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

[lan_wangji]

Wen Ning does not make sense. The change in the battle right before it all fell apart does not make sense. There is something wrong but Lan Zhan cannot prove it beyond a feeling and his need to defend Wei Ying so he does not try.

"Should not have been yours to bear, alone," Lan Zhan manages, voice tight as he looks again at Wei Ying's wrist. "Let you fall."

[yiling_laozu]

"Let me fall?" Wei Wuxian scrunches his nose, folding his arms around Chen Qing to hug it to his breast. "You fought harder than even Jiang Cheng to make me turn from my chosen path." Has Lan Wangji been convinced of this all this time?

"I will unburden you, Lan Zhan. No one lets me do anything. I do want I want, and no one is powerful enough to stop me. It hasn't to do with you at all."

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan's head snaps up, shocked at Wei Ying's continued defiance when he had seemed so utterly defeated at the end.

"Wei Ying," he breathes, stepping even closer to look at Wei Ying's red rimmed, sharp eyes. "After what happened, after I had to watch you die, you are still like this?"

He doesn't know what he had expected, but in those last moments he'd seen his Wei Ying even in the grief and defeat. That had been his Wei Ying lost to that long fall. This, this person is not at all what Lan Zhan had thought he'd find.

[yiling_laozu]

Fear trips like ice down Wei Wuxian's spine. What on earth is he talking about? Wei Wuxian might have lost this round, but he isn't dead. One of them has lost his mind, and for once, it isn't him.

"Are you fevered?" he asks, genuine concern warring with the irritation in his voice. Lan Wangji is so unnerving now, with his exhausted eyes and strange wounds across his back. Frowning, Wei Wuxian's hand drops to one of his pouches. Wen Qing left him herbs before she went to her death, where are they?

[lan_wangji]

Frustration and terror tie Lan Zhan's tongue as he tries and fails to argue, to make some kind of sense of what has happened to both of them and finally is only able to smack at Wei Ying's rummaging hand with the hilt of Bichen as he gathers himself.

"You fell off a cliff. You jumped," he spits out, exhaustion and agitation making a spectacle of the great Hanguang-Jun. "Your memory must be impaired by death. The battle and then you died in front of me."

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian yelps, but all of his outrage shifts to unease the longer Lan Wangji rants. "What are you talking about?" he asks, taking a step back. "I haven't jumped from anything. I - I ran to see my shijie in her grief, but they chased me away. I ran to the forest and then I was here."

He shifts, again holding Chenqing between them, as much to keep Lan Wangji's awful words away as the man himself. "Stop talking nonsense. You can't - you can't frighten me."

[lan_wangji]

It must be some kind of memory impairment or shock from being brought back from wherever Wei Ying had fallen to, Lan Zhan surmises. He'd only heard pieces while waiting for his punishment: that Wei Ying had gone to Carp Tower and been seen, that is was why Lady Jiang had arrived at the battle.

"Not trying to frighten, trying to save you," Lan Zhan insists, taking a step forward and thrusting a hand out to try and touch Wei Ying, to prove to himself that he is solid and whole and not going to disappear, again.

[yiling_laozu]

"Don't!" Wei Wuxian snaps. It's irrational, but part of him believes that those words will somehow be true if Lan Wangji gets his hands on him, and they can't be. He's standing here right now, isn't he? He's alive. He's fine!

"Don't touch me if you're going to talk nonsense," he says, stepping back. "I'm standing right in front of you. I'm not dead!"

[lan_wangji]

"Sorry, I'm sorry," Lan Zhan breathes, stepping forward for every step backward. "Not dead, now. Not dead. Alive. Glad Wei Ying is alive."

He carefully sets Bichen down on the ground and raises both hands in supplication, ignoring the way his back and shoulders rip and pull.

"Am sorry. All of it. Sorry for all of it."

[yiling_laozu]

Lan Wangji's empty hands come up, and Wei Wuxian becomes aware that he is cringing, shrinking away from his estranged friend. He makes his back straighten, even if his feet still itch to run. "Sorry for calling me dead," he decides Lan Wangji means, a hint of challenge in his voice.

But his fierce expression doesn't hold, and Wei Wuxian dares a half step forward. "You move like you are injured," he says, craning his neck to try to see the stripes of red on his back. "What happened, Lan Zhan?"

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan opens his mouth to clarify, to explain that he's sorry for telling Wei Ying about his death so bluntly. He's sorry he couldn't hold on. He's sorry he didn't defend him before everything had gone so wrong.

Before he can do so, he finds himself now stepping back, angling his back away automatically. "It does not matter," he answers, because it doesn't, only so much as it prevents him from helping Wei Ying. It is a weakness and he will need to swiftly overcome it. "What matters is I found you. Want to help you. Want to stand by you."

[yiling_laozu]

"Of course your back matters," Wei Wuxian sighs, taking comfort in the familiar conversation. He'd hounded Lan Wangji for ages to rest when he had a broken leg - he assumes the struggle to help him through this injury will be no different.

Still, what Lan Wangji has said is extraordinary. "You mustn't stand by me," he says, brow pinched. "They say we will go home eventually, and I will ruin you," he reasons. "You've already risked enough for my sake among the other clans. I won't destroy you, too, Lan Zhan."

[lan_wangji]

"Wei Ying will not be rid of me," he states, entirely firm in his resolution, despite the tiny trembles running through him as lack of sleep and proper wound care allow themselves to be known now that he has found what he sought after.

"Made a mistake not doing it, before. Will not make it, again. Want to stand with Wei Ying. Do not want to lose you."

[yiling_laozu]

He's wanted an ally for so long. Not only someone he loves but must protect like the Wens, but a friend, someone standing beside him and not behind. Yet Lan Wangji's sudden fervor brings him disquiet rather than comfort. What has changed that has made him so certain of his alliance, so afraid of losing him?

Death, Wei Wuxian's mind supplies, and he shies from it. The evidence of his continued life is here before both their eyes, whatever Lan Wangji thinks. He only needs to ignore his strange words long enough, and like everything else that troubles him, they will go away.

"Lan Zhan can scarcely stand now," he says, moving more forcefully this time to look at Lan Wangji's back. "These haven't even been treated!" he says, scandalized. "Let me tend to them, Lan Zhan."

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan stiffens as Wei Ying moves but does not try and pull away, afraid that if he refuses him, Wei Ying will leave him, again. The city is large and he needs to know where to find Wei Ying, especially if he is still so unstable.

"Wei Ying should not look at them," he murmurs, staring resolutely at the ground until this inspection is over. "They are distasteful." It is bad enough that Lan Zhan has been in nothing but an inner robe for so long, but to have Wei Ying see him in such a state would be unbearable. "Is Wei Ying hurt? You look pale."

[yiling_laozu]

"Wei Ying is fine," he murmurs. He hasn't been well in such a long time that it hardly registers beyond a lingering fatigue from Wen Qing's sedatives, all but consumed by now by repeated courses of adrenaline.

"Distasteful." He clucks his tongue. "No Peerless Jade of Lan could ever be distasteful." The wounds are ugly, though, in their newness, and he will need to make a paste of his borrowed herbs. "Lend me Bichen's sheath," he says. "I will grind my herbs against a rock."

[lan_wangji]

He frowns as he picks unsheathes Bichen and hands it over, realizing Wei Ying may mean to apply the medicines himself.

He thinks Wei Ying would be very shocked by how distasteful the entire cultivation world finds this Peerless Jade of Lan. "Was told I have a home in one of the giant, stone buildings," he says, allowing his perfect posture to sag a little once Wei Ying has looked away. The pain is growing worse but he is terrified that if he lets Wei Ying out of his sight, he will not find him, again. "Wei Ying can come to it with me."

[yiling_laozu]

"Ah." Wei Wuxian has been living among the graves, but Lan Wangji has a soft bed and no reason to have his wounds treated under the open sky. "Perhaps we should go there, so you may rest after."

Still, he keeps hold of Bichen, setting a bracing hand against Lan Wangji's uninjured shoulder. "Which ugly building is yours?"

[lan_wangji]

He breathes a steady, quiet sigh of relief when Wei Ying does not try to leave and pulls out the key and paper from inside his thin robe. "High Gate," he states, nodding his head to the north as he has already memorized the map of the city. He imagines it will be as unappealing as the rest of the city and he wishes very much to remain in the park.

The guardians do not agree with that wish.

"Wei Ying can stay there with me. I will find you food," he promises, turning towards the strange noises and sight yet again as they walk. Something near his shoulderblade tugs too hard as he walks and he is afraid the wound will re-open. He ought to be grateful all thirty three lashes had not been dealt before is arrival, he knows this. But he is still so angry.

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian has memorized it also, searching out proper places to hide as is now his instinct, and he nods in relief. High Gate is only four clusters of buildings away from the park, and Lan Wangji's movements are painful to behold. He would hate for him to have to walk much further.

He maneuvers one of Lan Wangji's arms over his shoulder. "Put some of your weight on me. We will worry after food when your wounds have been dressed."

[lan_wangji]

A part of him hates this, hates putting any sort of burden on Wei Ying. He hates that it hurts to have his arm lifted and he hates that it helps him walk and he hates that Wei Ying has to care for him.

But it means that Wei Ying will come with him, it means that Wei Ying will not immediately disappear back to wherever he has been before he found Lan Zhan.

He allows himself to shrink into Wei Ying, just a little bit, as they are assaulted by sights and smells and sounds so unfamiliar. He does not understand the magic that runs this city. He does not understand the hulking, metal carriages and the glowing colored lights and why he and Wei Ying look so different to everyone around them. He hates the stares as he has always hated stares his entire life and he hates that his clear dismissal has no effect.

He is afraid he will hate this new dwelling.

"Thank you for accompanying me," he says, the knuckles of his free hand white where they grip Bichen.

[yiling_laozu]

Wei Wuxian snorts. If he weren't, he has no doubt Lan Wangji would play by the river until he passed out, still hoping for Wei Wuxian's return. The thought sinks warmer into his belly than he expects, and he tightens his hold on him.

"They are called cars," he says of the racing metal beasts as they wait for the light that means they may safely cross. He's learned so much in this place already. "And the lights draw from a magical source they call energy. I know someone who wields it," he adds, sounding a little proud.

[lan_wangji]

"How did you already meet a wielder of this energy?" Lan Zhan asks, irritated and unsure why. It has only been a matter of days and Wei Ying has already met energy wielders and learned the names of the beasts and understands the commands of the lights.

Granted, Lan Zhan has spent nearly every moment of his time in the park, playing the guquin without rest but he is still disturbed. Regardless, he allows himself to lean a little more on Wei Ying, pleased at his firm hold where he has never before been pleased with such close proximity to another.

"Did you make friends, already?"

[yiling_laozu]

"I think so," Wei Wuxian answers. "People here have been unexpectedly kind and welcoming." Of course, they don't know Wei Wuxian's reputation, but he sees no need to enlighten them. "I suppose it helps that everyone I met was always made to come here against their will."

He glances sidelong at Lan Wangji. "What were you doing before you arrived here? Why are you so hurt, Lan Zhan?"

[lan_wangji]

Lan Zhan arranges his face into it's most neutral state, not wanting his irritation to be known. Wei Ying ought to have friends. He deserves many of them. Lan Zhan should not begrudge that.

The neutral facade falls just enough to be known to someone like Wei Ying at the line of questioning.

"Does not matter. Not important," he insists, knowing the answers will not only agitate them both but lead back to the death Wei Ying will not acknowledge. "Wei Ying can help prepare medicines, I will do the rest. Is Wei Ying certain he has no wounds?" He has not seen the wounds but he can feel them, can feel they will look too ragged to be from a sword.