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It starts, as many questionable ideas do, with Jin Ling. Who in this moment has a crease in his forehead so similar to his mother’s, it leaves Wei Wuxian slightly woozy.
Or maybe that’s the lack of oxygen. Who’s to say, really. This coughing fit has lasted long enough that the world’s turning a bit purple.
“You’re ill,” Jin Ling says. It’s amazing how he manages to make even that sound like an accusation.
Wei Wuxian does not have quite enough breath to inform Jin Ling that he never gets sick, actually. But he does make such an objectively horrible rattling wheeze that Jin Ling jumps back in horror, so there’s that, at least.
“Ugh,” Jin Ling says pointedly. “Why did you come with me if you were going to do this?”
“I didn’t actually schedule this, Jin Ling,” Wei Wuxian finally manages.
Jin Ling, for his part, looks deeply unconvinced. “Really? So you felt fine until now?”
“Completely,” Wei Wuxian says. It’s not that much of a lie. He did feel a little tired, maybe. But if he says I just thought Lan Zhan hadn’t allowed me enough sleep lately, Jin Ling is going to run screaming into the woods, and Wei Wuxian does not have the energy to chase him.
Jin Ling narrows his eyes. This look is much more his father than his mother. “You can’t travel today.”
Wei Wuxian can’t argue with that, much as he’d like to. It’s not like he’d be home tonight, anyway – they’re a little inland in Yunmeng, several days out from Gusu even at his fastest pace. But as much as he’s enjoyed the time with Jin Ling, the hunt lasted for several days. Now that it’s over, he’d been hoping to cover as much distance as possible before nightfall.
But he knows, better than anyone, when he’s been beat. So he sighs, “There’s an inn nearby. I’ll rest there.”
Jin Ling goes red, his mouth open. That look is pure Jiang Cheng “Alone? In some inn? Do you know what Hanguang-Jun would do to me?”
“I won’t tell him if you won’t.” Miraculously, Wei Wuxian laughs without coughing. “I’m fine. You don’t need to stay with me. And I don’t think the accommodations would be up to Sect Leader Jin’s standards.”
“Well that’s fine. We’re not staying there.” He lifts his chin defiantly. “I’d planned to stay with Uncle tonight, anyway. You’ll come to Lotus Pier with me.”
Wei Wuxian blinks. “A-Ling. As a rule, your uncle doesn’t love me dropping in without an invitation.”
Jin Ling waves a hand. And here, with a mix of dread and an odd sort of warmth, Wei Wuxian recognizes his own influence, too. “He’ll be fine with it if I ask.”
***
Jiang Cheng, unsurprisingly, is not fine with it when Jin Ling asks.
Wei Wuxian finds it doesn’t bother him much. By the time they make it to the Jiang compound, the only thing he can find it in his heart to care about is a place to sit. He even catnaps on a training mat for a while, the sounds of Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling’s argument lulling him into a light doze. So it’s possible Jin Ling had a point about not leaving him on the road, to his own devices.
At one point, Wei Wuxian feels someone hovering over him, and cracks an eye open to find one of the younger shidi wringing his hands. “Young Master Wei,” he quavers, “can I get you something to drink?”
Wei Wuxian rolls onto his back to smile sympathetically up at him. He’s been to Lotus Pier three times, now four, since that disastrous visit after the Burial Mounds. He’s been getting slowly, carefully reacquainted with Jiang Cheng under the most controlled circumstances. But the disciples of Yunmeng Jiang are all new since the Sunshot Campaign. Everyone who knew him as a boy is dead now. Everyone here now knows only the Yiling Patriarch. Once the sole object of their Sect Leader’s rage, now an occasional, uncomfortable dinner guest.
“I’m fine,” he says. “Am I in your way?”
The shidi pales even further, if possible. “I can bring you a chair, Young Master Wei. Only if you like! There’s nothing wrong with, um. The floor.”
Wei Wuxian brushes off the concern with a wave. “I might be leaving soon. I won’t get too comfortable.”
Jin Ling stomps across the training hall then, giving the poor shidi an opening to run for his life. “Get up,” he says. “Uncle’s preparing a guest room for you.”
Wei Wuxian raises his head and squints. At the moment, Uncle is not preparing anything. Uncle is still in the next room, watching the two of them through narrowed eyes. But when he catches Wei Wuxian looking, he disappears down the hall.
It’s fair enough. Jiang Cheng can, by Jiang Cheng standards, have a civil conversation with Wei Wuxian now, at least as the husband of a prominent cultivator. Asking him to be nice to his sweaty, potentially contagious former shixiong seems like a bit much. He gave his hospitality, albeit grudgingly. There’s nothing else to expect.
***
Wei Wuxian’s room is in the back, in one of the newer wings. There’s a clean, fresh scent to the wood that even his tortured sinuses can pick up.
Jin Ling flits from one end of the room to the other at first, like he wants to do something useful but hasn’t thought much further than that. But once Wei Wuxian coaxes him into a game of weiqi, he forgets to be worried. Or at least, his worry doesn’t keep him from being the sorest loser Wei Wuxian’s ever seen. He’s too old for it to be charming, but Wei Wuxian is thoroughly charmed anyway.
The hours pass at a crawl. If he were back in Cloud Recesses, he could worm his way into Lan Wangji’s lap, make Lan Wangji lull him to sleep with a song. He could lie down for a bit. He’s tired enough. But he never sleeps that soundly here anymore.
Jiang Cheng makes himself scarce enough to be nonexistent. Wei Wuxian wonders, for a few hours, if the training hall will be the only time he sees him. But he appears late in the afternoon, when the light is low and angled and they’ve just started their third game.
“A-Ling,” he says. “Dinner.”
Jin Ling sits up straight with a start, his uncertain gaze flickering to Wei Wuxian. “Uncle—”
“He’ll eat with the disciples at 7:00.” Jiang Cheng hesitates before looking at Wei Wuxian directly. “You’ll take your meal in the training hall. No one’s going to bring it to you.”
“Uncle!” Jin Ling says again, hotly this time.
“Jin Ling.” Wei Wuxian bats at his shoulder. “I’m not going to crumble into dust.” Eventually, he meets Jiang Cheng’s stare. For lack of anything better to do, he says, “Thank you for your hospitality.”
Jiang Cheng mutters something to himself as he turns on his heel.
“… well, that’s already better than I expected.” Wei Wuxian sinks into the covers. His bones suddenly feel like liquid. “Go see to your Uncle, A-Ling.”
Jin Ling stands, the board and stones in hand. And then he hovers. “You’ll be fine?”
Wei Wuxian rolls over with a grumbled laugh and lets his eyes fall shut. “Do I look that fragile?”
***
When he next opens his eyes, it’s dark.
He blinks. And then blinks again, like maybe the first time didn’t take. But the low afternoon light has vanished from the windows. There’s a single candle on a table by the door, and nothing else.
He’s missed dinner, for sure. And potentially several other things. His neck is stiff, like it’s been bent for hours.
“I sent a message to your stupid husband,” says a familiar voice. “He’ll be here by morning.”
“My husband isn’t stupid,” Wei Wuxian mumbles. Then, slightly more alert, he tries to sit up. “Hang on. It’s dark. Tell him not to come.”
His eyes have adjusted enough that he can see Jiang Cheng now, sitting next to the candle. His face looks tight and drawn in the low light.
“You got worse,” he says simply. The asshole is implied. “I need him to take you off my hands. I did tell him to wait until morning, but tell me how likely that is?”
Awareness trickles back slowly. Wei Wuxian’s skin feels tacky with sweat, his hair plastered to the sides of his face. The brazier in the corner is lit. There are several more blankets than he remembers. But he’s so cold, his teeth are chattering with it. He reaches up to his forehead. There’s a compress there, rapidly warming.
Jiang Cheng would look unimpressed, if he didn’t also look a bit scared. “You couldn’t have stolen a stronger body?”
“Not stolen. Was forcibly given.” Wei Wuxian narrows his eyes, which does nothing to clear his fever-blurred vision. “And be nice to my body. It didn’t do anything to you.”
Jiang Cheng scoffs. “It’s not as if I’ll hurt its feelings.”
“Shh.” Wei Wuxian pats absently at his own arm. “He doesn’t mean it.”
Jiang Cheng’s face loosens, just slightly, into a straightforward scowl. “If you’re still delirious, I’m leaving.”
Still. Wei Wuxian is briefly tempted to ask if he said anything, but he rapidly thinks better of it. “What time is it?” he asks – a vastly safer question.
“About 2:00,” Jiang Cheng says.
Wei Wuxian sits up a little further. Then instantly regrets it. “Go to bed, Jiang Cheng,” he groans. “I’ll live.”
“Will you?” Jiang Cheng says. “Because if you die in my guest room, Gusu Lan will have my head.”
He and Jin Ling really are the same person, sometimes. Wei Wuxian considers pointing out, again, that he is nowhere near dying, but he lets it go. He’s tired. And it’s apparently not helping. “Not all of Gusu Lan,” he says mildly. “I think the elders would send gifts.”
“They wouldn’t be the only ones,” Jiang Cheng says. But there’s surprisingly little heat to it. “Anyway. Someone needs to watch you. And in case you’ve forgotten, a Sect Leader of Yunmeng Jiang shouldn’t delegate anything he’s not willing to do himself.”
“I hadn’t forgotten,” Wei Wuxian says. He kind of had, but that’s beyond the point. “But that’s not, like, an imperative.”
“Whatever.” The candle flickers, obscuring his face. But he sounds so young, Wei Wuxian could forget what year it was. “If you feel so grateful, then go back to sleep, get better, and get on your way. And remind your husband, when he gets here, that he’s in someone else’s home.”
Sleep. Just the word knocks what little energy he has left out of him. He doesn’t lie down so much as slither back onto the mattress. It’s not as soft as the bed in the Jingshi, but it doesn’t matter. If he closed his eyes right now, he’d be asleep in seconds.
No one would blame him if he pretended not to hear what Jiang Cheng had said. And yet.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Wei Wuxian asks.
“It means what you think it means,” Jiang Cheng says, infuriatingly.
Wei Wuxian’s temples pound in a way that has nothing to do with his fever. “Ah, yes,” he bites out. “Because when I think of disrespectful guests, I think of Lan Zhan.”
“Of course.” There’s something tight and sharp as razor-wire in his voice. “Hanguang-Jun, paragon of virtue.”
“Jiang Cheng ah.” Wei Wuxian’s own voice sounds embarrassingly like pleading. “I don’t know what you want, here.”
“Nothing.” Jiang Cheng shrugs viciously. “He can hate me as much as he likes anywhere else, but I’m not going to take it in my own home. That’s all.”
Wei Wuxian props himself up on his elbow, to the extent possible. “He doesn’t hate you,” he says automatically. But even as he speaks, he’s thinking better of it. He hadn’t really thought to put a name to it before whenever they were in the same room – he was usually too busy trying to keep them from each other’s throats – but.
“Oh no, yeah,” he says out loud, the brain-to-mouth filter boiled right out of his head. “I take that back, actually. He hates you.”
There’s a beat. Jiang Cheng sniffs. “Well. Thank you for admitting it, I guess.”
“Wow,” Wei Wuxian says, under the full force of the revelation. “He despises you.”
“Yes,” Jiang Cheng says, “we’ve established that.”
“Like,” Wei Wuxian says. “If I had to decide who he hated more, you or Jin Guangyao, it might be a tie?”
“Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Cheng says.
Wei Wuxian’s laugh is more of a cough. It probably serves him right. “Lan Zhan doesn’t hate anybody. How’d you manage that?”
That, it turns out, is just a little too far. Jiang Cheng’s easy annoyance curdles. “You have to ask?” he says.
Slowly, Wei Wuxian lowers himself back to the bed. The sheets smell a little like the soap he used as a child. “You have to understand.” His voice comes out a little slurred. He closes his eyes against a rush of vertigo. “It would have been easy for Lan Zhan and Zewu-Jun to turn against each other, too. They worked hard. To keep each other’s trust.”
He cracks an eye open, but Jiang Cheng isn’t quite visible anymore from his position. He’s not sure how to finish the thought. But Jiang Cheng understands, doesn’t he? Wei Wuxian can accept that, among all the options Jiang Cheng had to weigh, that he wasn’t worth it. It was probably fair enough, in the end. But that isn’t something Lan Wangji can swallow.
But all Jiang Cheng says is, “Go back to sleep. You’re not making sense.”
Reluctantly, Wei Wuxian rolls to face the wall. It seems important, somehow, to make Jiang Cheng understand what kind of person Lan Wangji is. Maybe he’ll have better luck later.
***
“Wei Wuxian!”
Wei Wuxian is sitting up before he’s fully awake, a move he sorely regrets about two seconds later. “What?” he rasps. There’s a hand on each of his shoulders, gripping tightly. “What’s happening? Are you okay?”
He blinks, and Jiang Cheng’s face swims into view inches from his, eyes wide and scared. He moves back, but doesn’t quite let go. “Your breathing,” he mutters, by way of explanation. “You were—wheezing, or something.”
Oh. Was that all? Because Wei Wuxian would happily give up a lung if it meant going back to sleep. Possibly both. “It’s fine,” he groans. “Lemme lie down. Dizzy.”
Jiang Cheng’s grip on him only tightens. “Sit up straight. Drink this first.”
A bowl of dark liquid is shoved into his hands, and extremely reluctantly, Wei Wuxian remains upright. Tea. Now that he thinks about it, his throat is bone dry. He can be awake long enough for tea.
He takes a sip. And then takes an accidental full-throated inhale in his effort not to spit it out.
“Gods above,” he chokes, once he’s able to get several full breaths. “Why is your tea salty?”
“Who said it was tea?” Jiang Cheng snaps. “It’s broth. You missed dinner.”
Wei Wuxian is not quite miserable enough that he’d let that go. And the spice actually has loosened his chest somewhat. “I thought no one would bring it to me.”
“Shut up. I’m not heartless.” He loosens his grip, as if to release Wei Wuxian’s shoulders, but not enough that he’s allowed to sink back into bed. Wei Wuxian manages not to let out a horrible whining noise, but barely.
He converts that energy into the most baleful look he can muster. Jiang Cheng visibly crumbles, just a little. “Maybe you shouldn’t go back to sleep,” he grits out.
Wei Wuxian blinks. “Jiang Cheng,” he says. “If you don’t let me lie down, I’m going to cry, and neither of us wants that.”
“Your breathing sounded terrible,” Jiang Cheng says.
“Then let it sound terrible,” Wei Wuxian groans. He doesn’t sound great, he’ll admit. He probably doesn’t look great, either. But he can’t imagine that he looks bad enough to have Jiang Cheng unhinged to this extent. It’s true that neither he nor Jiang Yanli were sick much, growing up. But Jiang Cheng did half the work raising Jin Ling. It can’t be that he’s never seen a cold before.
Jiang Cheng at least lets him go then, takes a little step back as he does his best to become one with the covers. That lost, angry look doesn’t quite leave him. And Wei Wuxian shuts it out for a moment. Allows five seconds to feel sorry for himself. He doesn’t want to comfort someone else. He doesn’t want to be on this pillow. He wants his head in Lan Wangji’s lap, those strong, clever hands on his forehead. He wants to close his eyes and let someone else handle the rest.
But that’s not totally fair, is the thing. Jiang Cheng never asked for the way things were, exactly. He doesn’t expect it anymore. Certainly doesn’t expect it now.
It’s certainly not his fault that Wei Wuxian is about to do it anyway. He’s too tired to break old habits tonight, after all.
“I’m not dying, Jiang Cheng,” he sighs. “The second I feel like I’m dying, I, a Professional Formerly Dead Person, will let you know.”
“I know,” Jiang Cheng says. “Obviously. But if you did, and we never…”
‘Never’ what, he doesn’t say. Wei Wuxian has a few guesses. Most of them probably correct, in one way or the other.
His eyelids are too heavy to open now. But he turns in Jiang Cheng’s general direction. “We’ll figure something out, didi,” he mumbles. “We have time.”
If Jiang Cheng has anything to say to that, he doesn’t catch it.
***
It can’t be much longer until sunrise. But the hours pass like drizzling honey. The bed feels unsteady, liquid. Wei Wuxian shivers, then burns.
The compress comes off his forehead, at some point, and a cool hand lays flat across his skin.
“Shijie,” Wei Wuxian slurs. “I’m cold.”
The hand disappears.
***
Wei Wuxian wakes, for real finally, to full sunlight and fingers untangling his damp hair as gently as they’d pluck strings on the guqin. He doesn’t have to open his eyes to know who they belong to.
“Er-gege.” He turns over to bury his face in Lan Wangji’s hip. “My head hurts.”
Lan Wangji’s body quivers with a little relieved huff, and his fingers dig gently into his scalp. “Does it?”
“So much it could burst,” Wei Wuxian says mournfully. He’s laying it on a little thick, he knows. But he was deprived of Lan Wangji’s adorable mother henning all night. He has to make up for lost time.
Eventually, he extracts himself enough to make eye contact. Lan Wangji looks a little tired and a little windblown. He must have come straight to Lotus Pier when he got Jiang Cheng’s message. Wei Wuxian valiantly maintains eye contact and doesn’t roll over to shriek into his pillow.
“You came to take me home?” he says hopefully.
Lan Wangji brushes the hair out of his eyes. “When you’re well enough.”
“Lan Zhan.” Wei Wuxian flops back to the bed. “If you love me, you’ll break me out of here.”
“Hm.” Lan Wangji smiles, utterly unmoved. “You once said the same thing about Gusu.”
“I was wrong about Gusu,” Wei Wuxian pleads. “Time has shown me the error of my ways. If I can sleep in our bed tonight, I will eat your family’s watery medicinal soups every day for the rest of my life.”
“I doubt it,” Lan Wangji says, leaning down to kiss his temple. “But your enthusiasm is noted.”
Wei Wuxian grumbles performatively and settles back into his lap. “So strict, Lan Zhan,” he says. Then, with a glance around the empty room, he adds, “Where’s Jiang Cheng? Haha, did you scare him off?”
Lan Wangji, predictably, stiffens. But when Wei Wuxian shifts to look up at him, he doesn’t look angry. More—sympathetic.
“When I arrived this morning,” he says slowly, “Sect Leader Jin was with you. I have not seen Jiang Wanyin.”
Wei Wuxian doesn’t move. But he swears he sinks a little in Lan Wangji’s arms. “Oh.”
Lan Wangji’s silent, at first. He adjusts Wei Wuxian’s head so it sits further up, more securely in his lap. But it’s a long moment before he says, “I can have someone summon him.”
Wei Wuxian almost laughs, remembering remind your husband that he’s in someone else’s home. Looking at Lan Wangji right now, he’s pretty sure what his answer would be.
“It’s okay.” Wei Wuxian tilts his head to the side, breathes in the warmth of Lan Wangji’s body. “If he wants to see us, he’ll come. If he doesn’t – we’ll come back.”
***
Jiang Cheng doesn’t come back to the guest room. Nobody does except for Jin Ling, stopping by for regular games of weiqi and attempts to harangue Wei Wuxian back to health. Lan Wangji brings everything he needs. And if he runs into Jiang Cheng along the way, he doesn’t say anything about it.
On day two, Wei Wuxian finally strikes a compromise with Lan Wangji. He’ll agree that he’s not up to walking, and that riding Bichen might aggravate his healing lungs. But they can take a boat to Caiyi.
So the next day, they head for the docks. And that’s where Wei Wuxian finally sees Jiang Cheng again, looking particularly wound up. Next to him, stacked to his waist, is a pile of parcels.
“Hanguang-Jun,” Jiang Cheng says.
“Jiang Wanyin,” Lan Wangji says.
Jiang Cheng looks at Lan Wangji. Lan Wangji looks back at Jiang Cheng. Wei Wuxian briefly considers flinging himself off the pier just to break the tension.
“So you’re leaving,” Jiang Cheng says. “Couldn’t wait to get out of here?”
Wei Wuxian shifts uncomfortably, feeling entirely too small in the spare robe Lan Wangji had wrapped him in. He’s not happy that it’s true. But it is.
But that doesn’t mean it has to be true forever, either.
“Maybe you can come to Cloud Recesses next time?” Wei Wuxian says. “Lan Zhan’s got a whole alternative menu going. Perfect for Yunmeng palates.”
Jiang Cheng uncoils a fraction. “Don’t just invite me into other people’s homes.”
“Cloud Recesses is Wei Ying’s home,” Lan Wangji says. And it’s a wonder the river doesn’t freeze solid from the sudden chill. “He can invite who he wishes.”
Several competing expressions seem to cross Jiang Cheng’s face at once. And then, with a demonstrative scowl, he lurches forward, nearly shoulder-checking Wei Wuxian as he passes. “Take those with you when you go,” he says, indicating the parcels. “And set off soon. A couple hours and the wind will blow you right back here, and then I’ll never be rid of you.”
Wei Wuxian waves with one hand and holds Lan Wangji’s waist with the other. “It’s fine, it’s fine,” he soothes in an undertone. “That one was actually almost affectionate.”
It’s quick work to load the boat. They come back for the parcels last. Lan Wangji kneels to inspect them, but Wei Wuxian doesn’t need to get much closer. He can smell it from here: roasted meat, fresh pepper and paprika.
“He left us… rations?” Wei Wuxian says slowly.
Lan Wangji opens the top box, his face impassive. “It seems so.”
Wei Wuxian squints into the late afternoon light. At the top of the steps, he can still see the edge of Jiang Cheng’s retreating back, disappearing into the compound.
“That brat,” he says through a smile. “Does he realize that we’d sink if we tried to take all of that?”
Lan Wangji hums thoughtfully. “Unless that was his intent.”
Wei Wuxian leans in to kiss his cheek before he bends down to help. There’s far too much, for sure. But he’ll take what he can carry.