Archive of Our Own ^beta

Honestly, Yu Ziyuan should have expected it.

Of course it wasn't enough that she would have a loveless marriage, die in a bid to protect the legacy of a man who had brought the son of his beloved into their household, and have to watch helplessly as her children—blood of her blood, heart of her heart; she'd carried these foolish children within her for nine months—get spit on by the entire cultivation world.

No. Of course not. That'd be too easy. Of course she'd have to be stuck with only Wei Wuxian to see and hear her, after what seemed like a huge fight that had left him and her son lying around the grass.

How dare they let her children traipse in mud like this? Yu Ziyuan had not allowed even a mosquito to land on a-Li's skin as a child. She had brushed her hair herself. How could they let her daughter wander around aimlessly? How could they make her cry?

And her a-Cheng, her son, her only son. How could they let him disgrace himself like this? She can't watch. She cannot watch him. She would prefer him not to grieve her if it meant not watching him break apart like this.

Get a move on, she snapped, right into his ear. Are you that in a hurry to die? She wasn't expecting anyone to hear her. She was dead, after all, as unfortunate as that was.

But Wei Wuxian had stared at her, wide-eyed, mouth agape. She wished that a fly would swoop right in and then scolded herself for the thought. If anything should fly in, let it be a wasp.

Of course. It had to be Cangse Sanren's son. It had to be him, of course. Attempt the impossible. Look, Fengmian, look at how your favorite fares even now.

She wondered where her husband was now. Probably already scrambling up to the after life so he can reunite with Cangse Sanren and that righthand man of his.

Stuck here, Yu Ziyuan stared back.

Let it be known that there has never met staring contest that she didn't win. Wei Wuxian looked away.

Wei Wuxian seemed to be too busy trying to keep her son alive to investigate Yu Ziyuan, which—fine. She understood that part, even when she wanted to berate him a little for having the self-preservation skills of a mouse.

But then again … maybe even the purples of a ghost were better than the reds of a stranger in this kind of conflict. Yu Ziyuan wished, not for the first time, that she didn't have to leave Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli to fend for themselves.

Is he going to wake up? Yu Ziyuan snapped.

Wei Wuxian flinched. Slowly, very slowly, he looked up at her. It was the same way he'd looked up at her when she was alive. "He thinks you're dead," he said flatly.

Yu Ziyuan snorted viciously. I am dead, fool, she gritted her teeth. You don't see Jiang Cheng noticing me at all, do you?

Wei Wuxian frowned at her. He even appeared a little angry. "You can't expect him to be alright after that."

Why are you ? It was the same misplaced jealousy, the same poison that had made Jiang Cheng look so small when she was alive. She winced at herself and forced her tongue back in behind her teeth.

"You're cruel," Wei Wuxian said, slowly, haltingly, "you're cruel, and you haven't been good to a-Cheng until it was too late, but he loved you more than anyone ever loved their mother. The least you could do is let him mourn you."

Yu Ziyuan looked at him again, saw how his hands shook. But even so, he covered Jiang Cheng away from Yu Ziyuan, made his body the shield when her eyes flitted from him to her child laying on the bed.

She let herself relax, let her frown fall. That was her child, so small, so precious, her only son. Someway away, her daughter was making him soup. Her daughter, who had the heart she never had, had the kindness and the radiance and the sweetness, and her son, who had everything she did, but somehow—

You love him, she accused. Wei Wuxian startled, like she said something especially damning, and he crowded closer to Jiang Cheng, like she would pull him away from him. No. She wouldn't.

Jiang Cheng would need the protection of someone who loved him, now more than ever. Jiang Fengmian could not protect her, could not love her, but—

(The reason why she had made sure to save Wei Wuxian as well was because he so clearly loved Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli, after all.)

—she has always known, even if it was a little, when Wei Wuxian had looked at Jiang Cheng, and the way Jiang Cheng looked back, helpless and saccharine, everything bared, like the sun pushing away the clouds to shine.

Keep them safe, she whispered. Wei Wuxian was nodding now, fervent, as he went on his knees and kowtowed to her, forehead on the dirty wooden floor of the inn.

She knew that expression. Jiang Cheng had her face, after all. How could she not know?

Jiang Cheng loved Wei Wuxian.

Yu Ziyuan had seen Jiang Cheng run out and lead the Wens away from Wei Wuxian in the marketplace.

When she didn't get him back, she'd been inconsolable, nails scratching the floor and eyes crying blood, but she refused to tell Wei Wuxian of what her son had done. What he had sacrificed—his life, his clan, his duty, all things he cared for more than life—to keep Wei Wuxian safe.

She knew his character. The way she refused to talk to Jiang Fengmian kindly, the way she delivered his medicine through Yanli—it was all things he did too.

When he was retrieved, he was even smaller than he already was when she and her husband had died. MY SON, she cried, anyway. My son. Wei Wuxian got him back. Everything else was inconsequential. He was sobbing at his bedside, holding his hand, relief making way for grief, grief crystallizing into anger. A-CHENG.

"Madam Yu," he whispered, "they took his golden core. Madam Yu, I..."

Yu Ziyuan felt like she was gargling blood. She was so angry. Her son, pillaged, stolen from. Her son, without his golden core. Her son, her son, her son—

How dare they. My son, she said, sounding like herself for the first time in days, how dare they do that to my son. My son, the heir to the Jiang Clan—

Wei Wuxian was nodding, eyes closed, even as he laid his cheek over the cold palm of Jiang Cheng's hand. His tears were making his skin wet.

"Madam Yu, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to do to make it better. Tell me what to do, please. I don't know how to make him feel better."

Yu Ziyuan wanted to tell Wei Wuxian to cut off their tongues, wanted to tell him—

But Jiang Cheng was so small, and Yanli was already so alone. She fell to her knees, so upset her form started to flicker, and Wei Wuxian had already started to rise. As if he could do anything.

Keep him safe, she whispered, and for the first time, for the only time, she wished she could keep him safe herself. She wished that Yanli could be happy, could have had the family she has always wanted, and she wished that Jiang Cheng could have grown into his birthright without a war.

"Madam Yu?" Wei Wuxian called, and he sounded absolutely heartbroken.

This was Cangse Sanren's son. That was true. But Wei Wuxian was also a child, not much older than her a-Cheng, and younger than her a-Li, besides.

Keep yourself safe.

Wei Wuxian's eyes filled with tears.

The golden core operation was a horrible idea. Wei Wuxian didn't care to listen to her, had all but plugged his ears the days where he was researching. She was resentful and furious. She refused to tell him what a-Cheng did for him, but if he knew that Wei Wuxian had given up what he had sacrificed himself to preserve—

How could that doctor allow this? Did it not burn her eyes to see someone so self-sacrificial, so without any concern for their whole life? How could Wei Wuxian let this entire thing happen conscious? How could any of this happen?

But Wei Wuxian had smiled when he covered Jiang Cheng's eyes with the blindfold. Had looked like himself for the first time in days when Jiang Cheng had finally started eating again. Had eagerly fed him a story that would absolve him of any responsibility.

It made Yu Ziyuan sick.

But Wei Wuxian had held him so tenderly, so carefully. He had been almost flippant with the gesture, even as he'd tenderly took his palm and pressed a kiss to the center of it, careful. He had made it so Jiang Cheng would never have to feel guilty about it.

Yu Ziyuan didn't want to let Jiang Cheng go.

But she remembered Zidian in Fengmian's grip that final day, how he had heard him say my lady one last time. How she had loved him, and though she was angry that he didn't, she knew that would have been enough for her to love him her whole life.

Wei Wuxian was sending him off with the same sort of finality Yu Ziyuan had given Jiang Cheng Zidian.

They both loved him. That was enough.

(Sometimes she wondered about how Fengmian had reacted to Zidian slithering up his wrist. Wei Wuxian—this stupid boy—probably wouldn't dare touch Jiang Cheng's spiritual weapon, wouldn't even get close, but Yu Ziyuan knew that if he touched it, Jiang Cheng couldn't hide how it'd respond to his touch. It's good, wasn't it? That her son was luckier than she was, in some ways.)

Yu Ziyuan was not a good person. She didn't care for the semantics, but if Wei Wuxian needed to survive in the Burial Mounds, if Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli were meant to see him again alive, Yu Ziyuan would try and shield him the best she could.

If this boy could give up his very ability to fly to make Jiang Cheng soar, then what would she not do?

"Madam Yu," Wei Wuxian gasped, "you... you're protecting me...?"

Yu Ziyuan ignored him, even as her resentful energy curled around anyone who tried to harm Wei Wuxian. Saying such things in public, she snarled. Do you not care for your shame or for your life?!

Wei Wuxian, confused, gestured to the corpses trying to eat him. "In public?" he echoed. "Madam Yu, how is this in public?!"

She had been so angered by that she had held off the corpses an entire night, enough for Wei Wuxian to get some rest. It wasn't enough, of course, but...

It was three months in the Burial Mounds, and it had taken its toll. Wei Wuxian killed Wen Chao. Jiang Cheng killed Wen Zhuliu with Zidian. Yu Ziyuan had simmered with enough defensiveness over Wei Wuxian that she had snapped at Lan Wangji from over his shoulder.

Jiang Cheng had hugged Wei Wuxian again after Lan Wangji left. Yu Ziyuan had looked away and turned her nose.

Secretly, she was thankful Jiang Cheng could still have reunions like this. Loudly and waspishly, to Wei Wuxian, she wished that Jiang Cheng not look at him with eyes like that ever again so that she wouldn't fall sick seeing her son so obviously in love with a man like Wei Wuxian.

Wei Wuxian had only winked at her from where his hands had slithered dangerously down her son's waist. Yu Ziyuan wished with all her might that she still possessed Zidian.

"Madam Yu, do you know they're saying that you would have whipped us yourself if you saw what Jiang Cheng and I were up to?"

I still will. Don't test me, Wei Wuxian.

"Little do they know that Madam Yu doesn't care that her son is a cutsleeve."

I still don't care. Yu Ziyuan looked over at Wei Wuxian, giving him the kind of once over that used to make all the girls who flirted with Jiang Fengmian in their youth shake in their heels. I do care, however, who he's being a cutsleeve with. I wish he had better taste, that's all.

Wei Wuxian made that whiny little expression of his again. "Madam Yu, that's mean! A-Cheng could have bagged much, much worse!"

With his current status? Yu Ziyuan snorted, full of disbelief. Sect leaders never married poorly, no matter how horrible. Jin Guangshan ended up with her sworn sister, after all. The rich bastards always got the prettiest flowers. Unlikely.

"Excuse you! I rank fourth in the cultivation world! I'm a catch."

So? Jin Zixuan is third, and he isn't worthy to kiss the ground my a-Li steps on. What makes you think you would impress me? Frankly, Jiang Cheng could marry Lan Xichen, and she would gladly find faults in him. It was just the way of the world, and how mother-in-laws were expected to act. Wei Wuxian clearly did not understand the intricacy of this ritual.

Well, except if the person marrying in was a-Li. Any in-law would be lucky to have a-Li, and Yu Ziyuan would whip anyone who dared be rude to her, besides. Jin Zixuan was lucky he was her sworn sister's son; though, she remembered with a fierce contentment, her lectures could bring Budda himself to tears, and no doubt that pompous son of hers was subjected to that after the incident that Cloud Recesses.

Calling a-Li plain... Ha! Her lips twitched. Maybe she should whip him still. Could she still regain sentience by the sheer frustration of what partners her children ended up picking up from whatever dodgy street corner?

One of her children wanted Jin Zixuan, and the other Wei Wuxian... Couldn't they have chosen someone like Nie Mingjue? Yu Ziyuan wanted to tear her hair out.

"You agree too, huh? Shijie definitely deserves better than that peacock!"

Yanli deserved to have a god descend and wed her, but Yu Ziyuan had the inkling that even if one did that, she'd still want Jin Zixuan anyway. She sighed. Of all the things to inherit from Yu Ziyuan, Yanli had to choose her stubbornness and horrible taste in men. A-Cheng, she already expected from the second he looked at Wei Wuxian like that, but her darling a-Li...

And my a-Cheng is fifth, when clearly, he should be at the top.

"Madam Yu, that's..."

What? Do you disagree?

"Haha, of course not! Stop glaring at me!"

Do you know how Fengmian reacted to Zidian?

"... He thought you hated him, Madam Yu. He was shocked when it had..."

Ha. Well. Yu Ziyuan sighed. I did.

"... Did you? Truly?"

Sometimes. Often. Yes. I hated him.

"I see."

But I loved him, too.

Wei Wuxian nodded, as though it was a fact of life. His eyes weren't pitying, not exactly, but he looked curious. "Yes."

You could tell?

"Ah, well. Sorry. We all could, Madam Yu." Wei Wuxian sighed. "Liking someone truly is like putting a noose around your own neck."

It would have hurt, in a different time. It only ached a little now. Then you know.

"That?"

Jiang Cheng loves you.

"Excuse me? What?" His tone sounded very much like how could he possibly? Stupid boy. Yu Ziyuan had known the day Jiang Cheng realized it, and Jiang Yanli knew shortly after that, she suspected.

He loves just like me, you know. If everyone knew how I felt then, then everyone must know now. Jiang Cheng has tied a noose around his neck for you. If that's the case, you... take responsibility! Thinking of Jiang Fengmian, she amended: don't pity him, either! I'll break your legs if you care for him because of obligation!

"Madam Yu, is this your way of giving me your blessing to romance your son?"

Don't push it.

"Right!"

"Madam Yu, I think you're starting to warm up to me."

Don't be ridiculous, boy.

"I'll get you to admit it one day."

It wasn't as simple as that, but Yu Ziyuan wouldn't let Wei Wuxian embarrass her son and daughter, so Yu Ziyuan insisted Wei Wuxian let himself go to Gusu.

"You'd let them imprison me?" he snapped.

That surprised her. Wei Wuxian's temparement was admittedly very good; he never got angry at her unless it was for her children's sakes. To hear him back talk like this... The resentful energy must really be affecting him, though he'd never admit it.

They mean to play Cleansing for you, Yu Ziyuan snapped back. She didn't add that Lan Wangji clearly adored him, did all he could to ensure Wei Wuxian's safety. If you're not in the state to care for yourself, how can you care for others? Foolish boy. Don't make me repeat myself.

Wei Wuxian had looked at her strangely, but he didn't relent. "Since when did you care about that?"

Yu Ziyuan sighed. Fair enough. Resentment clouds the mind and harms the body. How long do you want me to linger?

"Madam Yu—"

Go to Gusu, and then, clipped, because Wei Wuxian apparently needed to be taking care of others to take care of himself (like her a-Li, perhaps he really did spend too much time with her like she predicted), with your sect leader's express permission, of course. He didn't give up his golden core for you to take liberties with your life.

Wei Wuxian paused, and then, "What? Madam Yu, what are you saying? "

Wake up, Wei Wuxian.

It took a while, but he did, eventually. She was screaming by the time she was, but whatever. When he saw her, his eyes widened in shock. "What is going on?" he whispered harshly. Jiang Cheng was sound asleep beside him.

Funny how many of her conversations with Wei Wuxian were like this.

You know what's going on.

Wei Wuxian tightened his inner robes around himself and frowned. "It's time, huh," he mumbled, faint. "Goodbye?"

Yu Ziyuan thought about Jiang Yanli. Of her kindness, her warmth. Of the way she looked at Jin Zixuan. She almost sighed. Did all her children have to share her fate, at first?

You'll put Jin Zixuan in line, she said. Wei Wuxian nodded, irritation making his brows furrow. Good. A little bloodlust was good for a person. She can handle herself otherwise, but—you know how she is with the people she loves.

Yu Ziyuan had been horrible to her daughter, but she still took it stoically. It was one of her worst regrets—that she hadn't told her just how proud of her she was, that she was so thankful that she'd grown up nothing like her. That she had grown up with so many people to care for her.

As for Jiang Cheng… 

Make him happy, she said, her only wish for Jiang Cheng. His son had grown up like her, exactly like her, but he had done right things with all of them. She already knew Wei Wuxian would keep him safe. For someone like herself, for Jiang Cheng, the challenge was with keeping him content.

Considering they gave up their golden cores for each other—

Wei Wuxian folded himself in front of her fading figure and said, "Of course, Madam Yu."

Oh, what the hell. Let him have this. Popo, she huffed, looking away from him. I'm your Popo.

"I knew you were warming up to me!" Wei Wuxian accused loudly, waking up Jiang Cheng, who grunted and sat up, just as Wei Wuxian scrambled to explain why he was kneeling on the floor and speaking to no one.

Yu Ziyuan snorted. At least his son and daughter were happy now—or as happy as they could be, considering the political climate. Jiang Cheng got his second-in-command, and Jiang Yanli her spoiled peony-encrusted peacock prince (she had spent far too much time with Wei Wuxian).

And Yu Ziyuan—

Well, she'd see where the afterlife took her.

extra .

"Oh God," Wei Wuxian wheezed, trying and failing to disguise how he looked over his shoulder to Yu Ziyuan's eyes, which were wide in both indignation and shock when Jiang Cheng shyly offered to use Zidian to tie him up, "your mother would turn in her grave if you used that on me. Let's not!"

Jiang Cheng let himself get herded away from where Yu Ziyuan lingered, confusion clear in the furrow of his brows.

Yu Ziyuan murmured that's certainly… a creative way to use it. If Fengmian was less of a stick in the mud—"attempt the impossible," my ass— under her breath and watched with amusement as Wei Wuxian yelped loudly, clearly hearing her words, and pushed Jiang Cheng faster out of the room.