Chapter Text
When Wei Wuxian wakes he is standing in the middle of a room, a sword, not his own, held in one hand, his clothes tacky with drying blood.
Someone’s crying.
He blinks against the dim light and slowly the room seems to resolve itself around him.
He’s in a prison littered with dead bodies, splattered with blood. In front of him a small figure huddles on the floor, another figure held in her arms.
“Wei Wuxian,” she pleads again.
The sound the sword makes when it clatters to the ground is surprisingly loud.
Wei Wuxian opens his mouth to reply, or tries to. His lips are sealed together as if by the Lan silencing spell. And then, like the spell releasing, they part.
For a moment the craziest idea crosses his head that there was no inside of his mouth until it opened, that he had no trachea, no lungs until the in-breath hollowed them.
As if his body is still being made.
He shoves the thought away and breathes in again, speaks.
“Wen Qing,” he says. “What are you doing here?”
“Wen Chao discovered what Wen Ning and I did,” Wen Qing says. “He would have killed us but Wen Rouhan still needs me.
Wei Wuxian’s new eyes try to make out Wen Ning in the dark. He is cradled in his sister’s lap, his skin bloodied and bruised.
He waves his hand at their shackles and they dissolve. Wen Qing gapes at him.
“Wei Wuxian,” she says, her voice now a whisper. “What happened to you?”
Wei Wuxian shakes his head. “I don’t know,” he admits.
Wen Qing bites her lip, then shakes her head. “We have to get out of here,” she says. “Can you carry Wen Ning?”
Wei Wuxian nods and lifts Wen Ning in his arms, as easily as if Wen Ning weighed nothing.
Wen Qing stumbles through the dark corridors, her body clumsy and uncoordinated. She doesn’t have the visible wounds Wen Ning does, but she must bear some damage, Wei Wuxian thinks.
The office- they’re in the Yiling Supervisory Office, Wen Qing informs him- is littered with dead bodies, dripping with blood. Wei Wuxian has the insane desire to lick it up, to snack on the dead bodies; the callused fingers, the tender ears. The hunger quickly turns to nausea and he turns aside and feels his abdomen heave as if he’s vomiting, but nothing comes up, not even bile.
Wen Qing rubs his back until he’s able to move on again.
In the courtyard of the office, likewise full of dead bodies, they encounter Jiang Cheng and Lan Zhan with a phalanx of their disciples.
At the sight of Lan Zhan, something strange moves inside of Wei Wuxian and he can’t help the smile that splits his face.
“Lan Zhan!” he exclaims and he finds himself dumping Wen Ning in Jiang Cheng’s arms and flinging his arms around the other boy.
Lan Zhan’s body is stiff and still beneath his.
“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng scolds behind him. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Stop assaulting Lan-er-gongzi.”
But, remarkably, one of Lan Zhan’s arms- the one not holding his sword- wraps around Wei Wuxian’s back and Lan Zhan says, into Wei Wuxian’s hair, “Not an assault.”
There's a hitch in his voice and Wei Wuxian pulls back far enough to see Lan Zhan’s face, to see Lan Zhan’s soft eyes and parted lips and tiny smile.
“Wei Ying, you’re alive,” Lan Zhan says, like it’s the most wonderful thing he’s ever heard, like it’s a fucking miracle, and his arm is still around Wei Wuxian, and Wei Wuxian can’t help it, he really can’t. He closes the few inches between them and presses his lips against Lan Zhan’s.
He feels like something is rising up through him, a lantern ascending, all wonder and light.
It’s a short kiss and an unpracticed one; just the press of lips, but Wei Wuxian is panting when he steps away and Lan Zhan’s ears have turned red.
Wei Wuxian smiles at him, nods his head, and Lan Zhan nods back and lets his arm fall from Wei Wuxian, lets his hand slip down his back and waist and thigh and then fall away.
Everyone is staring, gaping at them; Jiang Cheng doesn’t even seem to realize Wen Ning’s head is lolling, unconscious, on his shoulder.
Wei Wuxian looks back at Lan Zhan and notices he’s gotten blood all over Lan Zhan’s white robes and resists the urge to try to wipe it off.
“You really thought I was dead, huh?” Wei Wuxian asks, grinning at Jiang Cheng.
He spins around and holds out his arms. “But here I am, good as new.”
“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Chang barks. “Did you kill all these people?”
Wei Wuxian frowns at him. “I…” he looks at the dead bodies piled up in the courtyard. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t…” Jiang Cheng repeats, confused.
“I just… woke up like this...” Wei Wuxian says.
Jiang Cheng glares at Wen Qing. “What happened?” he demands.
She shakes her head. “It happened so fast,” she says. “I was trying to keep A-Ning alive…”
Jiang Cheng’s gaze goes to the boy he seems to suddenly realize he’s holding and he carefully lowers him to the ground.
“What happened to him?” he asks.
“Wen-er-gongzi,” Wen Qing says.
Lan Zhan swoops down beside Jiang Cheng like a white crane landing and takes his wrist. “Is there anything we can do?” he asks Wen Qing. “We have medical supplies.”
“Lan-er-gongzi, he’s a Wen!” one of the Lan disciples protests.
“He was a Wen prisoner!” Jiang Cheng snaps back at them. “An enemy of our enemy.”
“Yes,” Wen Qing says. “Any medical supplies you have.”
“Would it help to feed him some qi?” Lan Zhan asks, like the wonderful and generous person he is.
“If Lan-er-gongzi doesn’t mind,” Wen Qing says, accepting the qiankun pouch from the chastened disciple.
While she’s occupied with treating her brother, Lan Zhan with feeding him qi, and the disciples with searching the office, Jiang Cheng rounds on Wei Wuxian.
“What the hell was that?” Jiang Cheng demands.
Wei Wuxian scratches his neck. “Eh? What?” he asks.
“You kissed Lan-er-gongzi !” Jiang Cheng hisses. “In front of forty people.”
“Half of them were dead,” Wei Wuxian says, gesturing around at the bodies. “I don’t think they’re going to talk.”
“He didn’t push you away!” Jiang Cheng says.
Wei Wuxian looks at him with shock. “Of course not!” he exclaims. “Why would he?”
“Because he barely tolerates you!” Jiang Cheng.
Wei Wuxian shorts and crosses his arms. “That’s clearly not the case,” he says. “Anyway,” he continues, rubbing his nose, “why would you think that? We’re very close.”
Jiang Cheng sputtered for a minute. “Are you saying you and Lan-er-gongzi...?” he finally manages to ask.
Wei Wuxian sticks his nose in the air. “I don’t see how it’s any of your business,” he says. “Hey, is that my sword?” he asks, plucking Suibian out of Jiang Cheng’s belt.
He unsheathes the sword and dances his way through a sword form for a minute, then grins at it. “Cool,” he says before sheathing it and tossing it over his shoulder.
“Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng gasps.
“What?” Wei Wuxian asks. “It’s not like I can’t use it.”
“What do you mean you can’t use it?” Jiang Cheng grits out.
“I don’t have a golden core,” Wei Wuxian says, casually.
“Wei Ying!” Lan Zhan exclaims, staring up at Wei Wuxian from where he’s kneeling on the ground beside Wen Ning.
“Oh, don’t worry about it, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian says. “I don’t need it anymore!”
“What do you mean you don’t need it anymore?” Jiang Cheng demands.
“Jiang Cheng, you’re much stupider than I remember,” Wei Wuxian says. “I mean I don’t need it. I can fight perfectly well without it. Look,” he says and slashes his hand at a stone bench on the other side of the courtyard. The bench breaks in half cleanly and then collapses. “See?” he says. “I’m much stronger than any cultivator now.”
“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan says softly, slowly, standing up.
Again Wei Wuxian is struck by his incredible beauty, the way all his breath seems sucked out of him when he sees him.
“Lan Zhan,” he finds himself gasping, barely restraining himself from throwing him in his arms again.
“What happened to you?” Lan Zhan asks.
Wei Wuxian opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He shakes his head. For a moment there are brief flashes; teeth, hunger, terrible pain. But then, mercifully, they’re gone.
“I don’t know!” Wei Wuxian laughs.
“You were supposed to meet me in Yiling,” Jiang Cheng says. “After…” he blanches. “Wei Wuxian!”
“Jiang Cheng!” Wei Wuxian exclaims back. “See- I know your name too!”
“Where. Did. My. Golden. Core. Come. From?” Jiang Cheng asks, his voice surprisingly quiet.
Wei Wuxian laughs again. “I guess maybe you’re not so stupid?” he says. “It’s mine, of course. I’ve got the scars to prove it.” He begins to undo his belt, but Lan Zhan grabs his wrist.
Wei Wuxian pouts at him. “You don’t want to see?” he asks. “But I’m so pretty, Lan Zhan.” He leans into the other boy’s space. “Don’t you want to see how pretty I am?”
“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan chokes out, his hand tightening on Wei Wuxian’s wrist so hard it begins to hurt.
“Wei Wuxian, the core,” Jiang Cheng persists.
Wei Wuxian turns his pout on him. “Jiang Cheng,” he says. “You’re still on about that? It’s easy- I didn’t need it as much as you did, I owed your family a debt, I lied to you about Baoshan Sanren- really, Jiang Cheng I can’t believe you fell for that. Wen Qing here did the core transfer, you got a golden core, I was captured by Wen Chao....” his face fell and he pressed his hand- the one Lan Zhan wasn’t gripping so hard his bones would have broken if he’d had any- to his chest. “Wen Chao,” he murmurs, but he shakes his head.
“It’s fine,” he says. “Everything’s fine now.”
“Wei Ying, how could you?” Lan Zhan demands, his face a mix of anger and pain. Wei Wuxian rests his free hand on Lan Zhan's cheek.
“It was so easy,” he says. “Love is so easy. I had no idea. I thought it was hard and embarrassing and awkward and…” He smiles. “I’m such an idiot. Will you forgive me?”
Lan Zhan releases his wrist, steps back, all sorts of emotions chasing across his face.
“What happened to you?” Jiang Cheng demands.
Wei Wuxian sighs. “I already said I don’t know. This conversation is so boring,” he says. “I’m hungry. Can’t we get some food? They’re all too dead,” he adds, flicking a hand at the dead Wen guards, “to be tasty.”
“What?!” Jiang Cheng exclaims, horrified.
Wei Wuxian turns to see equally horrified looks on Wen Qing and Lan Zhan’s faces. “What?” he asks.