For Wei Ying

[lan_wangji]

Thirty six hours. Lan Wangji has not rested in thirty six hours. He cannot and he will not, no matter how many times the guardians of the City tell him to leave this place or how often his back and shoulders protest. He can feel the badly treated wound trying to reopen but the pain is incidental and he is Hanguan-Jun of Gusu Lan. He has trained for this. He will not fail Wei Ying, again. He will not lose him.

He has heard rumor of another man recently arrived with similar looks to himself. He'd arrived two days prior; Wei Ying had died two days prior. It must be him.

The sun has set again over the park where Lan Zhan sits next to the river, desperate for quiet as his fingers pluck at his guqin. Inquiry rings out over the park, broken up only when he switches to his Wangxian until his heart can no longer stand to hear it.

His Wei Ying has to be here.

Comments

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian darts inside, prompting the doors to slide wide open again before closing, which he finds rather courteous. They stand in the strange metal room, but nothing else happens. The numbers on the wall panel are simple enough, but he has no idea which one might correspond to Lan Wangji's room.

"What is yours called?" he asks. "The Cold Room, perhaps?"

[lan_wangji]

"Twenty-eight," he mutters, unimpressed with both the still box and the name of his housing. "Floor six."

Ah.

He jabs yet again, this time at the engraved six and grabs at Wei Ying's wrist at the box shudders and pressure increases. It feels much like the pressure of flying and he wonders at the idea, that this box flies as his sword flies. If that is possible, it seems ridiculous that the hulking, metal beasts stay trapped on the ground. "Ridiculous. Where are stairs?" he huffs as the pressure starts to lessen.

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian tenses, shielding Lan Wangji's body with his own in the corner until it seems the uneven movement of the metal box is customary, again watching the doors with wide eyes when they slide open with a bright bing!

Quickly, Wei Wuxian rushes out again with Lan Wangji in tow, laughing when the doors close calmly behind them. He hasn't felt such a sense of wonder in ages. "What a marvelous little room!" he declares. "No wonder there aren't any stairs here."

[lan_wangji]

"Unnecessary," Lan Zhan murmurs, mouth twitching just a little at Wei Ying's mirth. He will forgo stairs in all buildings if it brings Wei Ying joy.

He will also never, never admit that he is relieved that he did not have to try and endure six flights of stairs in from of Wei Ying.

There is a plan, brown door marked with a 28 only two doors down and he is horrified to realize this is his home. A box within a large box, devoid of nature or silence, if the booming noises down the corridor are any indication. He pulls out a key, small and strange and grips Wei Ying as he approaches the door. "Is yours like this?"

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian shrugs. "On the outside, yes," he says. "I never went inside." Like Lan Wangji, he spent a few moments in his building - after climbing twelve flights of better marked stairs - and determined in not for him.

"I'm sure it will have a bed, at least," he says, taking the key from Lan Wangji's hand and sliding it into the lock. His nose wrinkle returns upon swinging the door open. Lan Zhan...Lan Zhan will not like this.

[lan_wangji]

No.

It is beige. It is a beige box lit by some hideous glowing thing on the ceiling which casts harsh light over strange furniture and mysterious shapes. There are two doors still closed and he prays one is at least a washroom as he cannot fathom how people wash in this strange new world.

"Hideous," he mutters, carefully setting Bichen down on what seems at first glance to be an overstuffed, narrow bed facing a strange, dark rectangle. There is no space for having tea, no space for meditation, no air and no escape. "Wei Ying does not have to live here with me, if he also finds it distasteful," he says with a stifled sigh, lowering himself to sit on the strange bed as his back spasms and aches harder with the new disappointment.

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian watches him sit stiffly, turning to enter the seeming cooking space in search of something with which to grind the herbs. Lan Wangji keeps mentioning him living with him. Why? Wei Wuxian knows that it was partly duty that kept him from spending even one night with his clan in Yiling, but likewise he can't imagine Lan Wangji wishing to live with him at Lotus Pier.

The sudden seeming affection is not unwelcome, but it's unnerving, just as Lan Wangji's fervor upon first seeing him had been. Frowning to himself, Wei Wuxian grinds the herbs into a bowl with the flat of a wooden spoon, adding some water to moisten the resulting paste. Turning back to Lan Wangji's new bedroom, he approaches cautiously. "You must be sore," he ventures. "Shall I help you remove your robes?"

[lan_wangji]

He wants to refuse, the tips of his ears already burning at the thought but the thin inner robe feels stuck in a way he knows will be unpleasant to remove. He has not been exposed like this in front of anyone since the cold pool years ago and somehow he is both relieved and mortified it is in front of Wei Ying.

"Mm," he grunts, undoing the ties of his inner robe and brushing his hair forward. "One robe only," he explains as he braces himself. "Outer robes left behind in Gusu."

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian's brow pinches as he settles behind him, pushing the length of Lan Wangji's dark hair over his shoulder. Lan Wangji prancing about in only his inner robes? It makes no sense at all. He'd sooner believe that Jiang Cheng had given up his clan to take up dancing.

"Why?" he asks, peeling the stained white fabric down carefully, but it catches in the dried blood all the same, and Wei Wuxian hisses.

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan squeezes his eyes shut as the fabric tears away from his back and cold air his his overly hot, bare skin. He does not open his mouth to answer until he is certain he has stifled all involuntary noise.

"Had taken it off," he answers, knuckles white as he clenches his hands against his knees. "Came here without warning. Was in Gusu, then here. As Wei Ying was in the forest and then here."

He chooses, for now, not to argue that Wei Ying was not in a forest prior to his arrival as he has already upset him enough for one evening.

[yiling_laozu]

Ah. He had been undressing, then, to treat his injuries. Wei Wuxian surveys his back, taking in the angry wounds, not clean enough for a blade, he thinks, but it's hard to tell through the blood.

"Āiyā," he swears. "Lan Zhan, I need to boil water to clean these first. Wen Qing would - " He stops, breathing through the new realization that Wen Qing will not do anything ever again. "She would have my head, otherwise," he finishes in a small voice.

[lan_wangji]

He is too distracted by the pain to note Wei Ying's words until the shift in his tone. It takes a moment to register who he could mean by she as this Wei Ying does not seem to know the fate of his shijie.

Wen Qing.

He presses his lips together as he unclenches one hand and slides it over to grip Wei Ying's. He lost Wei Ying once to his darkness and his grief because Wei Ying had thought himself alone, because Lan Zhan had not stood by him. It will not happen again.

[yiling_laozu]

Lan Wangji endures touch better than he likes others to believe, but he initiates it so rarely that Wei Wuxian nearly gasps, throat suddenly hot for the scandalous display of comfort. He draws a steadying breath, making certain his voice is even before he says, "I must honor her memory by healing you well, mustn't I?"

It's another moment before he can bring himself to move his hand from underneath Lan Wangji's, curling his overtop it for a moment before he rises again. "I won't be long. Try to relax, Lan Zhan. Your muscles are so tight."

[lan_wangji]

He nods, wanting to find words of comfort, wanting to say things that will help. He wants to tell Wei Ying how relieved he is that Wei Ying is with him but he does not know how.

He thinks of Wen Qing and all the others he'd heard were strung up or burned, the same people who allowed him into their home. He thinks of A-Yuan and hopes fiercely that he will be allowed to stay in Cloud Recesses, even if Lan Zhan has disappeared.

He ought to tell Wei Ying. He ought to tell him where A-Yuan is but he is terrified that Wei Ying will try and return, will leave him in this place before he has even had one day back with him. None of these thoughts have served to relax him or his muscles and he vows to find a way to tell him, soon. There must be a way to say it that will keep Wei Ying here.

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian's face is damp and red when he returns from the kitchen, a sight he will blame on the steaming bowl in his hands. He sits and dampens a cloth in the hot water, pausing before he settles a hand on Lan Wangji's unmarred shoulder.

"I expect this will hurt quite a lot," he murmurs. "I'm sorry, Lan Zhan. I must get out the dirt."

[lan_wangji]

"Wei Ying owes no apologies," he insists, eyes lingering on Wei Ying's weary face and red eyes until he is settled behind him. He will not make a sound, he vows as he takes a deep and steadying breath, drawing what energy he has left into control over his reactions.

The first thought, however, as Wei Ying starts as gently as he can manage is that there were to be thirty one more of these. He hopes he would not have cried out; he hopes he would not have given them the satisfaction. He hopes all thirty three would have been testament to how wrong they had all been.

He hopes someone would have helped him afterwards as Wei Ying is.

[yiling_laozu]

"Wei Ying owes many apologies," he murmurs, thinking once more of those suffering at home, and those who will never laugh nor cry again. He draws a steadying breath and focuses on the wounded flesh before him, applying the cloth to the wounds as gently as he can. There isn't too much dirt, thankfully, though he detects small fibers that look like wood, and as the dried blood is washed away, he realizes what he's looking at.

He had bruises like this himself, once, though his were wider and from a larger staff. Wei Wuxian stops.

"You were beaten."

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan would rather say nothing. There is no refuting it. Wei Ying is a smart and observant man and the wounds speak for themselves. But he is afraid that his coldness will turn Wei Ying away.

"Broke several rules," he murmurs, hands clenching and unclenching at the sensation of the cloth against his back. "Came here at the beginning of the strikes. Is why I am missing a robe."

[yiling_laozu]

"Your own clan did this?" Wei Wuxian gasps, clutching hard at Lan Wangji's shoulder as if he might somehow escape before Wei Wuxian is done examining him. The body before him doesn't move, yet Wei Wuxian loses sight of it after all, tendrils of dark energy beginning to trail from his fingertips as red floods in to obscure his vision. "Your Uncle would dare?"

[lan_wangji]

"Dont," Lan Zhan warns, heart pounding to see that dark energy yet again. He grabs at the hand gripping his shoulder, still facing away but fingers clenching at Wei Ying's as strongly as he can manage.

"Knew what the punishment would be when I broke the rules. It is fine. Do not think on it." It is not fine. It is painful and infuriating but he would have gladly taken the other thirty one blows. They were wrong; they were all wrong.

[yiling_laozu]

"What rule could be more important than his nephew's flesh and blood?" Wei Wuxian growls, moving past the astonishing idea that Lan Wangji has broken not only rules, but those of his own clan in his growing anger. The darkness spills from him in waves, his teeth bright and locked in a snarl.

"I will kill him if he comes here."

[lan_wangji]

"Wei Ying," Lan Zhan warns, twisting painfully, disregarding his back as he grabs at Wei Ying's arm.

"Stop this. Don't give in to it. They are my wounds, my choice. Uncle must punish me as he would any other. Please, don't do this."

[yiling_laozu]

Came here at the beginning of the strikes.

"The beginning," Wei Wuxian repeats, watching as the ugly wounds twist as Lan Wangji tries to look at him. The darkness swirling around them begins to slow, not as if to disappear, but honing, sharpening, a predator searching for its prey. "How many strikes were there to be?"

[lan_wangji]

"No," he huffs, the cloths sliding off his back as he grunts softly with the effort of turning all the way around on the overly soft bed.

"Enough. Wei Ying, please. Tired. And you, thought I'd lost you and now you're here and..." he trails off, throat tight as exhaustion and worry catch up to him. He cannot lose him to this, again. "Please."

[yiling_laozu]

"They hurt you," Wei Wuxian snarls, and the buzzing lights over their heads flicker. "You, Lan Wangji, the best of all of us, and they dared - "

He staggers backwards, clutching at his breast and the Stygian Tiger Seal resting just over his heart. Understanding the sudden feeling of an eruption deep within him, Wei Wuxian turns, coughing blood over his lips and chin as his body rejects the too fierce power coursing through him.

"No right," he says, fatigued but still angry as he swipes a hand across his chin, wishing more than ever for a drink. "They had no right."