Work Text:
Winter comes not long after he loses Wei Ying. Lan Wangji hardly notices the cold, for his heart is already frozen.
Deep in Cloud Recesses, he sits in the ice cave and runs his fingers over the strings of his guqin, plucking out the chords of “Wangxian” slow and melancholy. The last image he ever saw of Wei Ying’s face floats across his memory.
The despair in his eyes. His longing for death.
Lan Wangji shakes it off. He thinks of a different Wei Ying: the one with the mischievous grin who read indecent books, the one who smiled sweetly as he drew a rabbit on a paper lantern. That is the Wei Ying he wishes to remember.
In reminiscing, Lan Wangji conceives of all the ways he might have saved him. These imagined scenes, so real in his mind, demand that he be more than what he is—more courageous, more clever, more candid. More like Wei Ying.
A sort of man he is not and has never been and perhaps could not be, not even to protect his love.
So, secluded and alone, Lan Wangji plays his song, its sombre melody steeping the cave with the echoes of his desolation.
• • •
The cherry trees blossom, and Wei Ying returns from the dead.
Lan Wangji can hardly believe it is true. Wei Ying is a miracle, a ghost made flesh. And in his resurrection, he has brought Lan Wangji back to life as well. The world, once grey and lifeless, now bursts with colour and possibility. The future, once sorrow and drudgery, now seems something worth anticipating. For Wei Ying is again at his side, and Lan Wangji dares to hope he will stay there in all the days and months to come.
Lan Wangji does not tell Wei Ying of his affections; he is not yet sure they are reciprocated. He shows them instead through his actions, through his willingness to risk all in Wei Ying’s defense. Not merely his reputation, his family, and his home, but his life as well.
There is a certain catharsis in becoming the man he should have been in the time before Wei Ying died—yes, a certain satisfaction in standing up to the clans that condemned Wei Ying, drove him mad, and sent him to his doom that terrible day.
Few souls get a second chance at the things that truly matter.
Lan Wangji does not mean to waste his.
• • •
They part for a while—months, nearly a year—but a night hunt brings them together again in the most sweltering days of summer. Ravenous and buoyant after their victory, they share a supper at the inn. It is as if they were never apart. Wei Ying talks of anything and everything while Lan Wangji drinks his tea and listens, his heart full once again.
When their bellies are satisfied, Wei Ying takes his hand and guides him up to his lodgings. There is a confession in his eyes, and a question. Lan Wangji answers not with words but with a kiss, one he has longed to give since the days of his youth.
They lie together. The air is hot, soupy and damp in summer night, but Wei Ying’s mouth and hands are hotter, leaving unseen brands on every swath of Lan Wangji’s skin they touch.
This man is mine, they say.
I belong to him, Lan Wangji’s soul answers.
Once, Lan Wangji thought loving Wei Ying from a distance was all he needed.
Now, as he joins their bodies completely, watching Wei Ying’s face soften in euphoria beneath him, he knows that could never be enough.
• • •
Outside, the leaves turn to red and gold, falling from the trees to blanket the jingshi courtyard in fire.
Within, Lan Wangji makes tea on the hearth, while Wei Ying sits in the open doorway, watching autumn sweep in. These quiet days together are treasures. Restless, seeking adventure, Wei Ying has often come and gone from Cloud Recesses, spending weeks on the road while Lan Wangji remained behind to tend to his duties.
It is not the arrangement Lan Wangji wants. But it is the only arrangement Wei Ying can abide. And Lan Wangji would never dream of holding him here.
Yet of late, Wei Ying has spent longer and longer stretches in Lan Wangji’s home, and less and less time away. Sometimes, when Lan Wangji asks him when he intends to leave again, Wei Ying will answer with a fond laugh and say, “Not today.”
Their relationship has always been an endless cycle of meeting and parting, of joy and longing, as certain as the changing seasons.
But as Wei Ying meets his eyes from the doorway, smiling, a picture of contentment, Lan Wangji thinks perhaps they have settled into something more constant.