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Lan Zhan had left Jinlintai earlier that morning for another conference, and Wei Wuxian has been in a sulk about it all day.
After all, he’d gone from being very warm and cuddled earlier that morning to very rudely awakened by a sudden draft of cool air at his side, a pre-dawn darkness saluting him when he opened his eyes. Wei Wuxian had groaned and fussed and tossed around, his hands reaching for the familiar shape at his side, but he’d only gotten a gentle hand to his cheek for his troubles.
“Lan Zhan,” he'd mumbled, tangling his fingers in the weft of Lan Wangji’s outer robe. His husband was already completely dressed, his sleep-fogged brain noticed. “What time even is it? Come back to bed.”
“The conference in Hedong,” Lan Zhan had replied in a hushed voice, his thumb stroking the apple of Wei Wuxian’s cheek.
“Skip it,” Wei Wuxian wheedled, and pulled at him with all his half-conscious might back into the bed.
“Can’t,” Lan Zhan had responded, but he sounded fond and wistful about it as he steadily refused to be sucked in and swaddled. “I will return in three days.”
“Too long,” Wei Wuxian whispered. He had brushed his dry lips across the ridge of Lan Zhan’s fine-boned knuckles.
“Mn,” Lan Zhan agreed, and leaned in to kiss Wei Wuxian’s forehead. “Wei Ying, behave in my absence.”
“Won’t,” said Wei Wuxian sleepily, and reeled Lan Zhan back in to properly kiss him on the mouth, languid and sleep-warm. Lan Zhan huffed against his lips, as though wry, but Wei Wuxian could feel his mouth tick up in a tiny smile nonetheless as he kissed him back — sweet and concentrated and earnest, like everything else about him.
“Be careful, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian murmured, already floating back toward sleep, and Lan Zhan had answered, “Always,” and the next thing he knows, Wei Wuxian is blinking awake into a searing slant of morning sunlight, and Lan Zhan is gone.
They’d come to Lanling for a separate conference a few days ago, and Wei Wuxian quickly finds that the place is incredibly boring without Lan Wangji at his side. He spends the day exploring nonetheless, ambling into town to pick up something to eat as well as a small souvenir for Lan Zhan. It’s just a silly rabbit trinket, pretty much worthless both in quality and material, but Lan Zhan can add it to his ever-growing collection of useless gifts from Wei Wuxian, which he nonetheless treats as the finest treasure trove, like the precious being he is.
The most eventful part of the day is when he trips down some stairs in the market in a rather public manner and rolls his ankle, which makes him feel all the more sullen about Lanling as a general entity.
The afternoon drags with an insufferable, bleached summer heat, baking thickly beneath his layered black robes, and Wei Wuxian is already tired and sun-fevered by the time evening rolls in like a fresh crush of cool water. He can’t bring himself to mope alone in his guest quarters, so he decides to explore Lanling’s famed gardens, which reportedly stretch in a labyrinthine fashion for several li outside of Jinlintai.
There are several couples out walking the gardens as the sun sets in red-gold ribbons — all out to enjoy a night that cloys with the heavy aroma of floral blooms, that thrums with cricket and cicada song. It makes Wei Wuxian more morose, with only a jug of liquor and Chenqing to keep him company, and he has to forcibly remind himself that he’s being ridiculous, and that Lan Zhan will be back in hardly no time at all, and he wonders to himself for the thousandth time how he survived nearly twenty years of this.
When he reaches one of the more remote corners of the garden, Wei Wuxian is surprised to find a familiar face — his most favorite surly nephew, sitting on one of the ornate benches with his arms crossed around Suihua and his expression drooping in his usual pout.
Jin Ling glances up at his approach, and the sulky expression transforms into an open glare.
“Ugh, you,” he says, getting to his feet. “What are you—” He hesitates, then scowls harder. “Why are you limping.”
The sudden opportunity to torment his nephew arises, and Wei Wuxian takes it.
“Oh, you know me,” he says, stretching one arm above his head with a wink. “Hanguang-jun likes it rough, and who am I to deny him?”
Even in the impending darkness of evening, Wei Wuxian can see Jin Ling’s face flush scarlet. His hands snap to his sides, clenched into fists. “Y-You — how can you go around and say things so shameless? It’s — it’s—”
“It’s disgusting, that’s what it is,” someone says from behind them, and Wei Wuxian turns on one heel, slowly. The owner of the unpleasant voice is a young man who looks about Jin Ling’s age, dressed in the white-gold hanfu of the LanlingJin sect. He looks vaguely familiar, but not enough to be any person of importance to Wei Wuxian. His thin lips are twisted in a sneer. “Sect Leader Jin, your uncle’s brother walks around talking filth like this, and you don’t beat him for it?”
Wei Wuxian laughs, clutching one of his sides. He’s so far removed from caring about anyone’s opinion of him, especially juniors from other sects, that the whole thing is indescribably hilarious to him.
“What, you haven’t heard about the Yiling Patriarch’s voracious sexual appetites?” Wei Wuxian asks the newcomer, flashing his incisors in a big, toothy grin. “I fear for LanlingJin’s education, then.”
The man's face splotches with red like a rash, his expression contorted with anger. “You— ”
“Jin Chan,” Jin Ling barks out from behind Wei Wuxian. “Just shut up and leave him alone. He’s not worth it, trust me.”
“That’s not what Lan Zhan said last night,” says Wei Wuxian, enjoying himself very much.
“Such a disappointment,” Jin Chan jeers, sweeping a contemptuous look over Wei Wuxian from head to toe. “The famed, nefarious Yiling Patriarch is no more than a dirty cut-sleeve who enjoys taking it like a woman — and a drunkard, if your stench is anything to go by.”
Wei Wuxian opens his mouth, preparing to rhetorically tear this boy a new asshole while smiling all the while, when a golden blur zips past him. Before he can blink, Jin Ling has punched the boy in the face, sending him sprawling in the dirt.
“Jin Ling,” Wei Wuxian says, surprised.
“Who the fuck cares if he’s a cut-sleeve?” Jin Ling shouts, then pins Jin Chan to the ground. He shakes him hard enough, once, so that his head slams into the dirt. “How the fuck is that your business? Even if he is, he’s leagues above any kind of cultivation you could ever achieve!”
“Jin Rulan,” Wei Wuxian says louder. He’s touched and kind of amused, enough so to see this play out to completion, but his (very few) avuncular instincts are telling him that he should probably put an end to this.
“Get off me!” Jin Chan yells, struggling to free himself from Jin Ling’s grip. “What the hell is wrong with you?! What kind of sect leader are you?”
Jin Ling gets up only to deliver a savage kick to the boy’s ribs, and Jin Chan rolls over and moans, curling into the fetal position.
“Have you had enough?” Wei Wuxian asks Jin Chan, tilting his head from one side to the other. “If not, I’ve got a few pieces lined up on Chenqing.”
Jin Chan hacks blood into the dirt and rolls to his feet, then sways and holds his side as he glares hatefully at the both of them.
“Your whole family is a disgrace,” Jin Chan spits at Jin Ling. “First Jin Guangshan and his whoring, then that incestuous, traitorous bastard Jin Guangyao — then you, ill-bred with no parentage — and now your uncle is bragging about defiling Hanguang-jun? With such a bloodline, it wouldn’t surprise me if you were cut-sleeve too!”
Before Jin Ling can land another punch, Wei Wuxian pulls Chenqing from his belt. This was fun, but it’s gone on long enough, and he’s starting to grow irritated on Jin Ling’s behalf.
Jin Chan’s eyes immediately go wide and glassy with fear, and he takes two stumbling steps back.
“What, did you think I was bluffing?” Wei Wuxian asks, raising one eyebrow. “Here’s one I call ‘Getting Railed So Hard By Hanguang-jun That I Can No Longer Walk.’” He brings Chenqing to his lips and trills out the first few notes.
Jin Chan scurries away into the hedgerows like a rat, hobbling and yelling insults over his shoulder until he disappears from view.
Jin Ling whips his head over his shoulder to glare at Wei Wuxian, his fists still clenched at his sides. “Doesn’t it bother Hanguang-jun that you go around speaking about him like that?”
“First off, Hanguang-jun lets me do whatever I want, in every possible connotation you can imagine,” Wei Wuxian replies, twirling Chenqing in his fingers before slipping it back into his belt. Jin Ling adopts the expression of one who’s testing whether or not he can make himself deaf by will. “Second off and more to the point, he definitely doesn’t care about offending the virtue of some acne-riddled punk insulting his marriage.”
Jin Ling, his face still twisted a little, starts shaking his head. “I don’t understand you two at all. He doesn’t even talk!”
Wei Wuxian frowns, then protests, “Maybe not to you. Besides, he doesn’t need to; I understand anything he wants to say.”
Jin Ling huffs and folds his arms over his chest. “You two are so weird. I have no idea what he sees in you.”
“Me neither,” Wei Wuxian says cheerfully. “But here we are.”
“Back in Guanyin Temple…” Jin Ling pauses, his face working as though swallowing around something unpleasant. Ah, Wei Wuxian often forgets that Jin Ling was there to witness that whole dramatic display. “You...the way you…did you not want to be with Hanguang-jun until Sect Leader Lan said something?”
“Oh, quite the opposite,” says Wei Wuxian. “I’ve been mooning over Lan Zhan since far before I even realized I was mooning — since before you were even born.” He grins slyly at Jin Ling. “Where do you think you got your courtesy name from, little nephew?”
Jin Ling’s face goes slack with shock and horror in equal measure. “No. No. Absolutely not.”
His expression sends Wei Wuxian into hysterics again, and he bends over at the waist, clutching at his ribs as he laughs, helpless and far too loud for this time of evening.
“I really hate you,” Jin Ling says through his teeth, then starts to stalk off, back toward Jinlintai.
“Aiya, A-Ling, don’t go, don’t go,” Wei Wuxian says through chuckles, jogging to keep up with his speedy exit. “Spend some time with your uncle while he’s lonely and missing his husband, please?”
“Hanguang-jun has only been gone for a day.”
“That’s a day without Hanguang-jun,” Wei Wuxian answers, with a theatrical sniff.
“Fine,” says Jin Ling, continuing to storm off away from him in a suspiciously Jiang Cheng-esque manner. “But don’t do anything stupid and don’t embarrass me.”
“Ah, Jin Ling, don’t be unreasonable! Stupid and embarrassing is at least fifty percent of my personality.”
“I know,” Jin Ling replies, rolling his eyes.
They keep walking, wending their way through leafy mazes shrouded in evening-blue as Wei Wuxian takes another swig from his jar. Stars prick through the gauzy haze of light emanating from Jinlintai, and a thin, sickle moon hangs low over one of its turrets.
“Do you think that Jin Chan will tell everyone about that?” Jin Ling asks after another moment, his voice laced with uncertainty.
Wei Wuxian wipes his mouth on his sleeve. “Probably.”
Jin Ling bites his lip, frowns.
“Who cares if he does?” Wei Wuxian asks. “Besides, anyone he tells, he’ll have to admit that he had his ass kicked.”
“It doesn’t reflect well on me as a sect leader,” says Jin Ling in a stilted voice. “I have appearances to maintain, and you, asshole, aren’t doing anything to help that.”
“Ehhh, whatever. The older you get, the more you’ll realize that this, all of this…” Wei Wuxian waves a tired, all-encompassing hand to indicate the cultivation world’s bullshit at large. “None of it matters.”
“Maybe not to you,” Jin Ling retorts. “I’m sect leader. I can’t exactly ignore what people say about the LanlingJin sect!”
“The same applies, sect leader or not. It doesn’t matter.”
“You —” Jin Ling begins.
“Take Hanguang-jun, for example,” Wei Wuxian interrupts him. “He doesn’t give a fuck about the cultivation world, and look at him! He’s Chief Cultivator!”
“Nobody likes Hanguang-jun,” Jin Ling snaps.
“But everybody respects Hanguang-jun,” Wei Wuxian replies, raising a teaching finger. “And that’s the difference. Who cares about being liked, Jin Ling? Especially as sect leader, you can’t worry about such arbitrary things. Besides, look where being liked has gotten any of us.”
Jin Ling’s scowl seems permanently affixed to his face, his lips pouted, but doesn’t say anything to contradict him, for once.
“Listen to your wise senior,” Wei Wuxian intones.
He’s expecting a bratty retort, but Jin Ling’s next question takes him completely off-guard. It’s genuine and tentative, though masked in his usual churlishness: “How did you know you were cut-sleeve, anyway?”
“Ah! Hmm.” Wei Wuxian taps a finger to his chin, unsmiling for the first time this evening. He wants to provide an answer to this with full and proper consideration. “Well, I’m not sure I am, to tell the truth, but I’m also not sure there’s a word for what I am.”
A puckered line forms between Jin Ling’s eyebrows, pinching the vermilion mark there. He’s going to have frown-lines by the time he’s thirty, Wei Wuxian thinks. It reminds him briefly of Jiang Cheng, and he finds himself, against his better judgment, missing his shidi, just for a moment.
“What do you mean?” Jin Ling asks.
“Well, I always liked women growing up, but then I fell in love early with Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian says, balancing his hands as though weighing two stones. “Then I died, which sort of threw a wrench in the whole thing. I’ve never really thought of myself as strictly a cut-sleeve, but Lan Zhan is the love of my life and he’s really the only person I’ve liked or loved that way, so I guess I wouldn’t really know otherwise. I always liked both boys and girls, though — it just took me longer to realize on the boys part. But I have never been, nor will I obviously ever be, with a woman, so maybe that does make me a cut-sleeve after all.”
Jin Ling nods very seriously, as though Wei Wuxian is delivering an important sermon and he’s studiously absorbing every word.
“Even if I am a cut-sleeve, though, it doesn’t matter to me.” Wei Wuxian waves a dismissive hand. “Nor do I care what other people have to say about it. I cared a little bit when I was younger, just because it was always presented to me as some scary, morally reprehensible thing, but I don’t feel any different than the person I was before, except for the fact that I’m far happier than I can ever remember being in either of my lifetimes, and by some miracle of fortune, I’ve found the best person in the world to spend my life with.”
Jin Ling gives him a funny look, before he glares and looks away, his ears flushed.
“What you said about liking both men and women — it makes sense,” Jin Ling says slowly, after another moment in thought. “It’s like…I liked roasted duck my entire life, but then I realized recently I also like braised chicken, but it doesn’t mean I don’t still like roasted duck.”
Wei Wuxian snaps his fingers. “Yes, exactly like that!” He pauses, then asks, without any hint of teasing in his voice, “Is there a reason you ask?”
Jin Ling full-body flinches from him like he’s been smacked. His face dully flushes again.
“No!” he retorts, turning away again to hide his blush. “I’m allowed to be curious, aren’t I? You’re the only cut-sleeve I’ve ever met.”
“That you know of,” Wei Wuxian points out. “Believe me, there are lots of us out there, waiting to infiltrate and take over the cultivation world.”
“Don’t joke,” Jin Ling mutters.
“That would be a much better cultivation world,” Wei Wuxian says to himself, tapping a finger to his chin.
Jin Ling’s gaze is fixed forward, still frowning slightly as he takes in the golden-blue lights of Jinlintai at night, and as Wei Wuxian looks at him, really looks at him and sees traces of both Jin Zixuan and his sister in his features, he can’t help it — a pang of fondness throbs in his chest. It would absolutely mortify and infuriate Jin Ling to know such a thing, he thinks with a private grin.
One day, Wei Wuxian thinks as they continue to walk along in pensive silence, he’ll sit down, have a drink with Jin Ling, and explain it all like a proper uncle should. He’ll explain shijie’s smile, her kindness and grace, her soup recipes and her absolutely boundless love — for her brothers, for her husband, and especially for her son. He’ll even explain how he couldn’t stand Jin Ling’s peacock father for the longest time, until he had come to warily respect Jin Zixuan’s integrity, which they had shared in more than one fight on the same side. All of these things — Jin Zixuan’s fiery commitment to his principles and shijie’s soft, sensitive heart — he can see beginning to take form in Jin Ling, and to think neither of them are here to see their son, as Jin Ling becomes a man —
Jin Ling’s horrified voice breaks him from his thoughts. “Are you crying?!”
“What?” Wei Wuxian chokes, then wipes at his watery eyes with his knuckles. “No, I’ve just — it’s just the liquor.”
Jin Ling is still looking at him as though he’d tried to offer him a skinned cat.
“Do you really miss Hanguang-jun that much?” he asks, sounding as though he can’t decide whether to be more amazed or repulsed.
Wei Wuxian bobs his head in a nod, sniffling for effect. “So much.”
Jin Ling makes yet another face, but then says, in what Wei Wuxian thinks might be an awkward attempt at consolation, “He will return soon. He’s the best cultivator, he’ll be fine.”
“I know he is,” Wei Wuxian says, smiling despite himself. “Thanks, A-Ling.”
“That’s Sect Leader Jin to you,” Jin Ling sniffs.
“Okay, A-Ling.”
They make their way back to Koi Tower in a surprisingly comfortable silence, until they reach Fragrance Hall and Jin Ling grunts a good night and heads off, and Wei Wuxian, as he makes his way back to his own guest quarters, feels lighter than he has in days.
—
When Lan Zhan finally does return two days later, Wei Wuxian is fully of the mind to be waiting for him in bed with his body arranged as lasciviously as possible, but his plan for seduction dissipates the second his husband walks in the door. Unable to restrain himself a second longer, he launches himself at Lan Zhan, tangling their limbs together and burying his face in his chest.
Lan Zhan huffs in surprise at the unexpected assault, then sets Bichen down to return the hug properly. “Wei Ying.”
“Lan Zhan, I was so boooooo-ooooored,” Wei Wuxian moans, his words muffled into Lan Zhan’s chest. “Please quit your job.”
“If you want me to,” Lan Zhan responds, solemn, his hands rubbing rhythmic circles along Wei Wuxian’s shoulder-blades.
“No, don’t do that, please.” Wei Wuxian tilts his head back to look Lan Zhan in the face, and beams as his heart warms up at the sight. “Hi.”
The corner of Lan Zhan’s mouth curls up ever so slightly, his eyes achingly soft as he gazes down at him. “Hello.” He pecks Wei Wuxian on the lips, and Wei Wuxian smiles wider into it.
Wei Wuxian is still clinging onto Lan Zhan’s arm as the latter settles in a seated position at the table.
“Lan Zhan, did you miss me?” he asks as Lan Zhan flips his sleeves back to pour himself a glass of water. He drapes himself over Lan Zhan’s shoulder, pushing his nose into the crook of his neck to inhale his familiar scent.
“I always miss Wei Ying,” says Lan Zhan, with utter sincerity. Wei Wuxian hums and makes fast work of his headpiece, fingers working with easy familiarity against metal and ties until Lan Wangji’s hair falls freely over his shoulders in dark, silky tresses.
Gently, he rubs his fingers into Lan Zhan’s scalp, massaging out the sore parts, and Lan Zhan sighs and visibly relaxes into the touch.
“Did the conference go well?” Wei Wuxian asks, and moves his hands downward to dig his thumbs into the tight muscles of Lan Zhan’s shoulders.
“Mn,” says Lan Zhan. “Boring.”
“Was anyone mean to you?” Wei Wuxian leans forward and speaks into his ear, pressing his front to Lan Zhan’s back as he wraps his arms around the other’s chest. “Do I need to beat someone up? I can send the Yiling Patriarch to beat someone up.”
“Sect Leader Yao is...trying, as always,” Lan Zhan answers, his own hands coming up to encircle Wei Wuxian’s wrists. “Sect Leader Ouyang is no help, nor is the new Sect Leader Su.”
Wei Wuxian scowls at the mental image of the three of them. They circle like carrion-thirsty vultures around Lan Zhan during gatherings like these, pecking at any chance they can to undermine or criticize.
“I can hex them,” he says, darkly.
“No hexing,” says Lan Zhan, in the tones of someone who’s had this conversation multiple times before.
“Just a tiny hex.”
“Hexes are forbidden in the Lan sect.”
“First off, no, they’re not,” Wei Wuxian replies, nipping at Lan Zhan’s earlobe in admonishment. “I mean, they probably are, but not formally, yet. And secondly, we’re far from the Cloud Recesses, so please let your Wei Ying have a small hex, as a treat.”
Lan Zhan sighs out through his nose, then hums, which is his way of saying, Do as you will. Wei Wuxian is really being quite innocent about it, envisioning a gentle case of genital warts or erectile difficulties; surely Lan Zhan won’t oppose that.
“Fine, enough talk of hexes,” Wei Wuxian concedes, and rests his chin on the top of Lan Zhan's head. “Lan Zhan, you won’t believe how much I missed you. I was going crazy.”
Lan Zhan hums quietly again, his large hands rubbing up and down Wei Wuxian’s forearms as he stands from the table. “What did you do?”
Wei Wuxian chatters as they get ready for bed, slipping out of their layers down to their underclothes. “Explored around town, a little. I know you’re going to say something about my limp, but I swear I just rolled my ankle and it’ll be fine in a few days. I got to torture Jin Ling, which was a nice surprise! You know, he has some of Jiang Cheng’s temper and attitude, and definitely his stubbornness, but I really can see more of shijie in him every time I see him. I think once he grows up a little and learns more about the world, he’ll be a good sect leader. I wonder if he could come stay with us at Cloud Recesses some time? I think he could do with more friends his age, and Sizhui would be good for him. Jingyi, too.”
Lan Zhan nods along to everything he says, punctuating with “mn” and “hm” where his input is warranted. When they slide into bed a moment later, Wei Wuxian immediately wriggles on top of him and Lan Zhan’s arms drift up to hold him against his chest tightly, the two of them slotting into a joint, familiar shape. Wei Wuxian had concocted detailed plans earlier for ravishing, given the three days’ absence, and it’s not like Lan Zhan would ever refuse him, but he senses that his husband is tired, more so than he’s letting on, and it’s enough to just hold him like this, and to be held.
Wei Wuxian...well, it's ridiculous, frankly, but Wei Wuxian hasn’t slept well in two nights without Lan Zhan in his bed, so he takes another quiet moment to revel in the steady comfort of his closeness, his scent and warmth and the shape of him. They’re far from the jingshi, but it still feels like home.
“Lan Zhan,” he mumbles into his chest. “Love you. See you tomorrow.”
That’s their usual good-night — a restating of the obvious, followed by a promise of the certainty of another day together, after lifetimes riddled with uncertainty and separation.
“Wei Ying,” Lan Zhan echoes, twice as soft. “Love you. See you tomorrow.”
Wei Wuxian tucks his head more comfortably under Lan Zhan’s chin, and Lan Zhan hums softly into his hair. Like that, they drift off, a shared dream.