Chapter Text
"Chengling, not again."
"But dad!"
"No 'but dad', you have school tomorrow, and I've told you this story a million times already."
"I haven't told it to him," Wen Kexing grinned, accepting the displeased glare his husband sent his way. "And storytelling is all about perspective, so I hear."
"We have an event tomorrow--"
"For the book launch, yes, which is a brilliant segue into--"
"Lao Wen."
"The story of how your fathers met."
"Lao Wen."
"How'd you meet?" Chengling coyly goaded, giving Zhou Zishu a wicked little grin. Awful boy. Wen Kexing had been a truly terrible influence on him.
"It begins, as any good story, with a party. The fae have always walked among humans, a few centuries ago it was hardly a state secret, and we've always been the most gracious of hosts."
"Dad went to parties?"
"You do realize I'm your human parent?" Zhou Zishu muttered, to Wen Kexing's great amusement. "I'm not on my deathbed. I was young once. I partied. I had a social life."
"You certainly aren't, A-Xu. And he certainly did, little brat. The stories I could tell you… but no matter. What better time than when we’re all into our cups, when there is merriment and pleasure in the air to meet one's soulmate?"
Zhou Zishu had been invited to the party more out of obligation than anything else. He’d done a job for the lord of the manor, and this had been part of the payment: an invitation to drink and revel with the best of the best, rubbing elbows with snobs and drunkards.
What a prize.
Still, the wine was good, and flowed freely into his cup no matter how many times he drained it. The food was less thrilling, but still passable. Zhou Zishu had settled himself at a little table in the corner, out of the way, unobtrusive.
He could not avoid neighbors, though, and the man at the table next to his was giving him a devilish grin.
“Quite the occasion, isn’t it?” The man asked.
"Is it?" Zhou Zishu asked, bringing a hand to his eyes to rub them so as to avoid rolling them instead. The last thing he needed was to accidentally offend someone powerful enough to exile him or cut his head off.
"Personally, I'm here for the wine. The food is godawful."
Zhou Zishu felt the corners of his lips tick up and bit his tongue to avoid speaking out of turn. He was being goaded; he was smart enough to know that.
"It's fancier fare than I'm used to," he settled on eventually. He heard a shift of fabric and looked up, jerking back when the man turned out to be much closer than he'd expected. "What are you doing?"
"I'm sorry, did I startle you?"
"Yes," Zhou Zishu snorted, sitting as far back in his chair as he could manage. "You're too close."
"Pity," he blinked, and Zhou Zishu realized that his eyes were… incredible. It was as though they reflected lights that weren't even in the room; it made him look otherworldly, not quite human.
The wine was really getting to him.
"I was hoping we'd get closer before the night is through."
"That's presumptuous."
"I prefer confident."
"I prefer solitude," Zhou Zishu replied, without skipping a beat. "Excuse me."
The grounds were quiet. Everyone who mattered was still at the party, and all the lesser mortals had been summoned to serve it. Zhou Zishu took his time leaving, enjoying the peace of a moonlit night.
Or, relative peace.
“I can hear you following me,” he called over his shoulder. When he turned, there was the man from the party, still smiling slyly, like he knew something Zhou Zishu didn’t.
“I couldn’t help myself,” the man said. “I knew when I saw you, you had to be a great beauty. That was only confirmed by the cut of your shoulder blades.”
The compliment threw Zhou Zishu off. He blinked, unsure of how to respond at first. “I don’t appreciate mockery,” he warned.
The stranger held up his hands. “No mockery here. Only admiration for one who looks so flawless."
He was not flawless, far from it, with scars and calluses alike. Most of those were hidden under his clothes, of course, but Zhou Zishu still felt his natural appearance could not possibly seem so enticing.
"You're certainly a happy drunk," Zhou Zishu said carefully, unsure of what else he could say. He didn't know who this man was, just that he was definitely of a higher rank than his own. He didn't want to offend him, he couldn't afford to, in every sense of the word.
But Zhou Zishu also knew that those of the monied persuasion weren't good at taking 'no' for an answer.
"Would you believe me if I told you I was stone cold sober?"
"I saw you drinking," Zhou Zishu replied, unable to keep a smile off his face. He'd turned to look at the stranger now, arms crossed over his middle.
"Alcohol doesn't quite affect me as it does you," came the coy reply. "Regardless of your impressive tolerance."
“That’s what all the drunks say.”
Rather than be offended, the man let out a cheerful laugh. “It is, isn’t it? Very well, then, what can I say to convince you to walk with me a bit?”
“Nothing,” Zhou Zishu told him, wary. The man tilted his head and then pouted like a child.
“Nothing at all?”
“Nothing.” Zhou Zishu kept his voice firm-- give a drunk an inch and they would take a mile.
The man shrugged. “Such a pity,” he lamented. “Perhaps a different agreement? If, come morning-- when we can both be absolutely certain I’m sober-- I choose to call on you again, will you walk with me?”
“Just a walk?”
“Just a walk,” the man promised. “Nothing more, nothing untoward. Your virtue is safe with me.”
Zhou Zishu snorted. Sure. Virtue. “Alright,” he said.
“Wen Kexing,” the man said, with a short bow. “At your service.”
“Zhou Xu,” Zhou Zishu lied. “I’m staying at the inn on the main road into town.”
Wen Kexing’s eyes seemed almost to glitter as he smirked. “Come morning, then, dear A-Xu.”
Zhou Zishu raised an eyebrow and watched as Wen Kexing very deliberately turned away to return to the party. He himself didn't move for a long time, and when he did, he went home.
"And this is why you never tell anyone your real name," Zhou Zishu lectured. Chengling groaned.
"Yeah, dad, I know, you keep reminding me. It's hard to forget."
"Good. Never forget it."
"And don't answer your uncle's letters if he sends any more of them," Wen Kexing added with a huff. "You know he's related to the trickster side of the family and they're--"
"The worst, yes, dad, I know."
"Well, luckily for you, your father, your human father, did not consider himself to be particularly outstanding. And in truth, as far as mortals went, he was of average height and build, with an unremarkable history." Wen Kexing continued.
"Thanks." Zhou Zishu muttered. "I think."
"His wits, however, were on par with the immortal fae. And his future had long ago become entwined with their ilk." Wen Kexing interrupted with a smile. "And so he didn't tell me his real name, nor his real location, even though he wasn't yet aware of the fact that I wasn't actually human."
"Trust your instincts," was all Zhou Zishu said, shrugging. Wen Kexing grinned at him. Chengling groaned at them.
Morning dawned without a hangover and Zhou Zishu was glad for it. He'd walked home, cutting through the occasional copse of trees or a cattle-trodden path in case a carriage carrying a certain someone stalked him home.
It wasn't that his curiosity hadn't been piqued, he just had no time. Life was work, and the last thing he needed were interruptions. Especially those clad in expensive silk and adorned with a devil's smile.
Zhou Zishu snorted against his palm and allowed himself a moment more of fuzzy pleasurable memories of the night before as he lay in the cool dawn light. Alone.
"Just pipe dreams," he mumbled, drawing a hand through his hair with a sigh.
"Or very ardent wishes," came a familiar, teasing quip. It was enough for Zhou Zishu to jerk up, almost upsetting the blankets from his lap, and himself from the bed.
At the end of the bed, collected as anything, sat Wen Kexing.
“What the hell are you doing in my room?” Propriety flew out the window, and with it, Zhou Zishu’s careful patience. Gone was the concern of offending his ‘betters’ and in its place, something adjacent to panic.
“You said I could call upon you come morning,” Wen Kexing said mildly, his tone betraying his amusement.
“Yes. Call upon me. Not break into my room .”
Wen Kexing waved a hand dismissively, as if to say one was much the same as the other.
“How did you find me?” Zhou Zishu ground out. “I gave you the wrong address.”
“And I was smart enough to predict you would.” Wen Kexing smiled, all teeth and knowing amusement. “The town is not so large, and there are only so many inns. And I have my ways of finding people.”
“You need to leave.”
“Of course,” Wen Kexing agreed, nodding his head. “If my A-Xu wishes it. Who am I to deny you anything. But first--” He twisted his wrist, and from somewhere, perhaps his sleeve, he drew a glass ball, perfectly clear, perfectly rounded. It looked almost unnatural. “I’ve brought you a gift.”
"I doubt I've done anything to warrant a gift," Zhou Zishu replied, not moving to reach for it. But he now knew for a fact what Wen Kexing was. "And isn't there a very specific warning given to us kids about taking gifts from you?"
"From me?" Wen Kexing laughed, leaning closer. He let the crystal fall to the bed, where it made a very defined dent under its weight. It wasn't clear anymore either, something milky, smokey, was swirling within.
"The fae," Zhou Zishu clarified, "the not-actually-human. I should have guessed it last night."
"Could you have?"
"Yes." And if he hadn't had as much to drink as he'd had, Zhou Zishu absolutely would have.
"Really? What gave me away?"
Zhou Zishu laughed, he couldn't help it, and rubbed his eyes.
"The eyes, the tolerance, your arrogance and persistence," Zhou Zishu listed. When he looked up again, Wen Kexing had moved closer into his space, but was still far enough away to be somewhat appropriate.
"Flattery will get you everywhere, my dear A-Xu."
"The way you look," Zhou Zishu added flatly. Wen Kexing's smile widened to something predatory.
"How do I look?"
Zhou Zishu considered his options. He knew Wen Kexing wasn't here to hurt him, there was no grounds for it and while the fae were pretentious, they were sticklers for rules. No, he was here for something else. And that was even worse.
"You know how you look."
"Tell me."
"Impossible," Zhou Zishu tilted his head. "Stubborn. Beautiful."
"Oh?"
"Shut up," Zhou Zishu could feel his pulse in his ears, his throat, anywhere but where it belonged behind his ribs. "You have no power over me without knowing my name."
"I won't ask for something that should be freely given."
"Then you'll get out when I tell you?"
"Are you telling me?"
Zhou Zishu groaned, pushing aside the crystal with his knee as he sat forward and grabbed Wen Kexing by his stupid fancy collar.
"Later."
This was stupid, this was very, very foolish. The fae did not give without taking, did not offer anything up on a silver platter without strings attached. Least of all themselves.
But he knew what Wen Kexing had been angling for from the beginning, and he could not truly say he was opposed. Wen Kexing was beautiful, as the fae always were, and Zhou Zishu had a man’s hungers.
“Have I won you over, then, A-Xu?” Wen Kexing murmured against his mouth, braced over him on all fours. When he pulled back, he looked as if he very much wanted to devour him.
“Not if you keep talking.”
"Urgh okay, okay...I get it," Chengling held his hands up to stop the flow of words. Zhou Zishu pressed his fingers to his eyes and sighed.
"We kissed and it was very nice." he said.
"We did far more than that, A-Xu, if you recall." Wen Kexing gave his husband a look, one which was not returned.
"Yes but our son doesn't need those details." Zhou Zishu muttered. "Nor does he want them."
Wen Kexing grinned, something vicious and feral in his eyes. Zhou Zishu did not have time to worry about it-- Wen Kexing immediately set his mouth to better uses, trailing biting kisses down the column of Zhou Zishu’s throat.
“Shit, watch your teeth,” Zhou Zishu complained.
“You like my teeth.”
He did, though there was no reason for Wen Kexing to know that. A little bit of pain always brought bright sparks of pleasure with it.
But teeth meant marks and marks meant questions, never a good thing when one’s line of work required subtlety and near-invisibility. He yanked Wen Kexing back by the hair and dragged him into another kiss, this one sharp-edged and ravenous.
It was a simple matter to pull Zhou ZIshu out of his sleep robes, nearly as simple to tug Wen Kexing free of his own clothes. Soon they were bared to each other, hands grasping, seeking out the heat between them.
Zhou Zishu hated to call something flawless, but Wen Kexing just happened to be. Infuriatingly so. Zhou Zishu had wondered before if the fae manipulated what they wanted out of people by molding themselves into what the individual truly desired.
He wouldn't put it past them.
This was certainly going to be a memorable day, if nothing else.
But he wasn't going to take it lying down.
A deliberate shove had Zhou Zishu straddling Wen Kexing instead, fingers slotted together and the insides of his thighs pressing to Wen Kexing's sharp hips. Wen Kexing smiled up at him, unperturbed by the change in position.
"You truly are rather remarkable, aren't you, A-Xu?"
"I bet you say that to all the boys."
"Perhaps once," Wen Kexing grinned, "but not for many, many years, now."
"Liar."
"I'm incapable of lying," Wen Kexing pointed out, with a deliberate arch of his back that brought their cocks together in a pleasing rub.
"You'll be the death of me," Zhou Zishu groaned, leaning down to nuzzle him.
"Or you of me," Wen Kexing quipped, drawing his knees up to push Zhou Zishu further up his body before he flipped them again. "It's hardly simple for me, you know."
"Oh, really?" Zhou Zishu snorted, pushing his hair out of his eyes as he followed Wen Kexing's movement down his body. " What could possibly be-- ah!"
Wen Kexing’s tongue was as clever as the rest of him, curled around the head of his cock or rubbing at the underside as he swallowed Zhou Zishu down. Zhou Zishu swore and reached for something to hold on to.
He settled on Wen Kexing’s hair, long and silky between his fingers. Wen Kexing let out a moan when Zhou Zishu tugged on it, doubling his efforts.
It wasn’t long before he had Zhou Zishu squirming, heels digging into the mattress, back arched, one hand fisted tight in the bedding. With the other hand, he tried to pull Wen Kexing back.
“Close,” he warned, kicking lightly at Wen Kexing’s calf. Wen Kexing ignored him, except to smirk up through his lashes as he bobbed his head.
Zhou Zishu let out a low curse, closing his eyes and throwing his head back. He let the pleasure overtake him, let it course through his veins like lightning. One foot lost purchase on the bed, then the other, and as he slipped he felt his foot brush against something.
The crystal from earlier rolled to the floor, and Zhou Zishu heard it shatter just as his pleasure reached its peak.
It seemed for a moment that he'd lost consciousness. Everything was too loud and too quiet at once, too bright and difficult to see. His heart thudded in his ears and his blood hummed against his bones and a feeling of the most blissful relief surged through him, that Zhou Zishu was certain was only partially due to Wen Kexing's clever mouth.
Against his back, all at once, were the sheets, the rough wall of a little shack in the woods, the marble floor of a silent empty ballroom, the stone cold of a pillar, the sandy surface of an unswept floor.
Beneath his hand were silken locks of varying lengths; the pattern of a braid, or several, the smooth coil of a topknot.
Against him, whispered, the same words:
"A-Xu, my A-Xu."
Zhou Zishu filled his lungs with a deliberate deep sigh and cast his eyes down the length of his torso to where Wen Kexing lay, coyly kissing his stomach, his navel, eyes narrowed in mischievous pleasure.
"I told you. Now, make something up to tie him back in."
"Zhou Zishu managed to drop my very precious gift and shatter it. Incorrigibly rude, but what can I do, really?"
"Offer it nicer next time." Zhou Zishu huffed. "Regardless, all you need to know, Chengling, is that my memories from past lives long buried were released from the crystal, and returned to me."
Chengling glanced between the two of them before raising an eyebrow. "I thought this was your first time meeting?"
"I'm an unreliable narrator." Wen Kexing grinned. "You wanted to hear the story the way I tell it, so I'm telling it my way."
"Yeah you're a lot more than that, Lao Wen." Zhou Zishu told him. Chengling rolled his eyes.
"Okay, so then what happened?"
Zhou Zishu snorted.
"You couldn't have started with that?"
"I did offer it to you," Wen Kexing reminded him, crawling up Zhou Zishu's body until they were nose to nose, a gentle nuzzle bringing them closer before their lips parted and met. "But you, stubborn as ever, rejected my generosity."
"Generosity?" Zhou Zishu grinned, cupping Wen Kexing's face. "What have you done that's generous?"
“I have generously hunted you through four lifetimes now. It should have only been three,” Wen Kexing added sternly. Zhou Zishu winced. He’d died young in his last life, he remembered now. Young and foolish, having only four months to spare for Wen Kexing. And then Wen Kexing had needed to hunt him down again.
“Alright,” Zhou Zishu allowed. “Generous Philanthropist Wen. I'm sorry.”
“Too right you are,” Wen Kexing said with a smile, tapping Zhou Zishu on the nose with a fingertip. Zhou Zishu scowled, but it did nothing to dim the pleasure between them, the satisfaction of being found again.
“My dear,” Wen Kexing said, in that wheedling tone he used when he desperately wanted something-- usually attention. “I was wondering if, having gone two decades without me, you’d be willing to give more thought to my proposal .”
Ah, right. The proposal. In all senses of the word, a question of marriage-- as the fae knew it-- and a suggestion of which path his life should take next. Namely, the path of immortality.
In his first life, Zhou Zishu had said no. Their relationship was too new to commit to forever. “Find me in the next life,” he had said, “and then we’ll talk.”
In his second life, Zhou Zishu had still said no. He was not a fan of the fae, besides Wen Kexing, and he did not fancy spending eternity with them.
In his third lifetime, he had died before Wen Kexing had been able to bring up the offer again.
Now, it seemed Wen Kexing didn’t want to waste any time.
Zhou Zishu swallowed and cast his eyes away from the man draped across his body. He felt the sound Wen Kexing made more than he heard it. A low questioning hum of quiet displeasure.
He knew what he was asking without him having asked: what are you afraid of?
He didn't know. He supposed it was the very human fear of the unknown. For him, until this moment when his memories unlocked and flooded him like a breath of fresh air, life ended. It just did. That's how the world worked. He would grow old, if he was lucky, and he would die.
But now…
"What if I say no?" He asked gently, looking back to Wen Kexing as he did, finding only a soft, sad little smile on his face.
"Then we'll share this life," he said, "and I'll find you once more in the next, and try and convince you again."
As simple as that.
Once he lost him, Wen Kexing would find him again.
He'd proven that three times over already.
He would wait.
It hurt Zhou Zishu's heart to think about that agony of waiting.
He caught Wen Kexing's chin and leaned in to kiss him, a deep and intimate thing, before pressing their foreheads together.
"How?" He asked, feeling his own smile spread as Wen Kexing grinned at him.
"Magic," he answered cryptically, and sealed that promise with another kiss.