.”

Jiang Wanyin gives him a very flat look.  “Anything?”

“Yes,” Lan Zhan says.

Jiang Wanyin waits another moment, but whether he’s still considering or just waiting for Lan Zhan to qualify his agreement is unclear.  “Wear a clarity bell,” he says at last.

Lan Zhan takes a moment to process this, but no matter how he looks at it he finds nothing unreasonable or unfair in the request.  A symbol of Jiang for a symbol of Lan.  This is a balanced trade.  “I would be honored,” he says.

It’s true.  He didn’t think of requesting a token from Wei Ying in return, but the idea is pleasing.  Lan Sect rules allow each disciple to wear three ornaments, and at the moment he only has one.  A bell from Yunmeng is acceptable and appropriate.

Jiang Wanyin raises his eyebrows but doesn’t otherwise react.  

Lan Zhan wonders if he should ask Wei Ying’s brother to confirm that permission has been given.  Is there more?  Another requirement?  Another question?

“You going to his thing tonight?” Jiang Wanyin asks abruptly.

It takes a moment to understand his intent.  “I’m here,” he says.

“Yeah, well.”  Jiang Wanyin puts his arms down and shifts his weight.  Visibly, awkwardly, and not just because he doesn’t have his sword.  “You should go.  There, I mean.  We had to hear how you weren’t coming three or maybe 300 times.”

Lan Zhan doesn’t think this is a very precise range, but it does involve Wei Ying.  Such an estimate might be as much as anyone can manage.  “I thought they might be caught breaking rules,” he admits.  “Were I to arrive unannounced.”

This time Jiang Wanyin looks at him like he’s stupid.  “So announce yourself,” he says.  “Tell him you’ll only come in if he passes inspection.  I guarantee he’ll clean up for you.”

This seems very demanding, but perhaps Jiang Wanyin is joking.  Or perhaps he knows how little Lan Zhan wants to report Wei Ying for anything right now.  He finds the advice he’s been given appealing regardless.

Announce yourself.

Chapter Text

Lan Zhan knows there is a matchmaker.  He has not met her, nor does he know her name.  He assumes she is a woman.  They usually are.

She’s likely to be from Caiyi Town, though considering his uncle’s undoubted determination to drag this out as long as possible, he might have insisted on someone more remote.  She would have traveled to Cloud Recesses first, since Lan Zhan is sure his uncle would not be content to convey his specifications without emphasizing them face to face.  Someone from farther away, less familiar with the family, might insist on meeting the suitor she allegedly represents.

Since Lan Zhan has not met with anyone, nor heard anything whatsoever about the opening of negotiations, he expects one of two things has happened: nothing, or an initial missive already dispatched and received by Lotus Pier.

Wei Ying hasn’t heard anything either, but he doesn’t receive regular letters from home.  He’s told Lan Zhan not to worry: if his sister says everything will be fine, then everything will be fine.  Wei Ying was sure the Jiangs would be happy to be rid of him, but since Jiang Yanli offered her opinion he’s refused to contradict it.

“We can be engaged forever,” Wei Ying whispered to him this morning.  “Courting.  Betrothed.  I don’t care as long as I get to be with you.”

Lan Zhan kissed him, all pretense of music or lessons gone now.  They sat on the floor anyway, doing all the things they can’t do outside: holding hands, stroking wrists and arms, kissing.  So much kissing.  When his skin is hot and he has to clench his fists to keep from burying them in Wei Ying’s hair and tugging, Wei Ying just fits their mouths together very gently until he can breathe again.

Wei Ying still talks to him like they’re practicing.  Like he’s waiting for Lan Zhan’s answers before he keeps going.  And every time he touches him, he waits for Lan Zhan to respond before he does it again.

It does not feel measured or controlled.  It feels like a language he doesn’t understand, bubbling and rolling around him until he’s lost.  Sometimes it roars in his ears so loudly Wei Ying must hear it himself.  Or maybe he feels it: Lan Zhan tensing and trying to withdraw until Wei Ying somehow makes everything familiar again.

Wei Ying had to kiss him many, many times this morning.  

Lan Zhan told him, “I care.”  

He told him, “I want to be with you too.”

Finally, when they were just sitting there with Wei Ying’s arms draped around him, Lan Zhan leaned in to rest his head carefully on Wei Ying’s shoulder.  So he couldn't see his face when he murmured, “You’ll have to leave.”

Wei Ying’s fingers were tracing idle patterns on his back.  The pattern changed, then, but it didn’t stop.  Even when Wei Ying said softly, “What… here?  With you?  Or Cloud Recesses?”

“Yes,” Lan Zhan whispered.

There was a quiet moment where Wei Ying’s hands still didn’t stop moving.  “You’ll have to come with me,” he said at last.  “It’s only fair.  I came here to study; you can come to Lotus Pier to…”

Visit, Lan Zhan thought, and it was terrible.  He doesn’t want to visit Wei Ying.  Not unless he’s visiting forever.  Not unless he’s visiting constantly, a guest who goes to Wei Ying at night and receives him in the morning, eats meals with him and sees him everywhere, smiling and waving and shouting after him all the time.

“Train,” Wei Ying finished.  “You can come train at Lotus Pier, like an informal disciple exchange.  For purposes of getting to know your future in-laws.  Although I have to warn you, mine aren’t even as fun as yours, so sorry about that.  I hope I’m enough to make up for it.”

Lan Zhan kissed his shoulder.  And then, since he was right there, his collarbones.  His neck.  The side of his face, but he stopped short of Wei Ying’s mouth to whisper, “You’re worth everything.”

Now, staring across a sun-drenched courtyard at Wei Ying, he wonders if the nature of the excuse matters at all.  Wei Ying is laughing, surrounded by friends and admirers and curious onlookers.  There’s a white sect ribbon in his hair, embroidered with the blue clouds of the Lan family, and when he tosses his head the ends of the ribbon swing forward over his shoulder.

He doesn’t wear it across his forehead.  It’s tied around his ponytail with looping strands that Lan Zhan pulled into a bow himself.  Wei Ying has been loudly proclaiming it “a gift from my fiancé” all morning.

Surely he doesn’t need a reason to follow Wei Ying wherever he goes.

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Ying cries, waving happily as though Lan Zhan could possibly have missed him before.  “Lan Zhan did you hear!  Uncle Jiang said yes!”

For a long moment, the words mean nothing to Lan Zhan.  

But Wei Ying is beaming at him, and one of Lan Zhan’s ribbons is holding his hair back for everyone to see, and when he calls, “Come back to Lotus Pier with me!” there was never anything Lan Zhan could say but yes.  

Forever.

Chapter Text

“You know,” Wei Ying says, sun bright on his face and a breeze making his hair dance, “we might not have thought this through.”

Jiang Wanyin scoffs.  “You?” he says.  “Now?  Realize you might not have thought it through?”

They're all sitting on top of the classroom roof, which isn't explicitly forbidden.  The ground below is still damp from the morning mist, but the sun has dried the roof and they don't have class here anymore.  Only the final closing ceremony remains before visiting students begin to leave.

Lan Zhan will be leaving with them.  It’s a strange thought.  He doesn't know how he feels about it, except that he prefers it to the alternative.

“I don't know which part of that to laugh at first,” Jiang Wanyin is saying.

Wei Ying is resting his elbow on his knee, chin propped on his hand as he considers the view.  The white-and-blue cloud ribbon is knotted in his hair today, leaving the ends longer than his hair is and now conspicuously draped over his other shoulder.  He makes a face without actually looking at Jiang Wanyin, so Lan Zhan assumes the words are not as inflammatory as they sound.

Wei Ying’s sister doesn’t look troubled by the mockery either.  “What are you thinking about, A-Xian?”

“Where are we going to live?” Wei Ying asks, without turning his head.  He’s addressing the courtyard, perhaps, with the occasional disciple drifting by below.  Or the trees, the nearby rooftops, or the far away slope of the mountain.  “After we’re married!  Lan Zhan can’t stay in Yunmeng, and I can’t be First Disciple from Gusu.”

“No, you can’t,” Jiang Wanyin agrees.

This time Jiang Yanli shushes him.  Lan Zhan wonders how she decides when to chide them and when not to.  They both adore her; they always seem to listen when she speaks.  She must have some reliable criteria when it comes to intervening or letting them be.

“You don’t have to decide that now,” Wei Ying’s sister is saying.  “A-Xian, that’s still so far in the future!  Don’t worry about it yet.”

“But you do,” Wei Ying says, turning his head at last.  He’s smiling, but it’s not a happy smile.  “You’ll go to Lanling to live with your Jin husband, won’t you.”

She looks down for a moment, and Lan Zhan wonders if Wei Ying dislikes Jin Zixuan because of his sister’s feelings, or in spite of them.  

When she lifts her gaze again, her smile is determinedly lighter than Wei Ying’s.  “He’s the sect heir,” she says.  “Of course I’ll go to live with him.  But you and Lan Wangji won’t have to worry about that!  You can spend half your time in Yunmeng and half in Gusu if you want to!”

“No, you can’t,” Jiang Wanyin repeats.  Conversationally.  Like he doesn’t expect them to listen to him.

“Why not?” Lan Zhan asks.

“Because,” Jiang Wanyin says, like this is so obvious he’s glad to be challenged.  He seems very satisfied when he tells Lan Zhan, “He’s going to be my adjutant.  You can’t have him.”

Lan Zhan holds his gaze.  “Wei Ying is the better fighter.  You should be his adjutant.”

“Well I can't be,” Jiang Wanyin snaps.  “Because I'm the heir.”

This is reasonable, so Lan Zhan nods.  Jiang Wanyin glares at him.  He understands that he has been impolite, but he does not like to see Wei Ying’s skills dismissed.  If Jiang Cheng acknowledges them, it is enough.

“Ah,” Wei Ying says, looking between them.  “Anyway!  Lan Zhan hasn't even seen Lotus Pier yet!  He doesn't even know if he'll like it!  So of course we can't decide yet.”

“I will like it,” Lan Zhan says.

“Of course you’ll like it,” Jiang Yanli agrees.  “Everyone’s very nice there, and there’s mist in the morning, just like there is here.  I bet you’ll feel right at home.”

He looks at her in surprise.  How did she guess he likes the morning mist?  No one alive knows that.  What a surprising coincidence for her to have identified that particular similarity.

“And you’ll have us!” Wei Ying exclaims.  “Well, not all of us.  Sorry brother Nie!”

Nie Huaisang sighs, resting his fan against the embroidered sect symbol on his robes.  “I wish I were going with you too,” he says wistfully.  

Lan Zhan wonders why.  Nie Huaisang has returned to Cloud Recesses repeatedly, and each time he professes his wish to be elsewhere.  Surely he looks forward to departing.

“Then you should come with us!” Wei Ying declares.  “Brother Nie!  Tell your brother he has to spare you a little longer, so you can come and study the famous swordwork of Jiang Sect!”

“Ah,” Nie Huaisang says with a nervous laugh, “you’re very kind, of course, but I don’t think that would be… convincing.”

“Tell him you’re coming to study our cuisine,” Jiang Yanli suggests with a smile.  “I’ll cook with you, and you’ll go home with so many new dishes!”

Wei Ying beams.  Lan Zhan doesn’t have to look to guess Jiang Wanyin is smiling too, and he won’t.  When Wei Ying is happy, there’s no reason to look anywhere else.

“That would be more plausible,” Nie Huaisang agrees.  “You’re very gracious to offer, Lady Jiang. I don’t expect my brother will be convinced, but I’ll certainly mention your proposal.”

“You can tell him I asked you to teach me something in exchange,” Jiang Yanli says.  “Painting, perhaps?  My brother is very good at that too, but if it were a different style?  Something unique to Qinghe, so Sect Leader Nie can praise you for expanding your cultural influence.”

“I will, Lady Jiang,” Nie Huisang says.  He’s smiling back at her now, and he adds, “I’ll tell him.  Thank you.”

“It’s worth a try!” Wei Ying says cheerfully.  “Speaking of brothers, do you know what I’ve just realized?”

He’s looking at Lan Zhan again, which is as it should be.  Still it’s Jiang Wanyin who answers.  “That yours is the best?” he says.  “Indulging all of your ridiculous whims the way Nie Mingjue never would?”

“Jiang Cheng!” Wei Ying protests.  “You’re my younger brother, you have to indulge me!  And who just said I can’t live with Lan Zhan in Gusu, anyway!  You can’t just go along with some of my whims!  It has to be all of them!”

“It definitely doesn’t,” Jiang Wanyin says.

“Hmph,” Wei Ying says, looking away so he can’t see him even out of the corner of his eye.  “But Lan Zhan!  Without brother Xichen, who will tell me when I mess up with you?  You’ll have to do it yourself!”

“I’ll tell you when you mess up,” Jiang Wanyin mutters.

Wei Ying doesn’t look at him, but his lips twitch and he says, “You have to tell me first!   Lan Zhan, I don’t need to hear anymore about my terrible habits from Jiang Cheng!  You have to tell me.  

“You can tell me when I do things right, too!” he adds with a wink.  “Okay, Lan Zhan?  Do you promise?”

He can’t say no.  Of course he can’t, no matter how unsuited he is to fulfilling this request.  He will learn.

“I promise,” Lan Zhan tells him.

For Wei Ying, he will learn anything.