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The first time, they reclined side by side on a tall rooftop, the inky black sky scattered with stars and centred around a brilliant full moon. Zhou Zishu warmed everywhere they touched: shoulders, hips, half-bent knees. The crook of his elbow and the line of Wen Kexing's arm. Contentment spread with each swallow of mulled wine. Sweetness slid like hot liquor down his throat, to spark a growing fire in his belly. It was a warm summer's night, the sort made for slick heat.
He felt Wen Kexing's gaze like another point of contact, scorching like the sun's rays, and heavy with expectation when their eyes finally met. Wen Kexing was his zhiji indeed: he had understood Zishu when he basked in sunlight. And he understood now. Under the full moon, the string of their gazes drew taut. They both knew where the night would end.
Zishu lowered his gourd, letting wine bead on his lip, never breaking eye contact. Lazy contentment weighed at his limbs. Let Wen Kexing be the one to reach toward everything he begged for.
"A truly majestic view," murmured Wen Kexing. His smile danced, but he did not move.
A challenge, then. Zishu darted out his tongue to draw in that bead of wine. It tasted sweet. Wen Kexing's sharp inhale, the way his pupils dilated into huge, dark holes, was sweeter still.
"Lao Wen should talk less," Zishu said, and parted his lips, waiting.
"But what else should we do?" Wen Kexing mused.
Zishu craned his neck closer. Wen Kexing's lashes were longer than his own. It would be off-putting if it weren't so terribly attractive. "What do you think?"
It was the precise moment fighting began on the paved roads beneath their feet.
Zishu was a man who created plans, not expectations. But when Wen Kexing offered to show him a brilliant sight, he really didn't expect that sight to be a murder spree that was, worse, total chaos.
-
After some contemplation—and an outburst, a truth revealed, and two dramatic rescues—Zishu decided that the rooftop was marred by circumstance.
Zishu had passed his days studying bland smiles and blank eyes, watching for the knife in the dark, for the treasonous whisper. He had been that knife and whisper. He spent years weighing his decisions twice before settling, save for the cold, decisive flicks of his blade, and it led him nowhere. At some point, you had to trust what you knew, or withdraw from the world altogether.
So Zishu decided to believe in it all. The Wen Kexing with whom he passed sun-drenched days was real. The fact of Wen Kexing's desire, as he professed with every poetic flirtation, was true.
That they were interrupted before Zishu could be coaxed into a leisurely night in bed was simply a matter of unfortunate timing. A small case of unexpected murder could happen to anyone, after all.
-
They spent the next several days clearing the area of scorpions new and old. Wherever they originated, they all gurgled their last breaths in the same way. Wen Kexing killed like he breathed violence, darting from one severed throat to the next. His hair whipped behind, framing eyes narrowed in concentration, mouth widened into a blood red slash. It was different from their sparring, which were an instinctual give and take. When he killed, Wen Kexing was a weapon with nothing but sharp edges, controlled by no master, with no handle to safely grasp. With every movement, he cut.
Zishu, adrenaline rising to a dizzy, excruciating peak, wanted to hold on tight with both hands.
As they returned to the lodgings, dusk creeping into night, Zishu felt the blistering-hot gaze turned his way, as it had so often during their skirmish.
"A'Xu carries a beautiful blade," Wen Kexing declared, darkly intent, "but it could never match the grace or beauty of its wielder. I could watch you fight all day and never get bored."
"Really?" Zishu didn't bare his teeth, but it was a close thing, adrenaline still rushing through his veins. "It was hardly a fight. They were no challenge."
Wen Kexing affected a loud, dreamy sigh. He had wiped his fan on some leaves, ripping them to shreds, but did manage to get rid of the blood. Now it fluttered at his chest. "Magnificent. A hawk that dances on the wind, untouchable."
Sweat formed a sheen at Wen Kexing's neck, where long, silky locks of dark hair fell into disarray. The wildness beat beneath Zishu's skin. Each drop of sweat would be salty on his tongue. Being close to Wen Kexing felt like the nails had slowed their progress, like each sense bursting back into existence at the touch of Wen Kexing's fingers, the scent of his skin. He should smell like blood, but Zishu found only sweat, and wood chips, and aromatic herbs.
When Zishu entered his room, Wen Kexing followed, assuming his own welcome. He wasn't wrong. There was a half-smile jerking up the corner of Wen Kexing's mouth, face alight with a deep, vicious pleasure, that shot straight into Zishu's gut.
"The untouchable hawk?" he parroted, for want of anything better. No matter. It was not a moment for words. He strode towards the bed, left his sword on the table, and tugged down the clasp holding his topknot.
"Untouchable. Invincible." Wen Kexing radiated heat like a furnace against his back. Fingers carded through his loose hair, tugging here and there in little starbursts of pleasure. Zishu waited for the grasping fist. For the firm tug that would guide their mouths together, to consummate this battlelust. Wen Kexing whispered into his ear, and he burned. "An immortal descended to the human realm."
Zishu laughed, a rasp up his bone-dry throat. "But I am not beyond human considerations. Hunger. Thirst."
"A'Xu does sound thirsty." It was a murmur into the nape of his neck, lips moving with unbearable softness at a time there should have been claws and bruises and desperate, devouring teeth. "I'll see to it."
Finally. The lips moved away, and Zishu prepared himself for something. A shove, a twist, teeth and nails, an action for him to cleave toward and flow with, and—
—clean, naked air.
Footsteps sounding away, and as he spun, bewildered, the flutter of Wen Kexing's lavender robes out the door.
Zishu blinked at the cold, empty room.
He'd just—left.
Zishu rubbed his arms, banishing the chill creeping into his gut. Wen Kexing had not seemed skittish, as he did at unpredictable moments. He'd sounded as clawingly hungry as Zishu felt, as ready to dig his fingers into willing flesh. Zishu would know. He used to garrote men on the evidence of tone of voice alone. He knew Wen Kexing, trusted him, heard his voice. Something made him retreat.
There was nothing else for it. Zishu settled onto the bedspread to wait. After a minute, the heat blistering his veins relented, and he was even able to cross his legs, to look like he'd relaxed into meditation.
Wen Kexing returned holding a large jar in one hand, and two porcelain cups with another. His skin was still damp, his lips bitten red.
"My apologies," was the first thing Wen Kexing said, as he poured. His voice was—not small. Wen Kexing wouldn't allow it. Sober. Restless.
Zishu accepted the cup, bemused. "Why?"
Wen Kexing studied the ground. Hair whispered down his shoulder, obscuring half his face. Zishu itched to smooth it back. It was always better to see Wen Kexing's expression when they did something, anything, and read the interplay of emotions. But in the moonlit quiet, braced for eggshells with each step forward, he kept his hands to himself.
"I should have guessed what you needed."
Zishu blinked. He raised a cup. "This?"
"Weren't you thirsty?" Wen Kexing tilted his head, lips flickering into a tiny smile that trembled only once. He looked, astoundingly, like it was a sincere question.
His lips were still an inviting red, but with that tremour, the mood vanished. Zishu had had enough of leading people astray with touch.
Zishu tipped the cup back, resignation battling affection, only to be struck by the direst betrayal. "Wait—Wen Kexing, did you bring me water?"
-
Wen Kexing understood being called striking as the flirtation it was. He glowed with it, letting their bodies overlap until they sat intimately close, two flames merging on the same wick. And yet:
"You could kneel, kowtow, and call me shifu. Then I'll teach you."
Wen Kexing scoffed in response.
Zishu would practice some defenestration, if only Wen Kexing's face weren't so hideously cute as he shuddered.
-
If it weren't so heartbreaking, later, when all his plans went awry.
-
"I really thought you two were fucking," said Ye Baiyi.
With the way Wen Kexing had treated any overt gestures like they didn't exist, Zishu expected some degree of confusion. Instead, Wen Kexing said waspishly, "Why? Jealous? A'Xu only has eyes for me."
So he did know that much, at least.
Zhang Chengling glanced up, then straight down again, and continued walking. Zishu approved. One ought to focus on improvement when training, and if there were a moment free of training, then Zishu was being too lenient.
He left his very foolish soulmate and their very blunt senior to their bickering, but there was something there, in this other facet of Wen Kexing that glimmered like gilt, tugging at Zishu's thoughts. If the attraction pulled them close, and attachment, and knowledge of both, then what was it that kept Zishu's bed empty?
There was something, he thought, in the way their bodies drew closer together and apart, elbows and finger-widths. In the arch of Wen Kexing's eyebrows, the bud of his pouting lips, the fly-away gasps of surprise. The trembling fan. Wen Kexing felt everything so deeply it filled him to the brim, like a worn deerskin flask, and spilled into adjacent moments. The closest body parts. Down the jut of his shoulder and the skinny wrists, where his fingers curled into fists.
There we the masks one wore to become another person. And there were the masks worn to be one's self.
I know you, Zishu thought. There would be another opaque lake or limpid pond, to wash away all masks. I wish you trusted that you knew me.
-
He'd suspected before, of course. Wen Kexing offered friendly greetings to all, and intimacy to no one. He killed as easily as he breathed. Easier. Wen Kexing told someone, Gu Xiang made me human, as though no one had before. As though no one would before.
Zhou Zishu wondered what he would think about the rush of lust after battle, if he had only ever been alone. Probably nothing he would want.
Zhou Zishu considered what he did want. What Wen Kexing would, if Zishu could crack open his chest and read the fine print on his heart and spleen and liver, and sew him up again so that none of those desires hurt.
-
The bath was scented with a spray of lotus and handfuls of peach blossom, floating up to Wen Kexing's half-submerged face. His mane of hair splayed around him like tendrils of jet black ink, framing cheeks flushed red with the heat. Zishu had never seen him so undignified, in such a state of total relaxation. He supposed it was, in many ways, the same thing.
"The bath is big enough for two," Wen Kexing said, without opening his eyes. His mouth curved up at the edges.
"Is that an offer?" said Zishu.
"For A'Xu? Always."
There was always a tacit invitation, for something. But if Zishu peeled off his clothes and slipped naked beside those lovely thighs, pressed their bodies together like two magnets meeting, would he meet a warm welcome? Or bewilderment, not for the act itself, but for the timing of it, the ways of it?
"Your hair's tangled," said Zishu, instead. "You look like a drowned corpse."
Wen Kexing waved his arm in a leisurely arc out of water. Rivulets crept past the crook of his elbow. "I have too many evils to expose to die yet."
"Let me help," said Zishu.
A deafening splash. Wen Kexing thrashed to the surface. His glare burned into Zishu's face, and then his outstretched arm. "I could take that so many ways. A'Xu should be clearer. Should I run for my life?"
"Lao Wen." He let the amusement flicker into his expression, as he had, in a conscious effort, for so many weeks. "I'll help you with your hair. I want to."
It took a long, long time for Wen Kexing to laugh. Zishu thought it might be directed at himself.
"Please," breathed Wen Kexing, once his laughter faded.
Zishu dragged a stool across the tiled floor, and took a seat, tying his sleeves back with swift, sure movements. Watchful eyes dragged a hot line from Zishu hands to his newly exposed elbows, like Wen Kexing could see past flesh into the shape and weight of Zishu's bones. When Wen Kexing swallowed, the click was audible.
"Turn around," Zishu instructed. He held Wen Kexing's gaze until he obeyed.
Despite its lustre, rich black that reflected no other tints, Wen Kexing's hair was the heft and texture of spun wool, gleaming with oils to hold it in place. It was subtly uneven in places, like chunks were torn out years ago, then obscured since by regrowth.
"Close your eyes," Zishu said, and rained dippers of water over Wen Kexing's head.
He found ointment that smelled strongly herbal with an underpinning of ash, and worked it into Wen Kexing's scalp in fast, even movements, taking care not to catch any of the knots. His nails scraped, dragged really, into Wen Kexing's scalp, entire body warming at Wen Kexing's bitten-off exhale. Zishu worked from the temples inward in rhythmic scratches, parting Wen Kexing's hair into rows, enjoying the little noises of contentment.
At the second pass, Wen Kexing gasped. By the fifth time, he had melted back into Zishu's hands with a groan. He was beautifully, temptingly hard, the jut of his collarbones, the length between his legs, but more important considerations demanded Zishu's attention.
Wen Kexing's face was a picture of slack bliss, his body arched, his neck bared. Vulnerable. Trusting. His eyes remained closed. Zishu could run his fingers down his throat and do anything. He smiled down helplessly, brushing away some oil that had fallen to Wen Kexing's brows.
"Keep them closed!" he said when Wen Kexing's long, curved lashes fluttered, washing away what remains of the oil. "All right."
Wen Kexing didn't wait for the concession. Once the water splashed his face, his eyes opened. There wasn't the slightest hint of suspicion in them. He looked—lost—pupils blown wide, searching Zishu's face. He didn't close them again, as Zishu moved onto the rest of his hair, even after his stare settled on other side of the room.
Zishu gathered a section of hair, wet it from scalp to end with a dipper, and began to unpick the knots with infinite patience. He was careful not to pull. These were not knots he could simply slice through and be done with it.
"Have you done this before?"
"Yes."
"I haven't," said Wen Kexing. "I didn't have any younger siblings to look after except A'Xiang, and she dunked her hair in the closest source of water until she was eight. You'll never guess what a wild child she was."
"I have some idea," Zishu said dryly, worrying at a particularly stubborn knot.
"After that... others took over."
"Hmm." Zishu found success, and moved to another section of hair. If he wanted to see, he reminded himself, he needed to be seen. "I didn't do it for my shidi. There were more junior sect members for that. It was for—" Companions? Marks? "—information. I learned how to do it for information."
Wen Kexing stiffened. "It was for your missions."
"Many things were." Zishu finished the section of hair. Rather than moving on, he tilted Wen Kexing's head back with a finger at his chin, and held him there until Wen Kexing's downcast gaze return to meet his. "But not honesty. They never had any true parts of me. Often, not even my face or my voice."
Wen Kexing's lips parted. Hair plastered to his forehead, the sharp angle of his chin, the lively arch of his brows. "I don't want the same thing as—them."
Zishu stilled his hands. "Do you think this is the same?"
Wen Kexing's eyes darted between each angle of Zishu's face, like he could pluck the answers out of the lines of Zishu's face. He could. Zishu hadn't worn a mask for Wen Kexing since he opened his robes, to reveal the scars studded into his chest. He wouldn't start now, but he waited for Wen Kexing. He had waited for weeks. For an eternity. At some point, Wen Kexing would have to trust what he knew, or withdraw from this altogether. It was the nature of a bonds that burned white-hot. Without fuel, they burned out into ash.
"No," Wen Kexing whispered. "A'Xu. No. It's not. It's not."
Zishu rested his brow against Wen Kexing's water-slick forehead. "At least you know that much."
He let Wen Kexing draw him into a soft, lingering kiss that tasted, as if he could taste again, like spun sunlight.
-
The first time they had sex, which was much later than Zishu would have liked, Wen Kexing cried. He was an ugly crier, full of hitched breaths, swollen eyes, and red-faced frustration. Magnanimously, Zishu refrained from saying so, if only because he was too busy panting with each thrust.
"I've never done this before," Wen Kexing mumbled, rubbing his tears into Zishu's shoulder.
Mischief reared its head. Zishu stilled, despite Wen Kexing's protests. "Lao Wen should have told me that I had the honour."
Wen Kexing's eyebrows passed through five different expressions, each more amusing than the last. Despite their situation, this, this made him flush. It was adorable. "That's not—I meant tears—I think A'Xu is underestimating me."
"Am I?" Zishu grinned. He nuzzled Wen Kexing's palm, which rose to cup his cheek.
"Oh," Wen Kexing breathed, between hiccups. "You're crying too."
Zishu smacked his hand away. "Who's crying?"
Wen Kexing replaced his hand with his lips at Zishu's cheek, and then a slow, deepening kiss on the mouth.
Zishu decided to let the matter go.
A small case of sobbing could happen to anyone, after all.
-
fin.