Archive of Our Own

Meng Yao does not expect to find employment in the Unclean Realm.

Qinghe Nie is the last of the great sects he has approached, seeking work, and if any of the others had offered him anything—anything at all, he had thought as he trudged north from Carp Tower, blood slowly congealing at his temple—he would not be here now.

But he has been turned away over and over again, and the winter nights are flexing their claws into the weakened daylight hours. Meng Yao came to Qinghe because he was desperate enough to walk into the snow in search of a hearth.

Desperate but not stupid. He knows of the reputation of this place and the people who make their homes here. There are stories about how they are as unwelcoming and cold as the mountains that surround them, and at first he fears they are true. Meng Yao learnt in his youth how to flatter people in such a way that they do not realise they are being flattered. He learnt how to ingratiate himself without obsequious fawning. But the people of Qinghe do not smile when he smiles at them.

Meng Yao is a scholar of people and this scroll is written in a language he cannot yet read.

Yet.

He spends ten days in the cheapest inns he can find, often having to barter to cover the cost of an uncomfortable mattress (and often forgoing a meal as a result). He has slept on worse; he hopes one day he will never have to again. Soon Meng Yao will understand Qinghe—every day he learns a little more—and he will make himself into the person he needs to be to present himself at the Unclean Realm. He will not be turned away again.

The people of Qinghe appear inhospitable at first, but they are simply guarded against outsiders who believe they are as barbaric as the mountains where they live, as the sabres with which they cultivate. They are fiercely loyal and loving; to their families, their communities, and to Qinghe Nie. Especially to the young Nie-zongzhu whom Meng Yao sees, briefly, in the streets on the fourth day.

Meng Yao sees: a tall young man, perhaps in his mid-twenties; a serious but beautiful face that would look younger without the moustache he wears; a heavy iron guan; intricate braids held in place with burnished iron pins in the shape of flowers; an unsheathed sabre of astonishing size across his back. He commits each of these fleeting impressions to memory.

His name is Nie Mingjue and his father was killed in a terrible accident a decade ago, so terrible that the common people still tell stories about it for Meng Yao to overhear on the sixth night. Perhaps they have forgotten he is not of Qinghe. Perhaps they have simply forgotten he is there at all.

This suits his purpose.

Meng Yao learns: the previous Nie-zongzhu was predeceased by two wives and an infant son; the previous Nie-zongzhu died suddenly and violently on a night-hunt; the previous Nie-zongzhu was gored by his own sabre, in front of his son and heir; the young Nie-zongzhu was not yet sixteen but he took on the role he was born to without complaint, in spite of his grief.

The people of Qinghe love their young Zongzhu. Meng Yao, too, finds himself half in love with the legend of Chifeng-zun, but he knows well enough that legends are nothing more than pretty words, and no person can ever be entirely contained within words, regardless of their beauty.

On the ninth day since his arrival, he learns the name of the steward of the Unclean Realm. On the morning of the eleventh day, he dresses in the finest clothes he owns, walks up to the imposing gates of Qinghe Nie's ancestral home and asks to speak with Nie Jian regarding any possible job openings.

Meng Yao does not smile when he asks. He is shown inside right away.

An hour later, he has been offered—and has accepted—a job as Nie-zongzhu's secretary. He came at just the right time, it would seem; Nie Jian did not say what happened with the last secretary, but evidently he left unexpectedly. The role needs to be filled with some urgency, and Meng Yao is the first qualified candidate, with his quick mind, sharp memory, and attention to detail. He has never been a secretary before, but he can learn how.

Meng Yao does not smile. He does not smile when he thanks Nie Jian sincerely. He does not smile when he leaves to collect his scant belongings from the cheap inn. When he returns, he is shown to a small room adjacent to Nie-zongzhu's more extravagant quarters and left alone there, and even then he does not smile.

But he does laugh, humourless and gasping, until tears run down his face.

"There are not many rules here, but the most important is that you must never go into the north wing," Nie Xiang says. She is the housekeeper and she is showing Meng Yao around the Unclean Realm. "It is forbidden to everyone except Zongzhu, the healer, and three of my girls." She looks at him sharply, as if she expects him to ask why, and when he doesn't, she nods. "Nie-er-gongzi lives there," she says, her voice low. "He is very unwell. Has been ever since he was a child, the poor lamb. He can't tolerate the presence of most people."

"This one was unaware Nie-zongzhu had a brother," Meng Yao says, choosing his words carefully, "and is sorry to hear of his ill health. This humble servant wouldn't dream of interfering in such family matters. My only wish is to assist Nie-zongzhu."

He remembers the stories he heard in the cheapest inn.

(Meng Yao remembers everything.)

Nie-zongzhu's brother died as an infant—except, it would seem, he did not. Meng Yao is sure in time it will be easy enough to discover the reason why such a falsehood would be spread. This woman acts as if she holds all the secrets of Qinghe Nie and then spills them as carelessly as water. There will be others just like her, if this is the example she sets. There always are.

Nie Xiang doesn't smile, not exactly, but the corners of her eyes crinkle imperceptibly in what he thinks might be approval. Because he did not ask? "That's just as well. The last secretary pried and we were glad to see the back of him. But you seem to be a sensible young man. You know your place."

My place is no lower than yours, Meng Yao thinks, and he twists his face into an imitation of her not-smile before dropping into a respectful bow to hide the flash of anger that burns white-hot inside his ribcage.

"You'll get lost," she says as she leads him around the labyrinthine passages of the Unclean Realm. "Newcomers always do. Don't be afraid to ask someone for help, though. No one will mind pointing you in the right direction."

"This one is grateful," Meng Yao murmurs. He won't get lost; he never does. His memory is simply too good and he is constructing a mental map of the sprawling building as they walk through it. He can already tell that there are some areas Nie Xiang hasn't shown him, but he will explore for himself and fill out his map.

There is comfort in knowledge. Knowing more than other people is the best way to protect oneself.

Nie Xiang is still talking, but she is saying nothing of consequence. Meng Yao takes in her words while his mind is elsewhere; nodding and humming, and hiding the fact that he does not like this woman at all. He knows her. He has known so many people like her in his life. Her character is stale, overused, and he does not care to read her book further.

At the end of her tour, she returns him to the area where Nie-zongzhu's personal rooms and study are, and of course his own bedroom. Near the north wing, Meng Yao notes.

"Servants take the evening meal in the kitchens at xū zhèng. I hope to see you there, so I might introduce you to everyone," she says. "Zongzhu doesn't expect you to begin work today so the rest of the afternoon is yours, but he will want to see you first thing in the morning. He is an early riser."

"As am I," Meng Yao says, and bows to her again. "This one thanks Nie-guanjia for her guidance and knowledge."

"Ah," Nie Xiang says fondly, reaching out to pinch his cheek as if he is a child who has amused her. "Yes, you'll do very well here."

Meng Yao does not like her at all.

He writes a letter, short and to the point.

Sisi,

I am newly employed in Qinghe, under Nie-zongzhu. If you wish to reach me, I can be found at the Unclean Realm.

I hope you are well,
A-Yao

He does not expect to hear back from her, but he owes her this much.

The next morning dawns bright and chilly, with the scent of snow a promise in the mountain air. Meng Yao eats his congee in the kitchen in blissful solitude, excepting the cooks preparing ingredients around him—and as they aren't bothering him, he does not object to their presence. Most of the other servants have already broken their fast and begun their workday.

The sun is not yet visible over the high walls of the Unclean Realm when he finds Nie-zongzhu on the training ground, running his disciples through their forms. They are working hard enough that most are sweating and stripped to the waist in spite of the cold, even the women. It doesn't look like a particularly enjoyable activity, though Meng Yao has to admit the view is pleasant.

Nie-zongzhu notices him standing there a few moments after he arrives and gestures to another man to take over from him, jogging across to greet Meng Yao. He is broad and tanned and bare and glistening, and Meng Yao is glad that the winter air has already chafed his cheeks crimson.

"Meng Yao is your humble servant," he says, bowing deep. "It is an honour for this one to serve Nie-zongzhu."

"You are not of Qinghe," Nie-zongzhu says. "I thought your name was unfamiliar. We don't often have visitors, let alone people choosing to stay here. Has Nie Jian explained what your role will be?"

"This one will keep your diary and arrange appointments, take dictation and ensure correspondence with other sects is replied to in a timely fashion, and generally assist in any other way Zongzhu requires."

"Yunmeng," Nie-zongzhu says nonsensically. Then, at the flash of confusion that crosses Meng Yao's face before he can suppress it, he adds, "Your accent—it's faint, but you grew up in Yunmeng, yes?"

"Yes, though this one has not lived there for some years," Meng Yao says smoothly. "Zongzhu is very perceptive." Too perceptive for someone like Meng Yao, who goes to great pains to not be truly seen, to be underestimated until he is certain he has the advantage. It seems that Meng Yao is the one who has underestimated his new employer, and he won't make the same mistake twice.

"Nie-zongzhu does his best," he says, looking a little uncomfortable with the compliment. That is something Meng Yao tucks away for later. "I train with the disciples every morning at dawn. Other than that you're free to rearrange my schedule as you see fit. Were you given the key to my study?"

Wordlessly, Meng Yao pulls the large iron key from his sleeve.

"Good. As most of your work will be there, you needn't seek my permission before entering. I would prefer you not to enter the rest of my chambers without knocking first, otherwise."

"Privacy is important, even for a man such as yourself who answers to so many," he says, returning the key to its place against his forearm.

Nie-zongzhu appraises him then, his dark gaze unyielding. Meng Yao meets it, unflinching. Neither one of them smiles.

"Thank you, Meng Yao. I will see you in my study at the sì chū bell and we can begin."

When he turns to walk back to his disciples, Meng Yao sees his back is covered with half-healed scratches, and he wonders.

That night in his cramped quarters, Meng Yao strokes himself to orgasm at a punishing pace, fucking the tight circle of his fist, imagining—remembering—the shape of Nie-zongzhu's mouth as he said you needn't seek my permission before entering.

He doesn't think too hard about it.

There are three entrances to the north wing of the Unclean Realm. Two of them are obvious; the third Meng Yao only suspects exists, because he has not yet seen it with his own eyes.

The first is a large door in the main thoroughfare of the building, sealed with iron chains and fluttering talismans. Everyone acts as though it isn't there at all, so Meng Yao is careful to do the same.

The second is a smaller door in the kitchens, which is used by the servant girls who deliver the ailing Nie-er-gongzi his meals. This door is also locked, though only with a single key that Nie Xiang carries around her neck on a chain.

This is interesting to Meng Yao. Is Nie-er-gongzi so delicate? Or does his illness result in fits of violence? He has heard of such things before, and no one ever says plainly what exactly plagues the second son of Nie.

The third door—the hypothetical door—is in Nie-zongzhu's private chambers. He has one major piece of evidence for the existence of this door, and that is: Nie-zongzhu never enters the kitchens and the first door remains sealed. There must be another entrance somewhere, and given the amount of secrecy around Nie-er-gongzi, Meng Yao can only surmise a door hidden in a room that no one may enter without permission is the easiest way for Nie-zongzhu to visit his brother.

On days when his schedule permits it, Meng Yao takes to arriving for dinner early enough to surreptitiously observe the serving girl entering the second door. It goes the same way every time.

Nie Xiang ties a silk scarf around the girl's eyes, then places a tray of food in her hands. She pulls the key from the front of her robes and unlocks the door before opening it and guiding the girl through. She leans through the door and does something that Meng Yao cannot see from where he sits—to find a more convenient angle would betray his observation of the process—but she is always very careful to keep both feet on the kitchen side of the threshold. Then she slams the door shut and locks it behind whichever girl passes through, and only unlocks it again upon hearing a specific pattern of knocks. All in all, it leaves Meng Yao with more questions than answers.

The kitchen door is clearly the way to go if he wants to explore the north wing, but he doesn't think he'd be able to get the key away from Nie Xiang. He will have to pick the lock, and he will have to do it in the middle of the night when the kitchens are empty.

He won't rush into it, though. He has been in the Unclean Realm for less than a month and he has time to investigate further before doing anything he can't take back.

One of the girls who goes through the door is a potential source of information. She is almost as quiet as Meng Yao, and he has overheard the other maids mocking her behind her back. Her name is Li Chengmin and she looks so much like Nie-zongzhu that Meng Yao suspects she may be the by-blow of the previous sect leader.

His features do not sit as well on a woman's face and it is clear from her reaction when Meng Yao compliments her during dinner one evening that she knows it.

"This lowly one is flattered by the generous Meng Yao," she mutters around a mouthful of rice, wary, and proceeds to ignore his further attempts at conversation for almost an entire week.

Meng Yao can't really blame her. He has been in her position before: unable to tell if the overture of kindness is genuine or simply another tool with which to humiliate you. And while he has no intention of humiliating Li Chengmin, his pursuit of her is not genuine. Still, he believes in time he will change her mind.

In Qinghe, in winter, there is nothing but time.

One of the more boring tasks that falls under Meng Yao's purview is reading through the various letters Nie-zongzhu receives on a daily basis and deciding which are important enough to be passed on and which he can respond to on behalf of—and with permission from—his employer.

(He is not allowed to throw any out without response, though when he suggests doing exactly that to a missive from a minor sect near Lanling, it is the closest he has seen Nie-zongzhu come to laughing.)

The vast majority fall into the latter category. Meng Yao perfects the art of reading without really reading; he skims for certain key phrases that indicate a letter is more than just hot air. So far, he has yet to miss any important correspondence in this fashion.

He almost misses this one.

The scroll is not large, but the paper used is heavy and clearly expensive. It contains none of the phrases Meng Yao knows are important and is from a nearby sect whose leader often writes to complain about Qinghe Nie's night-hunts straying into their territory, and he almost assumes it is more of the same.

But Meng Yao is better at his job than that, and he quickly realises that it is not a complaint. It is an offer of marriage.

There have been no other letters like this and Nie-zongzhu has not given him instructions specific to marriage proposals before, so he tucks it away with the two other letters that are worthy of Nie-zongzhu's eyes.

While he replies to the many letters that are not worthy, Meng Yao thinks.

Nie-zongzhu is not married; this is well-known. His ranking on the list of eligible cultivators is high enough to be respectable, and he is the leader of one of the five great sects. Nie-er-gongzi's mysterious illness surely makes him an unfit heir and most people don't even know he yet lives, and so to anyone outside the borders of Qinghe it would seem that the Nie line is in need of exactly that. It is therefore no great surprise that other sects with unwed sisters and daughters would seek an alliance with Qinghe Nie.

He wonders why Nie-zongzhu is not already engaged. He wonders if it has something to do with Nie-er-gongzi. But wondering alone will not answer his questions, and it certainly won't finish answering the other letters.

When he meets with Nie-zongzhu later that day, he decides to bring it up outright instead of just including the letter with the others and waiting to observe the reaction. It is something that is related to his job, after all. It is exactly his business to know about such things.

"Pingyang Yao have sent an interesting proposal," he says, sliding the scroll across the desk to Nie-zongzhu.

"Meng Yao," Nie-zongzhu says with astonishing frankness. "If this is another marriage proposal, I am going to scream and then put my fist through the nearest wall."

"Another?" he ventures, pulling the scroll back slightly.

Nie-zongzhu takes it from him, reads the first few lines, and then does not scream, which Meng Yao appreciates. "Yao-zongzhu has spent the past three years trying to get me to agree to marry his sister. Another proposal arrives every month, like clockwork, and the man cannot seem to get it through his thick skull—" He holds up one finger and takes a deep breath, collecting himself with some effort. "I have refused all previous offers. I will continue to refuse them, but still they come."

"Forgive this one's presumption, but—does Nie-zongzhu not need a wife? For an heir, if nothing else?"

"I have neither the temperament for marriage, nor the inclination to seek one out," he snaps, the words bitten off and jagged. "My time is better spent elsewhere, on matters that are more important." And then, as an afterthought: "You are forgiven."

It seems to Meng Yao that securing the future of the sect with a marriage and an heir is a matter of the highest importance, but he keeps this to himself. He keeps quiet and waits to see if holding his tongue will prompt a further explanation.

"I forget, sometimes, that you came to us from outside Qinghe." Nie-zongzhu looks at him consideringly, then sighs. "I suppose it has been long enough since my father's death that his misdeeds are no longer gossiped about by the servants. Why would they be? You should not speak ill of the dead." He lapses into silence again.

Meng Yao waits. He knows by now that Nie-zongzhu will talk when he is ready, after he has collected his thoughts.

"My father wanted sons and he was not a patient man. My mother died young in pursuit of this aim, and so did the woman he married after her. I barely remember either." His jaw tightens; flexes once, twice. "I am aware of my responsibilities; I know there will come a time when Qinghe needs an heir, but when it does, I will adopt. Qinghe Nie will continue and our father's sorry bloodline can die with us—with me."

There is a story. There must be a story behind Nie-zongzhu's vehemence. To openly admit he will not even attempt to seek a wife and father an heir, but instead intends to adopt? Meng Yao has no great attachment to such principles, but he is taken aback that a man such as Nie-zongzhu would diverge from them like this.

He does not let it show, but he will remember this. Meng Yao remembers everything.

"It is understood," he says softly, carefully. His face is schooled into an expression of perfect, servile neutrality. "This one will not bring such letters to your attention again. Had I realised, I would have kept it back with the other unnecessary correspondence."

"How were you to know?" Nie-zongzhu says with a flat, humourless smile. "Reply however you see fit. I trust you not to start a war with Pingyang Yao in doing so, although if you did, perhaps they would finally stop asking."

"A war only if there is no other way to make them stop," Meng Yao says gravely, pretending to make a note of it. It startles a surprised laugh out of Nie-zongzhu, and sets Meng Yao's chest aglow with warmth.

Even as the weather outside grows more unwelcoming, the people of the Unclean Realm begin to open themselves to Meng Yao.

It helps, he thinks, that he has used his wages to purchase new robes in the colours and style favoured by Qinghe Nie. Dressed like them, he feels like he could be one of them, and it seems they are starting to feel the same way.

He learns another language from Li Chengmin, who has softened towards him. He tells her directly: "I will not marry you, nor do I have any interest in putting a child in your belly. My bed is cold and I want to share it with you. This doesn't need to be anything more than that."

Li Chengmin appreciates the honesty. He makes her come with three fingers crooked in her cunt and his mouth on her clit; she returns the favour with her tongue and lets him spill across her face or breasts. Then as the sweat cools on their bodies, she teaches Meng Yao about the braids the Nie wear to signify all manner of things.

There are braids for the gentry, for soldiers, for cultivators, for brave acts in battle and on night-hunts. There are braids that tell you if someone is betrothed, married, widowed. Braids for joy and braids for grief. They can be combined like deft brushstrokes to convey even more meaning.

If they pass in the winding corridors during the day, Li Chengmin nudges his side and points to someone, and says, "Tell me what you know."

"The heir to landed gentry, unmarried," he says, or, "A guest cultivator, seeking Zongzhu's favour."

Meng Yao is a quick study. He is rarely wrong.

The first morning when he wears Nie braids in his hair to meet Nie-zongzhu on the training ground, there is surprise and then a gratifying warmth in his eyes. Meng Yao selected them with intent, meaning them to say two things.

The first meaning—the explicit meaning—is that he is a servant of Nie, belonging to Nie-zongzhu's personal staff and not a more generalised household servant. The second meaning is more of an implication, but he has seen vaguer things implied and understood: I am not of Qinghe by blood or by birth, but I would be of Qinghe by choice.

"You are settled here, I think," Nie-zongzhu says later that day, when they are alone in his study. When Meng Yao looks up at him, an artful look of confusion on his face, Nie-zongzhu says, "I had not seen you wear the braids before. Who taught you which to wear?"

"A maid. Li Chengmin."

He nods slowly. "She is one of the girls who takes my brother his meals."

Meng Yao feels triumph blooming like a flower in his chest. In all the weeks he has been here, he has not once heard Nie-zongzhu mention his brother. "Ah," he says delicately.

"You have never asked me about him."

"This one did not wish to intrude on Zongzhu's personal matters."

"Meng Yao." He sighs and scrubs a hand over his face, suddenly looking both younger than his years and very tired. "You are not an unintelligent man."

"It is not my place to ask questions," Meng Yao says, setting his brush down on the rest. "We have worked together closely these past weeks and I trust you would tell me if I needed further information on the situation. There is no reason for me to pry into family matters otherwise."

Nie-zongzhu has a strange expression on his face. "You are my secretary. Your hands steer the reins of my life."

"Your life as Nie-zongzhu," Meng Yao corrects gently. "Not your life as a brother." He raises his hand and then hesitates—very intentionally—before resting it upon Nie-zongzhu's shoulder. Then he removes it again, as if he has remembered himself all of a sudden, allowing a faint blush to colour his cheeks. "Forgive this one for his presumption."

They stare at each other for a long, unbroken moment.

"There is nothing to forgive," Nie-zongzhu says finally. He seems just as flustered as Meng Yao is pretending to be. "I—I am simply glad to know you have found a home here."

"A home is the least of what Qinghe Nie has given me," he murmurs, casting his eyes to the floor. He exhales shakily and picks up his brush. "I should..."

"Yes, of course." Nie-zongzhu clears his throat and reaches for another letter.

For the rest of the afternoon, Meng Yao is aware of the weight of his gaze, though he is careful to avoid showing any sign he knows Nie-zongzhu is watching him.

There are merchants from Yunmeng visiting the Unclean Realm. This is not unusual in itself; even in winter, there are people whose livelihoods rely on trade, and there has been a steady stream of people coming and going and hailing from any number of places, though the stream is slowing to a trickle as Qinghe gets colder and darker.

Meng Yao does his best to avoid them. Just the sound of the Yunmeng accent is enough to set his teeth on edge, especially after all the effort he went through to erase the telltale tones from his own voice.

It is therefore unpleasant when a small group of the merchants catch him outside the kitchens one evening. It is late, and he is tired, and visitors are not really supposed to be in this part of the building, so he is taken by surprise.

"I know you," one of the men says. He smells strongly of liquor. "Where do I know you from?"

"This one is a humble servant of Qinghe Nie. Excuse me," Meng Yao says, trying to walk past, but the man reaches out and catches him by the wrist.

"No, I know you. You're—shit, I know I've seen you somewhere before. Not just with Chifeng-zun."

"Leave it, Tang Yuan," says another man, more sober.

But Tang Yuan will not be so easily dissuaded. "It's that brothel in Yunping, right? Yeah! You're Meng Shi's kid! I remember seeing you around all the time. What was it they called you? Xiao Yao? Ah, Xiao Yao, you grew up pretty. Just as pretty as any of the girls in the brothel, as pretty as Meng Shi. You should have stayed there with them."

Meng Yao's stomach lurches and he is smiling, quite in spite of himself, conciliatory and brittle. "Please. I have duties to attend to."

"So late at night? Xiao Yao should stay and attend to me instead." And he laughs like the bray of a mule, his fingers still digging into Meng Yao's wrist. "I could never afford the mother, but the son might be cheaper. How much for a night with Xiao Yao? How much for a half shí?"

None of what he is saying is in Yunmeng dialect and there are other servants around. The people Meng Yao sees and works alongside every day are hearing and understanding every word, and he knows by morning even the ones who aren't here will know what happened. They will gossip about him.

Everyone will know where he came from, after all the pains he has gone to. And then the story will grow and change like a living thing until everyone believes they know things about Meng Yao which bear only the vaguest resemblance to the truth.

"I am a servant of Qinghe Nie," he repeats, trying to take his arm back. "As you are a guest of Qinghe Nie, this one must ask you to consider the disrespect you are showing to Chifeng-zun in his home."

"Oh, high and mighty for the son of a whore, aren't you?" Tang Yuan spits the words, and then actually spits on the floor as he finally releases Meng Yao's arm. "Are you this frigid with Chifeng-zun or is it different with gentry? Are you on your way to spread your legs for him now, is that why?"

"Please take your friend back to the guest quarters," Meng Yao says to the man who tried to stop Tang Yuan. "He is embarrassing himself."

"And the rest of us," the man says. "My apologies. He has never known his limits."

"I know my fucking limits!"

They take Tang Yuan by the shoulders and lead him away, and Meng Yao watches them go until they are out of sight.

His cheeks hurt. His wrist hurts. None of the other servants who witnessed this will meet his eye as they scurry back to whatever tasks they were ignoring in favour of a free show.

"Ah, Meng Yao, I hope you're keeping your hands to yourself," Nie Xiang says, pinching his cheek. "My girls are good girls, they wouldn't do that sort of thing."

Meng Yao smiles at her. "Nor would I."

"Not your preference?" she asks kindly.

It is not kind, though. It is a hateful thing to ask.

"My preference is irrelevant to my work here," he says, not as quickly as he would have liked.

"So dedicated! I'm sure he appreciates you—in his own way, of course. He doesn't do things like that, especially not with... well, you know."

Say what you mean, Meng Yao doesn't say. Tell me you think he's too honorable to fuck a servant, he doesn't say.

"The thought has never crossed my mind," Meng Yao lies.

"I've never understood the blindfold," Meng Yao says one night when he is in bed with Li Chengmin. He is stroking small circles around the peak of her nipple with a fingertip, and she sighs with pleasure. "Surely it makes it difficult to actually deliver the food."

"Whatever's wrong with him—he can't bear to be looked upon by anyone but Nie-zongzhu himself," she says. She tilts her head, considering her next words. "What kind of curse does that to a man?"

A curse? "I thought it was an illness. The healer—"

"Has never been able to do anything for him. She still goes in sometimes, but none of her treatments work." Li Chengmin sighs again, redirecting his hand between her legs. "But I would imagine the blindfold makes it hard for her to do her job. How do you treat a patient you cannot see? Before I was assigned to it, Mingming said the healer tried once and he screamed for nearly three days without pause. She could hear it every time she went into the north wing with his meals. Said it was like no sound a man should be able to make." Her mouth twists. "I shouldn't gossip. I'm no better than Guanjia."

"You are much better than her in every way." Meng Yao cups her cunt, letting her rock slowly against the meat of his palm. "It is fortunate you know the way well enough to feed him without sight."

"There's a rope on the wall," she says. She bites her lip as she finds a good angle. "We keep one hand on it and it—ah—guides us to Nie-er-gongzi's door."

"Does he even have a name, that Nie-er-gongzi?" Meng Yao asks, playful. "No one ever says it."

"Oh, Nie Huaisang. Does it matter? This is boring, A-Yao. I don't want to talk about work."

Never let it be said that Meng Yao cannot read the mood of a room. He brings Li Chengmin off with his palm, then his mouth, then turns her away from him to press heated kisses to her nape as he fucks her thighs from behind, pretending that she is someone else entirely.

Seven days before the winter solstice, a delegation arrives from Gusu Lan. The halls are suddenly filled with unfamiliar faces in pale, eye-catching robes, and Meng Yao's days are equally as filled with having to deal with them.

He directs disciples to the library. He redirects lost disciples to the Blade Hall, the guest quarters, the dining hall, the training ground. He sits in on so many meetings to take notes that by the end of each day his fingers are cramping and so stained with ink he cannot scrub the skin clean no matter how hard he tries.

He sleeps less. His mind moves faster. With so many strangers around to draw focus, he sees an opportunity.

Dōngzhì arrives, and with it his chance. The festival is exactly the distraction he needed; between their guests and people taking the evening to spend time with their families, it makes everything fall into place. Meng Yao can go to the door in the kitchen in the depths of night, safe in the knowledge that he will remain unseen, and pick the lock. He opens it with slow care, but the hinges are kept well-oiled and it is as silent as the rest of the Unclean Realm as he slips past and closes it again behind him. As Li Chengmin told him, there is a rope on the wall to his right.

Meng Yao does not have a blindfold with him. Whatever is wrong with Nie-er-gongzi—whatever reason his brother has for keeping him imprisoned away from the rest of his sect—it seems more like a convenient fiction to Meng Yao. Perhaps the boy is deformed in some way that would be shameful if it were more widely known. He intends to see for himself and then return to his daily reality, his curiosity sated.

He has not brought any means of making light with him either, and there are no windows in the passageway. He ends up holding the rope as he walks to make sure he doesn't stumble or miss a turn. It takes the maids two kè to serve the food and return, which he has always thought strange. Walking for so long inside the Unclean Realm shouldn't be possible. It is somewhat explained by being unable to see, but even so.

A curse, he thinks, and then almost laughs aloud. As unearthly as the Unclean Realm feels sometimes, there is nothing cursed about its halls. He is simply in a different part of the same building he has walked from top to bottom, that he knows like the back of his hand.

It is unfamiliarity, that is all, with a hallway that turns more times than is necessary, perhaps to disguise how close to the rest of the sect the hidden Nie brother is really kept. Out of sight, out of mind.

As Meng Yao walks, he considers what he will do if he finds Nie Huaisang. If he is so unwell, surely he is asleep by now. Will he simply observe a sleeping boy and then leave again? It would be an anticlimactic ending to the months he has spent unravelling the mystery of Nie-er-gongzi, and he doesn't know if simply having the answer will be enough.

What do you want, Meng Yao?

The voice in his head sounds like that of his mother. It sounds like that of Nie-zongzhu.

There is a light ahead of him. He stops dead as soon as he notices, hoping that it is simply a lamp left alight for Nie-er-gongzi to comfort him in the dark of the night. Meng Yao strains his ears and hears—perhaps the low hum of a voice? There is another turn ahead of him, and he can tell whatever is casting the light is past that corner.

He could turn back now. No one would ever know he was here.

He will not, though.

Meng Yao creeps towards the corner, breathing so lightly it barely feels like he's getting any air at all. His pulse pounds in his ears as he reaches the point of no return and looks around the corner.

Two figures stand in front of a door. Meng Yao is not certain of which direction it faces—the corridor took so many turns that his innate sense of direction cannot quite be trusted—but he thinks it may be the third door. Nie-zongzhu's door.

And Nie-zongzhu is one of the figures. His hair is still bound in braids but he does not wear the heavy ceremonial guan without which Meng Yao has never seen him before. He is dressed in simple grey inner robes and nothing more.

The second figure is smaller, slighter. Despite the fact that they are the one facing Meng Yao, he can see nothing about them. They are wearing a mìlí, layers of gauzy red veil obscuring their face entirely, the entire upper half of their body. It must be Nie-er-gongzi, but if he hides himself like this with his brother, why the charade with the blindfolds?

"You shouldn't be here," Nie-zongzhu says, and the resonance of the unadorned stone walls makes it sound like he's standing right next to Meng Yao, makes him flinch. "You know you're not supposed to come to the door, even if it is Dōngzhì."

If Nie Huaisang replies, it is lost in the shifting susurrus of silk as he moves closer to his brother.

"I'm here to spend time with you now, aren't I?" Nie-zongzhu says, with an aching softness in his voice. He reaches up and draws the veils back and away, layer by layer: bloody vermillion growing more sheer until there is none left at all, exposing—

Meng Yao tries not to make assumptions without evidence. Nonetheless, he did not expect the beautiful face that hid behind the mìlí's veils. He did not expect the pink rosebud mouth or the way his skin is so pale it calls to mind the shimmering translucence of fine marble. The eyes, though—his eyes are exactly like Nie-zongzhu's.

His attention, thankfully, is fixed on Nie-zongzhu. "Da-ge," he says, and his voice isn't what Meng Yao expected either. It is soft, yes, but there is a dark power curling through it that makes his throat tighten.

It seems Nie-zongzhu hears it too; he makes a broken, wounded sound and crushes their mouths together. Meng Yao sees, distinctly, a wet flash of tongue and hears, distinctly, a moan of pleasure from one or both of them, and then he turns and flees back into the night.

When Nie-zongzhu is in a private meeting with Lan-gongzi scheduled to last for hours yet, Meng Yao does what he has been asked never to do without permission: he opens the door from the study into his personal rooms and enters.

He was right.

There is a third door, and when he tries the handle, it is unlocked.

The next time he goes through the kitchen door, he does not meet another soul. Meng Yao is able to explore the corridors of the north wing fully, but with caution. He does not enter any rooms—even the ones with open doors that seem empty—for fear of walking in on Nie-er-gongzi and being caught.

As he passes the inside of Nie-zongzhu's door on his return to the kitchen, his mind flashes back to what he saw there. It has occupied his thoughts for most of his waking hours and more of his dreaming ones than he cares to admit to himself. Not just the unexpected sight of Nie Mingjue and Nie Huaisang in a lovers' embrace, though that has certainly featured in his mind's eye more than once; no, he is stuck on the disconnect between what Li Chengmin told him of Nie Huaisang's malady and what he saw. Because he saw.

Meng Yao saw Nie-er-gongzi unveiled and nothing happened.

He does not believe Li Chengmin lied to him, at least not knowingly, but it is clear to him that he is still missing information, and this is why he continues to return to the north wing. It is risky and stupid, but Meng Yao's flaw has always been his greed, his need to push past what he knows is sensible for the rewards he can almost grasp.

The fruit is just out of reach, but if he leans a little farther...

He sees Nie Huaisang again on his fourth visit, the first time he is brave enough to go through the third door while Nie-zongzhu is again occupied by a private meeting. It is also the first time he sees the north wing by daylight, or what little daylight makes it through the window coverings.

Nie Huaisang is wearing the mìlí again, shrouded. He is standing at the end of a long, long corridor, and Meng Yao cannot tell if he's looking back at him. His heart feels like it might burst out of his chest, it's beating so hard.

Neither one of them moves. Nie Huaisang is so still he could be a red, strange statue; he could be a drifting, slender illusion. He could be nothing at all.

Meng Yao takes a step towards him.

Nie Huaisang, unhurried, walks out of view. Meng Yao thinks he hears a faint laugh echoing behind him.

It is decided that Nie-zongzhu will accompany the Gusu Lan delegation when they leave. He has even more to discuss with Lan-gongzi, which doesn't seem possible given how much time they have spent talking, but of course Meng Yao would never voice such a thought.

He has not been asked to go with them, and it festers under his skin like a splinter.

"I will feel better knowing you are here when I cannot be, Meng Yao," Nie-zongzhu says. "I don't need someone to take notes for me on the road or in Gusu. Nie Zonghui will be in charge of sect matters, and you and Nie Jian can take care of the rest."

"Does Zongzhu expect to be gone for long?" Meng Yao asks, his face a careful mask of neutrality.

"Some weeks. Perhaps a month. After the business is concluded with Gusu, I need to make a stop in Lanling." Nie-zongzhu looks pained by this. "I hope that particular chore can be resolved promptly. I'd prefer not to linger at Carp Tower." They have discussed their mutual dislike of Lanling before, and the reminder of Nie-zongzhu's trust in sharing this with him goes some way to easing the sting of being left behind in Qinghe.

"Might this one ask a question?"

"En."

Meng Yao takes a quick breath. He does not think this is too much, but there is always a chance he has misread things. "Is there anything in particular I need to be aware of with regards to the care of your brother? I would not ask, except I do not know the nature of his—"

"His illness, yes." Nie-zongzhu reaches for Meng Yao's shoulder and squeezes. His hand is very large and he doesn't need to exert much pressure, though it is clear that he could. "I hope you know how much I appreciate you, Meng Yao. You have never pressed on the matter of Huaisang's—my brother's illness, and I am sure you must have questions."

"Your family—"

"I haven't finished speaking," he says, a gentle rebuke. Meng Yao drops his gaze to the floor, a silent apology, and Nie-zongzhu squeezes his shoulder again. "All I need from you is to ensure his meals are delivered as usual. There is a... treatment that helps his condition, which I will—I'll have the healer administer before I depart tomorrow. It should keep the worst of his symptoms in check during my absence. But if the worst does happen, I need you to promise me you will keep the serving girls out of the north wing until I return. If you hear anything strange, if something happens you cannot explain—do not let anyone past the door."

Nie-zongzhu is not a good liar, but he tries. He tries hiding the lies between things that are true and hopes they will slip past unnoticed.

The truth: Nie-zongzhu is afraid of what might happen if Nie Huaisang takes a turn for the worse, afraid enough to order his brother to starve instead of risking the three maids.

The lie: the healer will administer nothing. The treatment, whatever it really is, will be given by his own hand; most likely after dark tonight, when the Unclean Realm is sleeping.

"You have my word," says Meng Yao.

Nie-zongzhu exhales in relief, and there are tears gathering at the corners of his eyes which he quickly dashes away with a finger. "Thank you. Thank you, Meng Yao."

The kitchen is busy later than usual. With the Lan delegation setting out at first light, there are last-minute preparations to be made.

Eventually, though, the last of the cooks and servants finish their work and retire for the night.

Meng Yao picks the lock, as he has done many times now, and hurries through the twisting corridor to the room he believes to be Nie Huaisang's bedroom. If there is some "treatment" being given tonight, he would wager that is where it will be happening. He just hopes he isn't too late to find out what it is.

He knows the passage and doesn't need to keep his hand on the rope to find his way.

The door to Nie Huaisang's bedroom is not closed all the way and candlelight spills forth. As Meng Yao approaches, putting each foot down with deliberate caution, he hears loud, ragged breathing from inside. He hears the unmistakable sound of skin rhythmically slapping skin.

A distinct moan.

Treatment.

He risks a quick glance into the room, and then a longer one. Nie-zongzhu's broad, bare back is to the door, but even if it wasn't, Meng Yao thinks he would get away with watching, because it is clear his focus is entirely on the task at hand.

They are both naked, an exercise in contrast. Nie-zongzhu is all sharp, golden planes and flexing muscles; Nie-er-gongzi is soft and slim, inviting and pale and—unsettling. Meng Yao is not an artist, nor someone who has ever particularly appreciated art, but if this is how people feel when they see art, he thinks he might understand at last.

Nie Huaisang is splayed beneath his brother, legs wrapped around his hips and one arm bracing himself against the headboard. The fingers of his other hand are clenched in the sheets and his plush lips are parted in sheer, untempered pleasure. It was his moan that Meng Yao heard, and hears over and over again as Nie-zongzhu fucks him, driving him up the bed with each powerful snap of his hips. Nie Huaisang's braids are messy and coming undone, but Meng Yao recognises them immediately, because no one else in the Unclean Realm wears this exact combination. Only the wife of the sect leader wears these braids, and Nie-zongzhu has no wife.

If you hear anything strange...

"Didi," Nie-zongzhu says, his voice even deeper than it normally is. It goes right to the pit of Meng Yao's stomach, right to his cock. "Didi, ah, will you be good while da-ge is away? Will you be good for da-ge?" He punctuates each word with a fluid thrust, his big hands holding Nie Huaisang still on the bed.

Perhaps this is somewhat more prosaic than the appreciation of art, Meng Yao thinks, pressing his hand against the front of his robes for some relief.

"Da-ge, fuck." He cries out wordlessly, reaching between their bodies and getting his hand slapped away and pinned to the bed for his trouble.

"Say it."

He whines, pants, looks up at his brother from beneath thick black lashes, but Nie-zongzhu does not give in. "Didi will be good for da-ge," he says finally, sullen. And then, horribly, he looks right at Meng Yao.

His eyes are not entirely focused but there is a terrible little smile on Nie Huaisang's face. There is absolutely no doubt that he sees Meng Yao standing at his door, watching him being thoroughly fucked by his brother.

All he does is reach for Nie-zongzhu's face and pull him down into a bruising kiss, messy and wet. All he does is drag his nails—which are not unusually long, but pointed and clawlike, he sees now—over Nie-zongzhu's back, leaving shallow scratches that slowly seep blood, mixing with the sheen of sweat that already covers them both. Nie-zongzhu's hips stutter with every mark left on him.

Meng Yao's hips stutter, too. He grinds against his hand like a teenager, desperate for any friction. If he comes here, in his robes, will Nie Huaisang know? Is it what he wants?

He should leave. He should leave now. Not just the corridor, not just the north wing; he should leave the Unclean Realm. He should leave Qinghe and never come back.

He should. He won't. He doesn't, not before watching Nie Huaisang toss his head back and expose the long pale column of his neck for Nie-zongzhu to sink his teeth into as he comes with a shout, as they both come, wringing their pleasure out of each other's bodies until it is the only real thing left.

They lie there, still tangled up in each other, their heavy breathing slowly returning to normal.

This is worse than watching them fuck, somehow. This is more of a violation, observing their post-coital intimacy. And yet Meng Yao still doesn't move. He has not come, and the tension of unresolved arousal thrums through him. It keeps him there, pinned in place like a butterfly on a board.

Nie Huaisang's dark eyes seek his again, clearer now the haze of orgasm has passed. He tilts his head to the side in a way that reminds Meng Yao of the way a cat assesses a hole it suspects contains a rat. The smile that twists his pretty mouth now is just as terrible, just as predatory, and he murmurs something inaudible.

Nie-zongzhu leans up to kiss his brother, but it's nothing like before. Now they kiss with a slow, aching tenderness.

Meng Yao could name the emotion he feels, but that would mean admitting to it.

The Lan delegation leaves with Nie-zongzhu exactly as the sun rises. It is not snowing today, or at least not yet. Meng Yao goes to the gates to see them off and to see if there are any final instructions for him.

There are not. The only thing Nie-zongzhu says is, "I will write if I am delayed beyond a month. Remember what we spoke of yesterday." Then he mounts Baxia and takes off with the Lan cultivators, the entire group disappearing quickly into the clear winter sky.

For three days and three nights, Meng Yao does not go into the north wing. He does his job, filling his hours with paperwork and overseeing things that do not, strictly speaking, require oversight. He rebuffs Li Chengmin when she suggests they spend the night together, telling her that he feels unwell.

"A cold," he says simply when she exclaims in concern, "nothing more." He doesn't love her, but equally he doesn't want to hurt her. In any case, she might be useful again in the future.

By the fourth morning, Meng Yao has run out of things to do. A lie: he could find things to do, busywork that has been shunted aside in favour of more interesting tasks. The truth: he has run out of excuses.

He tells Nie Jian he has an errand to run and will not be available for some hours, just in case anyone tries to look for him. He goes to Nie-zongzhu's chambers and lets himself through the locked door, and then the third door.

He finds Nie Huaisang in a room that might have been a reception room once, when this wing was still used by anyone else. It must have been beautiful before twenty years of disuse peeled the paint in scabrous patches and mouldered the soft furnishings. There is the faint scent of rot beneath incense.

Nie-er-gongzi reclines in front of a small fire, apparently waiting for his kettle to boil. He is not wearing his mìlí today. He is wearing fine Nie robes, more expensive than anything Meng Yao would be able to buy if he saved for a year, and he toys with a closed fan, swinging it by the tassel.

"Ah, Meng Yao," Nie Huaisang says, as if they are continuing a conversation set aside for a moment while other matters took priority. "Sit, sit; let me serve you some tea."

"Nie-er-gongzi," Meng Yao replies with a smooth bow. "This one would be honoured." He hesitates briefly, then kneels beside him on the mat, which appears to be cleaner than the floor.

"I think we're a little beyond formalities like that, don't you, A-Yao?" His tone is gentle, but the smile he directs at Meng Yao has too many teeth. His canines are very sharp.

"What would you prefer me to call you?"

"A-Sang... ah, in time, perhaps," he says, tapping his chin with the fan thoughtfully. "Huaisang will suffice until we know each other a little better." He tucks the fan up his sleeve and takes the kettle off the fire and fills the teapot, humming softly to himself as he waits for the leaves to steep. When he pours a cup for each of them, it is with a graceful ease that makes Meng Yao feel like he's in a teahouse and not a neglected corner of the Unclean Realm.

He takes one of the cups and lets the heat of the tea warm his hands through the ceramic. "Thank you, Huaisang."

"Truth be told, I expected you to visit me sooner." Nie Huaisang sips his tea, though it must still be scalding. It doesn't seem to bother him. "After the moment we shared, I didn't think you'd be able to wait so long. But anyway! I thought we could play a game, since you're here now." He leans closer and lowers his voice, as if confiding a secret. "I get so lonely, you see, with no one to play with."

Meng Yao swallows, once, and asks, "A game?"

"Oh, it's a wonderful game; I think you'll enjoy it. You must have questions," he says. "I have questions for you as well. So: a question for an answer. You ask, I answer honestly, and vice versa. Don't you think that sounds fun?"

Actually, he thinks it sounds like a trap, but Meng Yao is too careful to say this. "And I ask the first question?"

"I won't count that as the question," Nie Huaisang says with another pointed smile. "Yes, go ahead. What do you want to know?"

There are so many things he wants to know that the difficulty will be choosing which to ask first.

"My understanding was that no one looks upon your face without causing you pain, with the exception of Nie-zongzhu. How is it that I am able to?"

"Oh dear," says Nie Huaisang, pulling a face. "I'm afraid you've asked something I simply don't know the answer to. It has only ever been da-ge, you see, and now you are the second. The second person I've ever met! I'm so glad you came to Qinghe. My turn: why did you come to Qinghe?"

Easy enough. "I needed a job. I was unable to find one elsewhere. How do you fill your days?"

"I paint. I write poetry, sometimes. I read the books that were left here when the wing was sealed. I've tried to get da-ge to bring me something new, but his taste is dreadfully pedestrian." He sighs dramatically. "It's dull. I don't really sleep so the days are very long. Mm, what else... oh! Does A-Yao enjoy working so closely with da-ge?"

"Nie-zongzhu has been very good to this one," Meng Yao says reflexively, and catches himself just before he smiles. "He is not the man I expected when I came here. Qinghe has a reputation for coldness beyond the climate, and I thought he might be the same. But he is a good man." He does smile then, surprising himself. Careless.

"Yes," Nie Huaisang says softly, and he offers a small smile in return. "He is very good. It pleases me that you see it as well. Do you have another question for me? It's your turn."

Meng Yao thinks for a moment. "How long have you been here, in this wing?"

"Twenty years. Since the day of my birth." He drinks from his cup again before setting it down. "Won't you try your tea? Da-ge brings it for me especially and I think it's a particularly fine strain."

"Yes," he says, taking the opportunity to make that one of the questions by answering it. He blows across the rim of his cup before taking a cautious sip, then a second, longer one. The tea is very good. "Since... forgive me, but I don't understand. If you have been here for your entire life, how did that come to be? Who cared for you as an infant?"

Nie Huaisang exhales deeply. "That's two questions. If you want me to answer both, then you'll owe me another visit." His eyes glint in the firelight. "Do you accept?"

"Yes," Meng Yao says again, barely hesitating.

"Our father was not a kind man. He might have been once, but by the time da-ge was born, he had begun to lose himself to the sabre spirit, and it only worsened with time. As many men do when aware of their own mortality, he became obsessed with his legacy. He had his heir, yes, but what if something were to happen to Mingjue? He needed a second son, a spare. I suppose he might have been satisfied with a daughter, if it had come down to it, but it was immaterial. None of the children he sired on Mingjue's mother survived to birth, for some reason. She died trying to deliver a dead child when da-ge was four or so. Oh, and father didn't like that at all. He had to marry again, and soon. No concubine's child would do; his spare had to be legitimate.

"He found my mother somewhere in Gusu, I think. The youngest daughter of some minor gentry family, who were overjoyed that Nie-zongzhu wanted their child as his wife. The fortune tellers found a lucky day very soon thereafter, and the marriage was witnessed and consummated within a month." He raises his tea and drinks a mouthful, swirling it around to wet his voice before he continues.

Meng Yao is rapt. The way Nie Huaisang tells the story is almost hypnotic, the rhythm of his words and the warmth of the room lulling Meng Yao's mind. His eyes are fixed on his face as he speaks.

"Father didn't want to take any more risks or waste any more time. There were whispers of a mó somewhere in the wilderness who could grant any boon in return for a favour, and he was growing desperate. I do not know what he promised it; I do not know if he delivered it, but I suspect he tried to deceive the mó somehow, given what happened after that. Or perhaps he was just careless in the words he used when he made the deal.

"My mother became pregnant, of course. It was an easy pregnancy to begin with, by all accounts, but as her time drew nearer, she began to have terrible dreams. Nightmares that would wake her screaming for my father, for her family back in Gusu, screaming that the child she carried beneath her heart was cursed. My father was not patient with her, I'm afraid. He had the servants move her belongings to a room here in the north wing, where they could both wait out the end of her pregnancy. I sometimes feel as if she is still here with me." He sighs again. "A lonely man must be permitted his little fantasies, don't you think?"

"We believe what we must to get by," he says when it becomes clear Nie Huaisang is waiting for him to speak, and it earns him another smile.

"I thought you'd understand, A-Yao. Father had a passage constructed from his chambers to the north wing directly, so he could visit Mother when he needed to relieve his urges, before she grew too large and unwieldy, before the dreams stopped waiting for her to fall asleep to wreak their horrors on her mind. I believe you've used it a time or two? It is very convenient.

"Eventually the day came. I like to believe it was beautiful, because it was late spring, and all the best authors opine on the beauty of spring. A midwife attended my mother as she laboured and a servant waited just outside the door, to return and inform my father once I had finally been born. I don't know what the first sign was that gave the midwife concern, but things were not proceeding as they should, and she sent the servant to find a healer to aid her. It was then that I made my appearance.

"I killed my mother when I was born. I do not mean this in the typical way; the way you might imagine when I say that. My mother did not die of unceasing bleeding, or an infection, or any of the other dangers of the childbed. I mean I tore my way out of her body like she was wet paper, ripping her from stem to stern. When the midwife laid eyes on me, we both screamed. It hurt, A-Yao; it felt like I was being burnt alive. I didn't know what I was doing, not really, but I killed her just to stop her from looking at me.

"When the servant returned with the healer, I killed them both as well. They were flaying me with their eyes, so I flayed them with my claws. And you must understand, I was so weak afterwards, after all the hurt they had inflicted on me. All I could think to do was try to replenish some of my strength, to heal from it."

"What did you do?" Meng Yao whispers, his voice barely audible over the crackle of the fire.

"I started eating my mother's body," Nie Huaisang says, matter-of-fact. "I remember choosing her because she had already nourished me with her body for so many months. It was only right that she continue to do so."

There is a faint, high whine, and it takes Meng Yao too long to realise it is coming from his own throat.

"It is unfortunate that my father came to see what was happening when I was still gorging myself on the meat that had been Mother. When he saw the bodies—when he saw me—he tried to kill me. I was only a little scrap of shadow and teeth and claws back then, and I was still weak, and his eyes hurt me more than his sabre. But neither could kill me. I will give him credit for realising that fact fast enough to save his own life. He left me and the bodies here and ran, and sealed the north wing from the rest of the sect with cultivation and chains. He told everyone my mother and I had both died in childbirth, and everyone believed him. They believed the reason he never wanted anyone to set foot here again was grief.

"Of course, the real reason was fear. He believed I would kill him too. He hoped I would die of starvation eventually and no one would ever know what he had done, the consequences of his greed."

"But you didn't."

"But," says Nie Huaisang, "I didn't. I wasn't human enough to die. I grew hungry, of course, but I grew clever, too. And it's just as well I did; when da-ge found me five years later, I could have killed him before realising his eyes were kind, but I wanted to see who this strange boy was first. I wanted to know why he felt familiar. I wanted to know why I felt so drawn to him. I believe I've answered your two questions."

"Yes. Thank you." His mouth is dry. He drinks more tea, unthinking. It is much cooler than before and he realises that he doesn't know how much time passed during the telling of Nie Huaisang's tale. "There is—" Meng Yao cuts himself off. He can't ask another question, not if he wants to abide by the rules—the rules he has already bent once, not knowing what manner of beast served him tea and sits beside him. He says, instead, "You must have been very lonely. That is no life for anyone."

"It was easier once I had da-ge, though of course he cannot always be here, and twenty years is a long time to be alone." Nie Huaisang sighs, pensive. "So let us return to the game, instead, and my next question for you. You are not of Qinghe but you wear our braids, our robes. You play the role very well, but are you loyal to Qinghe?"

"I," Meng Yao begins, and then stops. He worries at the inside of his cheek with his teeth. "I am loyal to Nie-zongzhu."

Nie Huaisang claps his hands together with a delighted laugh. "Oh, good answer, A-Yao. Very clever. Loyal enough to not tell anyone what you saw here, hm? It would ruin him. People would think he was a madman, a pervert, imprisoning his own invalid brother and bedding him like he was Nie-furen instead of Nie-er-gongzi. I would do anything to stop that from happening; would you?"

"Yes," he rasps, and means it. "His last secretary—"

"Never found out as much as you have. Still... too much." He sees the expression on Meng Yao's face and laughs again, pulling the fan back out of his sleeve and opening it with a deft snap of his wrist. "Do you think I killed him? Or da-ge did? No, no, that would have drawn too much attention. He had a family who would miss him. Not like you."

He closes his eyes. "Are you going to kill me, Huaisang?" If this is how Meng Yao dies, he hopes it will be swift. He hopes he won't have to feel it for too long.

Soft, cool fingers brush across his cheek, and then press against his mouth as if he is being hushed. "I told you, A-Yao, I'm so glad you're here. I think you want what is best for da-ge, and that's all I want as well. I think we make him very happy, the two of us."

Meng Yao exhales, harsh—tears sting hot behind his eyelids. He blinks rapidly as he opens his eyes again, trying to clear them away, but all he succeeds in doing is breaking the surface tension and letting two tears fall, first one and then the other, from each eye.

"Don't cry," Nie Huaisang says. He leans in to kiss just below Meng Yao's eye, where the socket curves. First one and then the other. "There have been enough tears shed in this place," he says, his breath hot and gentle against Meng Yao's face. "No more."

"No more," he repeats shakily.

"I've kept you for long enough, I think. I know da-ge left you in charge and you've been here for some time. I'm sure there are matters you must attend to." Nie Huaisang stands, gracefully smoothing his robes and then arranging his face into an artful pout. "Just don't forget about poor A-Sang all alone here, waiting for our next meeting."

I will never forget about any of this until my dying day. "I will endeavour to visit sooner, next time," he says. "If not tomorrow, the day after. You have my word, Huaisang."

"Oh," he says, pressing the hand that holds the fan over his heart. "Oh, A-Yao, I will look forward to it."

The next day, Meng Yao goes into the city proper. He finds a bookseller with relative ease, but then he never expected that to be the difficult part.

"Which books would you recommend for a young man with an interest in art and poetry, auntie?" he asks the woman behind the counter.

"The gentleman would need to be more specific," she replies, taking in his robes.

"Romance," he says, a gut feeling. "Romantic. Not—spring pictures, necessarily, but love. I think he would be interested in love. Nothing pedestrian."

She gives him a coy look. "Ah, romance, is it? Let me pick out a few things for the gentleman, and he can make his choice." She heaves herself up from her chair with a groan and starts moving around the room, selecting tomes without seeming to really look at them.

Meng Yao schools his face into a placid mask as he waits for her to finish. Before long, she places seven books in front of him, and he picks up each in turn to examine it briefly. They are all, as he requested, romantic. "And are these popular?"

"Oh, most certainly. Your, ah, friend will enjoy any one of these!" She places an eighth book on the counter and pushes it slowly towards him with one finger. "Now, I know you said no spring pictures, but this one is very tasteful. If it's romance you want, I can assure you, several of my customers have spoken highly of its use as a courting gift."

"I will take all eight," Meng Yao says, and haggles with her until he has argued her down to an amount that he suspects is almost as low as their actual value.

The whisper that has spread slowly through the servants of the Unclean Realm since the incident with the drunken merchant from Yunmeng picks up its pace in Nie-zongzhu's absence. It takes longer than Meng Yao would like to identify the person who is fanning the flames, though he has his suspicions that Nie Xiang is behind it before Li Chengmin confirms it for him.

She does not like that he has been put above her in the hierarchy of servants when he has only been there for a matter of months. She never says anything to his face, of course, but Meng Yao knows a false smile when he sees one. They trade their false smiles back and forth every time their paths cross, and as soon as he has turned away, Nie Xiang tells someone else that he is spreading his legs for Nie-zongzhu and that is the only reason why he has risen so high so quickly.

When Meng Yao enters a room, conversations end abruptly. When Meng Yao leaves a room, he hears crude laughter behind him.

No one is openly disrespectful to him, but he would prefer it to the pity or disgust he sees in their eyes whenever he gives an order. He would prefer anything to this.

Nie Huaisang clearly did not expect Meng Yao to return with a gift. His eyes widen and he reaches for the books, then pulls his hands back before touching them.

"For me?" he asks, and his surprise is so obvious, painted across his face like rouge, that Meng Yao cannot help but smile despite everything he knows about Nie Huaisang. When did he become someone who could not control his own face?

"For you," he says.

Huaisang takes them reverently, looking at the covers. "I don't have any of these. They're all new."

"I had to guess at what your tastes would be," Meng Yao says. "I apologise if they are too... pedestrian, was it? Perhaps next time I go into the city, you can let me know what to look out for."

"That is... very generous of you." Nie Huaisang collects himself with some effort. "I have nothing to give you in return, A-Yao, unless you have a particular interest in rotten silk or furniture that breaks when you sit on it."

"I did not buy them because I wanted something in return, Huaisang." Except my life, he does not say. Eight books would be a cheap price for that, and he does not think they would be enough if Nie Huaisang made up his mind.

"Thank you, then. I am very grateful for your generous gift. Would you like some more tea?"

"Only if it's not too much trouble."

"Because my schedule is so full," Nie Huaisang says, a bitter edge to it. "I asked you to visit me again, didn't I? We could eat instead, if you would prefer that to tea. They don't bring me lunch but I still have most of breakfast left over." He takes Meng Yao by the wrist and tugs him towards a different room than the one where they last met, one with a table large enough for four and a tray of food atop it.

"Why don't they bring you lunch?"

"Oh." He slips his fingers between Meng Yao's, so they are holding hands. "I don't get that hungry. I eat lunch with da-ge in his rooms if he isn't busy with sect business, but I don't need it."

Meng Yao knew that Nie-zongzhu took lunch in his chambers frequently, of course, but he had always assumed it was an excuse to be away from the pressures of people needing things from him for a little while.

"I would like to eat with you, then," he says.

"I hoped you would say that." Nie Huaisang smiles his sharp smile again and strokes the side of Meng Yao's hand with his thumb. The hairs on the back of Meng Yao's neck prickle.

They sit opposite each other, once Nie Huaisang relinquishes his hand. The food is cold but still good: soft bāozi stuffed with mutton, flaky green onion pancakes, chewy yóutiáo and spiced congee. Nie Huaisang seems to take particular delight in ensuring they each get exactly half, even going so far as to feed Meng Yao from his own chopsticks so he doesn't need to get his fingers greasy.

"Before," Meng Yao says, "you told me that Zongzhu found you here after five years. It feels like there is much of your story yet untold, and I must confess... I am curious."

"Your story is also untold. Would you tell me all your deepest secrets, A-Yao? When our friendship is still so new?" He laughs and dabs at the corner of his mouth with a cloth. "Just a joke, just a little joke between friends. I know more about you than you know about me, because da-ge and I have no secrets between us. He tells me of you often. He speaks of you almost every day. He likes you very much."

Meng Yao doesn't know what to make of that. "Ah," he says verbosely. The things he has told Nie-zongzhu were not his deepest secrets, of course, because he would be a fool to confess those to the man who pays his salary regardless of how kind he is, how broad his shoulders, how often Meng Yao wishes their stations in life were not so far apart. But it feels like a splinter of bamboo forced into his chest, to consider that Nie-zongzhu shared every part of Meng Yao he knew with Nie Huaisang without his knowledge, betraying his confidence.

He is, of course, being breathtakingly hypocritical, but he is only human.

"He likes you," Nie Huaisang repeats, softer this time. "And so I like you, because I came to know you through his eyes. That was the first gift you gave me, you know."

"I don't know," he says. "The only gift I have given you is the books."

He counts on his fingers. "Making da-ge happy. Sneaking in here so I could know you wouldn't hurt me—don't look at me like that, A-Yao, it counts! Playing a game with me while we drank tea. Bringing me the books. That's four gifts. You're spoiling me."

There is definitely an emotion Meng Yao feels, something undefined between fear and pleasure. It is not unpleasant, which makes him feel another undefined something. He reaches across the table for Nie Huaisang's hand, covering it with his own. "Tell me about the fifteen years since Nie-zongzhu found you," he says, eyes intent on Huaisang's face. "Make that your gift to me."

"Oh," Nie Huaisang breathes. Something dark dances in the depths of his eyes. "Are you giving me an order? No one ever orders me to do anything, not even da-ge. Well, he tries, but I ignore him."

"Would you ignore me?" Meng Yao asks. His heart pounds in his chest, in his head, where their hands touch.

Nie Huaisang's eyes flick down submissively. "No, A-Yao," he says, obedient, but the corners of his mouth curl up. He is enjoying this, their new game.

"So tell me." He rubs small circles on the back of Huaisang's hand with his fingertips. "You saw him and you were drawn to him."

"You have a good memory," Nie Huaisang says. "It had been about five years, but of course I didn't know that. I understood the passage of time, but I did not know how people counted it. All I knew was I was alone and alone and alone, and suddenly I wasn't. I remembered the last person I saw and how he had tried to hurt me, and how he had hurt me another way by accident. I didn't know if this new person would do the same, so I hid from him. I watched him from the shadows, because I was a shadow, and I could disguise my movements in them, so he wouldn't even know I was there.

"Except I had never really recovered from my birth. I had eaten all four bodies long before, every scrap of flesh and bone and hair. I was weak and clumsy, and he saw me." Huaisang sighs. "I remember it very clearly: I hissed at him, because I was anticipating the pain, only it never came. He held up both hands, I think to show me that he meant no harm, though of course I didn't understand that then. He held up both hands, and he said, 'My name is A-Jue. Who are you, little one?'

"I did not know how to respond to him. I understood his words in a distant sort of way but I had never tried to speak before. I had never had reason to. But I managed to repeat, 'A-Jue?' and the way his face lit up, A-Yao; it was like nothing I had seen before. The only thing I had ever seen on people's faces was disgust and hatred and fear, but here was this boy, this A-Jue, and he looked at me like he already loved me. I crept out of my shadow on all fours, repeating his name, and da-ge held out his hands for me to come to.

"He gathered me up into his arms—I was still so very small then, and of course he was smaller too. He picked me up and stroked me like I was a pet, and I could smell his blood through his skin, and it had the same smell as my blood. I knew that he was mine and I was his. 'Do you have a name?' he asked me again.

"I struggled to think of the words. I hadn't thought in words for a long time, but eventually I found the ones I wanted: no, and lonely, and hungry. I said the last two again and again, curling my claws into the front of his robes because I didn't want him to let me go.

"He didn't have any food with him, but he said he could come back with some, if I'd just let him go. I didn't want to; I was afraid if I did, I would never see him again. I let him go, and I cried at the door the entire time." Nie Huaisang laughs, and it echoes in a way that should not be possible for the room they are in. "Obviously, he came back. He brought me food, which he fed me from his own hand. He was so very gentle.

"Once I finished the food, he picked me up and held me again. I had a full stomach for the first time in a very long time, and I was happy to be full and warm and safe. 'How did you come to be here?' he asked me.

"I thought for a long time before I replied. I eventually settled on, 'Mother died. Lonely.' And he looked so sad, so horrified, that I thought for a moment I had said the wrong thing.

"But then he said, carefully, 'My father's wife died here, and my baby brother, my didi. Is that...? Are you...?'

"'Brother?' I said, and I clung to him a little tighter. I must confess: it was a manipulation, but aren't all children manipulative? How else do they survive, without making someone care for them? All I wanted in that moment was to survive, and I thought a brother was the thing I needed to do so. Mother had been helpful for as long as her body lasted me, and Father had never been anything good, but a brother was something new. A brother was something I could use.

"Yes, big brother,' he said, 'your da-ge.'

"'My A-Jue,' I replied, my eyes wide as I gazed up at him. 'My da-ge?'" Nie Huaisang sighs, looking down at the table. "You don't think too badly of me, do you, A-Yao? Wouldn't you have done the same, in my situation?"

Meng Yao has done similar things in similar situations, and probably will again. He says, "I don't think badly of you."

"After that he came to visit me often. Not always every day, but most days, and he always brought me food. I began to grow—slowly at first, and then faster as my body became accustomed to regular meals. I still did not look as I do now, though. I was a being of bestial shadow, sharpening my claws on the furniture like a housecat." He holds one hand out in front of him, examining his nails. They are sharp now, shaped like an almond that comes to a wicked point. Meng Yao has seen the marks they leave.

"Da-ge named me, of course. There was no one else to do it, and at first I didn't understand why it was so important to him. I had lived for five years without a name; what use could one be now? Nie Huaisang meant nothing to me, but it meant something to him. It meant Nie Mingjue was part of a matching set, even if his other half had to be kept hidden from the world. I was lonely because I was alone, but da-ge was lonely despite being surrounded by other people.

"He taught me to read after he named me, and tried to teach me to write, but my hands were more like paws then and I could not easily hold a brush. I had learnt, in the years of my solitude, that my form was somewhat mutable. I could reshape myself in small ways to more easily slip through a gap, but when I tried to make my paw into a hand to hold a brush, I couldn't do it. I couldn't make the toes extend correctly, and the palm was completely beyond me. When da-ge saw what I was trying to do, he laid his hand over mine and said, 'Like this.'

"It wasn't looking at his hand that helped me. It was his touch. I could feel the way the blood moved through his hand, sense the bones and tendons, breathe the way they attached and worked when he flexed his muscles. It was a revelation. It worked. It made me," he says wryly, "terribly hungry just to change that one small part of myself. Da-ge had to leave and find me more food, and even after I had eaten I didn't want to try and change any further that day. But I could hold the brush in my hand, and I could write the characters of our names.

"It took me almost an entire year to fully change from shadow to boy, and da-ge was there every step of the way. His touch shaped this body, continues to shape me, as you saw when you watched us. Without him, I would inevitably slip back into my other self. But when he is inside me, when I am inside him, I become the truest version of Nie Huaisang."

"This thing between you, when you," Meng Yao says, falters. "When did you become... your relationship as it is now?"

"Say it, A-Yao. You saw us. Name it truly."

"Lovers," he says.

"Lovers," Nie Huaisang echoes with a pointed smile. "Yes, he is my lover and I am his, and have been for years now. Could you ever have imagined this is why he never acted on your little acts of flirtation? I told you," he says firmly when Meng Yao tries to interrupt, "that there are no secrets between us. And even if there were, I've been able to smell your desire since you arrived in the Unclean Realm. I knew before da-ge did. When you watched us, did you imagine yourself in my place? Or did you imagine da-ge in mine, and you above him?"

He makes a noise that is not a word. Huaisang watches him patiently, waiting for him to try again. "The—the latter," he manages finally, his cheeks burning.

Nie Huaisang's smile gets wider and he reaches across the table to stroke the pale skin of Meng Yao's inner wrist where his sleeve has fallen back. "I would like to see you fuck da-ge, A-Yao," he says, his eyes alight with wicked pleasure. "Would you like to have us both at once? We make him happy now, and together we could make him happier. I could show you how he likes it, what makes him—"

"Huaisang," he says, closing his eyes. He cannot allow himself to think about something he can't have.

"Think about it," Nie Huaisang says lightly, drawing his hand back. "Da-ge won't be back for weeks yet. You don't need to make a decision until he is."

"Huaisang. What if he sends me away for coming here? I'm not supposed to be here."

He scoffs. "You're not supposed to be here because you could have hurt me, but you didn't. You were meant to find me here, just like da-ge was."

"I don't know if Zongzhu will see it that way," Meng Yao says. He feels slightly hysterical at how rapidly this situation has escalated out of his control. Not that he was ever in control, he realises, but there was an illusion that he could hold onto before Nie Huaisang ripped it out at the root.

"Do you think you know him better than I?" Nie Huaisang asks, his voice low and dangerous. "You, who has been here for a matter of months?" There is the rustling sound of silk, a movement of air, and when Nie Huaisang speaks again, his voice comes from behind Meng Yao. "Which of us has been his whole world for fifteen years? I don't think it's you, Meng Yao."

"A-Sang," he breathes. "Forgive me. I was being—I am not foolish enough to believe I know him as well as you. To imply otherwise was careless of me. I'm sorry."

Nie Huaisang's sharp nails drag from the hinge of Meng Yao's jaw down to the front of his throat, pressing into the divot of his collarbone hard enough to pierce the delicate skin. "I accept your apology," he says sulkily. "Even though I know what you're trying to do, calling me 'A-Sang' like that. I knew we were alike."

Meng Yao swallows, and swallows again, and says nothing.

The nails withdraw and Nie Huaisang says, very tenderly, "Oh, you're bleeding. May I clean it for you, A-Yao?"

"Father realised da-ge was sneaking into the north wing some years after that. He didn't know I was still alive, of course, but that didn't mean he wasn't furious and terrified enough to come looking to make sure I wasn't. We discovered something about my human form that day, da-ge and I.

"I started screaming as soon as he entered the same room as us, before he could even get close. Not just pain, but my entire body felt wrong, like clothes that had suddenly grown too tight around me, smothering me inside myself. I began tearing at my own skin, screaming and screaming and screaming, all while da-ge tried to put himself between our father and me. I couldn't stop him; I was ripping myself apart into shadows again, slowly and then all at once.

"The strange thing is, it was entirely bloodless, or at least it was until Father tried to cleave me in two with his sabre. Imagine a man desperate enough to make a deal with a mó; imagine how much further his mind could deteriorate given another decade. He knew he couldn't kill me the first time, when I was a helpless infant, and I had grown so much bigger and stronger thanks to da-ge.

"I don't remember much after that, but I know it was weeks before da-ge was able to coax me back to my human shape. The few times it's happened since then, I've been able to get back faster. Of course, we discovered a more effective way than the chaste touches of our childhood eventually, and that helped. It helps still.

"If we are apart for long enough, I start to backslide. Or I can change intentionally if I really want to; though, honestly—it's such a pain, I can hardly be bothered.

"Oh, Father? No, of course I didn't kill him. You must have heard he died on a night-hunt? It was very tragic, I'm told. His sabre shattered, almost as if someone had damaged it before they went out. One of the shards went through his throat and another through his heart. His own weapon killed him in front of the whole sect and his only son. Terribly tragic."

"I grew up in a city called Yunping, in Yunmeng, in a brothel. My story is not unusual. Prostitutes get pregnant by customers. Sometimes they have the child, sometimes they do not. My mother chose to, because she knew my father to be gentry, a cultivator—Jin Guangshan. Jin-zongzhu. He came to her because she was a curiosity: a literate whore. A night's entertainment for a man who has everything.

"She taught me to read and write, and sheltered me from the worst of the brothel. Other children who grew up there were not so lucky as I. It was... generally understood that if a child was fed and clothed and raised under that roof, they would repay their debt in the family tradition.

"Do not misunderstand me. It was a high-class brothel, if such a thing exists. People whose particular perversions involved children were not welcome there. But children grow up, and once we had grown up enough, there was an expectation of us. I watched as my fellows began to take men to their rooms and the life in their eyes started to gutter like a dying candle.

"My mother did not want that life for me. She believed I could be more than my birth. She educated me as she had been educated, teaching me to read and write. She tried to teach me cultivation and I tried to learn it, because my father was a cultivator and so surely it was my birthright. But she was not a cultivator, and the books she bought me were not a sufficient master. She told me my father was a great man, and if he saw how clever I was, he would surely legitimise me. He would be lucky to have a son such as I, as she had been lucky to have a son such as I, my mother told me, pressing a pearl into my hand as she died from fever. All I had to do was take the pearl to Lanling Jin and tell them who my mother was, and my acceptance into the Jin sect would be assured.

"It was not. Jin-zongzhu has bastards in every corner of China, and I was one of the few stupid enough to march up to Carp Tower and ask to meet my father.

"I am here now, and not there. Is that not enough to tell you how that went?"

In the end, the thing that undoes Meng Yao is not the return of Nie-zongzhu. He is still away in Gusu, and Meng Yao is still using the door in his chambers to visit Nie Huaisang. The visits grow more frequent until he is there almost every day. It is so easy when all he has to do is go through the study, a room where he has every right to be. There is no time wasted picking the lock, only unfettered access through an entrance where he has no need to worry about being seen.

He knows he is being stupid; he knows that Nie Huaisang is dangerous. He knows, too, that they are dancing around something almost as dangerous when they sit together in the north wing and talk for hours, and Nie Huaisang finds new ways to touch him that seem accidental and chaste, innocuous.

It is exactly how he had been behaving towards Nie-zongzhu, and he does not like that it is working on him just as well.

Meng Yao thinks about those touches when he wraps his fingers around his cock. He thinks about the way Nie Huaisang's nails felt against his throat when he spills across his hand and up his belly. He can no longer feign interest in Li Chengmin on the final night they spend together. She doesn't even argue with him about it, which might have helped him pretend she was the one he wanted to be with.

"I don't know where you are tonight," she says, frowning at him as she pulls her robes back into order. "But you're not here with me, and I deserve better."

He doesn't have anything to say in response, so he watches her leave in silence.

The thing he had not accounted for, his undoing, was that Nie Xiang would still be cleaning Nie-zongzhu's chambers even with them unoccupied. She is the only servant in possession of a key—not counting Meng Yao's key to the study—and the only one who goes inside regularly. Normally she wouldn't lower herself to such a task as cleaning, but Nie-zongzhu trusts no one else in the room with the unlocked door to Nie Huaisang, so it falls to her to ensure his chambers are kept to the highest standard.

Meng Yao steps out of the door and into Nie-zongzhu's bedroom, and Nie Xiang looks up from where she is airing out the bedsheets.

The moment hangs at the end of a rope, choking. Meng Yao's mind, normally his best and most reliable tool, is empty. Nie Xiang's lips part, her eyes widening in surprise as she looks between him and the door he has just exited.

Then she bolts for the other door, the door out of Nie-zongzhu's chambers.

Meng Yao's body responds before his mind, throwing himself after her and catching her by the hair. He drags her backwards, roughly clapping a hand over her mouth to try and muffle her scream. She tries to bite him—manages to get her teeth into the meat of his thumb hard enough to bruise—and he curses, yanking his hand away.

"You filthy little upstart," she spits, turning around and clawing at his face until he lets go of her hair. "I should have known you were up to something! Coming here with your innocent eyes and perfect obsequience, pretending to be one of us when you're nothing more than the son of a Yunmeng whore."

Her nails rake across Meng Yao's eyes, biting into the thin skin, but it doesn't hurt as much as her words. His chest feels tight; blood pounds in his ears. For a moment, he loses his senses entirely, washed away in a rising tide of red fury. He tries to hit her, an open-handed slap that glances off her cheekbone and does very little to dissuade her.

Meng Yao is not someone who fights with fists or swords. He has always been physically small, and his wit and his words are all he has to defend himself. And so their fight—if it can even be called a fight—is clumsy and brutal, neither of them practised enough to throw a good punch.

They are both desperate. They are both fighting for their lives, each in a different way. Nie Xiang forces him against a table, her fingers digging into his neck. Meng Yao tries to break her grip and fails; scrabbles for something, anything, gasping.

The paperweight fits into his hand so perfectly. He swings it at Nie Xiang's temple—just once—and she goes down hard.

Meng Yao pants open-mouthed, the paperweight dropping from his suddenly-nerveless fingers. He cups his hand over her nose, feeling for—yes. Good. She's still breathing.

No. Bad. She's still breathing.

If she lives, she will tell everyone what he has done. She will tell everyone that he has broken the only rule in the Unclean Realm that matters. She cannot live.

His eyes skitter across the paperweight. If he picked it up and hit her again, and again, eventually her skull would shatter like an eggshell and his problem would be solved. But they are still in Nie-zongzhu's bedroom, and it would be messy. There would be another problem.

Meng Yao takes a moment to breathe, but only a moment. He does not know how long it might take her to wake up and he can't risk her getting away from him. His mind, finally, begins to turn, and he digs through Nie-zongzhu's clothes until he finds a sash he can use as a makeshift blindfold. It takes him more than one attempt to tie the knot—his fucking hands are useless, they're shaking so much—but he gets the sash secured over her eyes eventually.

Nie Xiang is almost as tall as he is and thickened by middle age. Meng Yao is not a strong man, but he is fueled by panic and desperation. He drags her unconscious body to the door, through it, into the north wing.

This corridor is more direct than the one from the kitchens. Even so, after an unending minute of struggling with her weight and making very little progress, he realises it will take him too long alone. He begins to shout.

"Huaisang! A-Sang! Help me!"

"A-Yao? Back so—oh dear," Nie Huaisang says as he rounds the corner and takes in the sight of Meng Yao, bloodied, and Nie Xiang, unconscious. "Whatever has happened here?"

He wants to cry. He doesn't cry. Does he? "She caught me coming out of the door in your brother's rooms. I had to—I didn't mean to—"

Nie Huaisang wraps him up in his arms, making wordless comforting noises and peppering his face with small kisses. "Shh, shh, A-Yao, I have you. You did the right thing, bringing her here. I can still hear her heartbeat, you haven't killed her."

"I wish I had," A-Yao says, and wonders when he became the kind of person who could say that and mean it. His face is wet. Is he crying? "I should have killed her. She knows, Huaisang. She tried to run and I—hit her, and she—it would be better if she had died, but she didn't. I don't know if I can—"

"You don't need to, A-Yao." He strokes his fingers gently through Meng Yao's hair. "You brought her to me. That's as good as killing her, isn't it?"

"I covered her eyes," he says, because it feels important.

"I see that. I'm going to uncover them, though."

In spite of himself, Meng Yao makes a small noise of distress. "Fuck. I don't want her to hurt you."

"I appreciate that, but this form is—blunted, I suppose you could say. I can't do much now, and it would take me too long to change without a little—ah, let's call it assistance. Yes, it will hurt, but not nearly as much as I'm going to hurt her." Huaisang smiles humourlessly. "It already hurts, just being this close to her. I can feel myself pushing at the boundaries of this body, trying to escape."

"Then we should move her before she wakes and it gets worse." He sucks in a shaky breath. "Where is best?"

"I'll show you," Huaisang says with a final kiss to Meng Yao's temple. He hooks his arms under Nie Xiang's armpits, wincing at the contact. "Get her feet."

Carrying a limp body is much easier with two.

They take her to a small reception room near Nie Huaisang's bedroom. Most of the furniture has been moved out, and what remains is rotted and broken, pushed into corners and forgotten. They lay Nie Xiang out in the middle of the floor and Meng Yao unties the sash from her head. It is sticky with blood; he must remember to launder it before he returns it to Nie-zongzhu's chambers.

Nie Huaisang takes a seat cross-legged between her and the door. There is discomfort written across his face, and he wordlessly holds out a hand to Meng Yao until he comes over, and then they sit there together on the floor, clutching each other's hands.

"Who is she?" Huaisang asks.

"The housekeeper," says Meng Yao, and he's suddenly laughing, high and hysterical, pressing his face into Nie Huaisang's shoulder. "Nobody's going to overlook this. Someone will miss her and then what am I supposed to say?"

"Oh, A-Yao, I don't know," he says, distracted. "But you're so clever, such a quick wit. You'll figure something out." He blows out air in a harsh gust and detaches their hands. "I should undress. I like these robes."

"Ah. Do you want me to go... somewhere else?"

"Sweet," he says, which is not an answer. "So sweet to me, A-Yao." He stands and strips efficiently, holding out each layer of robes to Meng Yao, who mechanically folds them and puts them to one side. He doesn't seem to be at all self-conscious about his body, and maybe that was to be expected. Huaisang has a beautiful body: soft and pale like he is lit by moonlight, a stark contrast against the thick dark hair between his thighs and stretching up his belly, sparser across his chest and under his arms. Meng Yao tries not to look but Huaisang is luminescent. He tries to keep his eyes on Huaisang's face, where there is a level of safety and a level of plausible deniability.

They have been beyond that for some time, but Meng Yao has always been good at pretending.

Across the room, Nie Xiang groans faintly while Meng Yao's attention is still on Huaisang's face, and he sees Huaisang's pupils dilate like a cat's.

Vertical.

"Is she...?"

"Yes," Nie Huaisang says, and his voice is lower, pained.

She moans again, louder, and her eyelids begin to flutter. When they open, her eyes are glazed, unfocused. Meng Yao almost feels sorry for her, until she looks at Nie Huaisang and he begins to scream.

It is the worst sound Meng Yao has ever heard. It is human and inhuman all at once. It tells of pain, but it sounds as if the scream itself hurts as it leaves his mouth. It is raw and huge and aching, and he doesn't pause to draw breath. It pours out of him like a waterfall, unending and draining. Nie Xiang is screaming too, clutching at her head and weakly trying to get to her feet.

Nie Huaisang's body is—it is not, any more. It is coming apart, leaking smokelike shadow where his nails leave great rents in his own skin. His screams are becoming choral, harmonic, beautiful. Meng Yao didn't realise it was going to be beautiful. He is crying now, great heaving sobs, but he can't look away. He feels like he is watching the birth of a god. He feels like he is watching a miracle.

It lasts forever and it is over in a moment. The shadow-beast that was Nie Huaisang stands between the two humans, taller now than he was before—taller even than his brother, Meng Yao thinks, if he had to compare them, but it's hard to be sure. There is something about the edges of him that are difficult to quantify.

All of him is difficult to quantify; he is bestial but like no single animal that exists in the mortal world. The retractable claws of a tiger. The sharply pointed ears and muzzle of a fox. The heavy fangs of a wolf. Huge paws. Something that might be a tail, flashing in and out of Meng Yao's ability to perceive it. And yet beneath it all, he is still unmistakably Huaisang. His eyes are not the same but they are his. He drops to all fours, shaking himself like a wet dog, and Nie Xiang takes the opportunity to dodge past him and tries to run for the door.

Meng Yao is there, though. He intercepts her bodily, and they both crash to the floor with the impact, Nie Xiang's weight bringing her down on top of him. She is even more desperate than when they fought in Nie-zongzhu's chambers and she swings a punch at him, catching him in the side of the head hard enough to briefly stun. Then she is wrenched away from Meng Yao and flung, hitting the wall with a sickening crack. Still, she struggles to move. Still, she has not given up.

"Hold her down," Nie Huaisang says in his awful, wonderful, overlapping voices.

Meng Yao scrambles across to where Nie Xiang flops as weak as a fish on the floor and pulls her arms above her head so he can lean his full weight on her wrists. She twists and screams again, but weaker now. There is blood trickling from her nose and the corner of her mouth.

"You're... traitor to... Nie..." she slurs.

"I am more loyal to Qinghe Nie than you will ever know," Meng Yao says with the least sincere smile he can summon. "I am loyal to Nie-zongzhu. I am loyal to Nie Huaisang."

Her eyes widen with horror as she looks beyond him and sees to whom—to what—he is so loyal. "No," she mumbles, "no, no, no, no, no, please, no, no..." She tries to twist out of his grip, flailing, but Nie Huaisang gave him an order and Meng Yao is loyal. He obeys.

He holds her down.

Huaisang guts her with a single swipe of his heavy paw. His claws tear through her like she is as insubstantial as mist in the face of the morning sun. His blow spreads her ribcage open like she is one of his books, exposing her spasming lungs and frantically beating heart.

Meng Yao watches, fascinated, as her arterial blood spurts across them both to the same frenetic rhythm. It is hot as it splatters across his face, his lips. He watches as Nie Huaisang leans down, closes his jaws around her throat and tears it out with one swift jerk of his head. Nie Xiang wheezes a final, rattling breath through the ruin of her throat and goes slack under Meng Yao's hands. The blood continues to leak from her corpse, but it is already slowing, dripping out under the pull of gravity.

There is nothing but the sound of blood hitting the tile for a long moment, and then Nie Huaisang swallows thickly. Swallows his mouthful of meat. "Did she hurt you?" he asks, reaching for Meng Yao's face where she hit him.

He leans into the touch, closing his eyes, and shakes his head. "Is it better now?" he asks. "The pain, is it gone?"

"As soon as she died," Huaisang confirms. "You did so well, A-Yao, you helped so much."

"I was careless. This wouldn't have happened if I had just waited to make sure the room was—"

"No, it's not your fault. You weren't to know. We handled it, didn't we? We made the problem go away." He nuzzles against Meng Yao's cheek, his breath hot and iron-scented. "A-Yao, we're a good team."

"Yes." Meng Yao curls his hand into a fist, then releases it. He takes a breath, holds it, then releases that too. "What now?" He is at once an exposed nerve and so, so tired.

"We should heat some water, wash up. Your robes... I don't know if we can wash those here. I don't wash mine."

"We'll figure it out." He remembers, then, something else he will have to figure out. The key that she wears around her neck is still around there, and Meng Yao's hands do not shake as he reaches past the mortal wound that they delivered together to pull the chain free and take it for his own.

"What is that?" Nie Huaisang asks curiously.

"The key for the door in the kitchen." He will have to explain why she gave it to him, but he can come up with something convincing, given time to think.

They leave the body where it is. Meng Yao knows, objectively, what Nie Huaisang is likely to do with it, but that's something he doesn't want to think about. Now he is sore and sticky with the blood of two people, the adrenaline that powered him through the last—however long it's been—ebbing away and leaving him raw and trembling.

Huaisang takes him into the bedroom and undresses him with surprising deftness considering the fact of his paws, though there is one small rrrp sound near the end and he says guiltily, "Oops." It is choral. It is... hilarious.

Meng Yao laughs until no more sound comes out of his mouth, just breathless gasps. He is almost naked and hysterical, and that only makes him laugh harder. When he gets it out of his system, Nie Huaisang guides him to sit next to the fire and sets the kettle on its stand over the flames. "Wait here," he says. "Watch the kettle. I'll be back soon."

"Mm." He waits. He watches the kettle. When it boils he pulls it off the fire and pours it into the nearby basin, adding just enough cold water that he can bear to immerse his hand in it. Nie Huaisang still hasn't returned, so Meng Yao wads up the hem of his inner robes into a makeshift washcloth and begins to scrub at the dried blood he can see on his hands and wrists. It's under some of his fingernails, and he mindlessly digs it out with the nails of his other hand, rinsing it away in the rapidly reddening water of the basin.

It feels strange that the blood washes away so easily. It feels like it should stain.

A noise from the door makes him turn, but it's just Nie Huaisang slipping through the gap that should be too small for him and somehow isn't. He slinks up to the fire and sits—more like a person than an animal—next to Meng Yao. He tilts his head, his ears pricked.

"You still have blood on your face," he says.

"Can you get it for me?"

He turns Meng Yao's face towards him and leans in, using his tongue to clean off the blood like a cat washes her kittens. It isn't rough like a cat's tongue, though. It is hot and wet and laves across Meng Yao's cheeks, his jaw, over his throat, and Meng Yao remembers the last throat it was this close to. This is not the same. Nie Huaisang is so gentle with him and he is not afraid. Every deliberate lick thrums through his body, arousal curling in the pit of his stomach and stirring his cock beneath the thin fabric of his inner robe.

He winds an arm around Huaisang's neck, pulling himself closer to the soft heat of his body. "A-Sang," he murmurs. "May I kiss you?"

"Yes," Huaisang says, his voice so deep that Meng Yao feels it in his chest.

It is not an easy task, kissing someone with a muzzle instead of a human mouth, but Meng Yao is clever. He figures it out: small, close-mouthed kisses along the seam where his lips meet; the sharp edges of his fangs as the kiss deepens; the welcome intrusion of Huaisang's tongue into his mouth; the taste of Nie Xiang's blood shared between them.

A-Yao clings to him, his fingers clenched in shadow that doesn't feel like fur. He pulls Nie Huaisang on top of him, lets him feel exactly how hard he is where their bodies press together. He does not think he has ever been this hard with anyone before. He can feel, too, the solid heat of Nie Huaisang's dick jutting against his stomach, and just the thought of it makes him moan and let his legs fall further apart.

"Do you want this too, A-Yao?" he says into his mouth. "Have you wanted this for as long as I have?"

"Yes, A-Sang," he gasps, rocking against him, "yes, yes."

"Take off your robe." He moves away to give Meng Yao space to undress.

It makes him whine with the loss of the weight above him, fumbling off the last of his clothes like he can't bear to have them touching him for a moment longer. As soon as he is naked, he turns over and lifts himself onto his elbows and knees. "Fuck me, A-Sang," he says, looking back over his shoulder in a way that could be artifice with anyone else but isn't; he wants it so much. He has never wanted it this much.

Nie Huaisang rests a paw on the small of Meng Yao's back. His eyes are so dark. "No fingers," he says, "but, if you trust me...?"

"Anything. You can—fuck." Meng Yao drops his head against the floor when he feels Huaisang's breath ghosting over his hole, and then his tongue.

He is not precise about it. He licks from Meng Yao's balls up to the crack of his ass, wet and all-encompassing. Nie Huaisang is probably being careful with his teeth, but every time they graze against the sensitive skin behind his balls or catch on the edge of his hole, Meng Yao's cock twitches and spurts a little precome, and he pushes back onto his mouth. The paw on his back holds him firmly in place even as Nie Huaisang presses the flat of his tongue against his asshole and moans, the vibrations of it buzzing right through Meng Yao, and he is moaning as well, shamelessly.

When Nie Huaisang starts fucking him open with his tongue, Meng Yao's senses white out for a moment. His legs are shaking, breath coming unevenly, keenly focused on the hot, wet slide inside him. Belatedly, he realises he is chanting, "A-Sang, A-Sang, A-Sang," over and over again, with no real idea when he started. It is so good, and simultaneously not nearly enough. "Fuck, I need more, please, A-Sang."

He doesn't expect Huaisang to pull back and he whines at the sudden loss, clenching around nothing. The paw on his back is removed as well, and Meng Yao turns to look behind him.

"Be patient," Huaisang says, his voice rough. He darts across to his bed quicker than should be possible and returns just as quickly. "Give me your hand—not through your legs, go around—perfect. Perfect, so good for me, A-Yao."

Meng Yao, now balanced on one elbow, one trembling arm, is twisted and held in position by Huaisang's paw gripping his wrist, over and around his hand. Something cool and slick drips over his fingers and then Nie Huaisang moves his hand for him, guiding A-Yao's first two fingers inside himself.

"Is this what you needed?" he asks as he begins fucking him with his own hand. "Is this what my A-Yao wanted? I'm sorry I can't do it myself, but this is almost as good. Oh, look at you stretching out for me. You're already so wet from my mouth. Another finger, A-Yao, you can do it. You don't do this often, do you? I like that, I like the idea of this being just for me." He pours more oil down the crack of Meng Yao's ass, letting the relentless motion of his fingers push it into his hole. The sound it makes is obscene.

"Just for you," Meng Yao groans, trying to stretch further to give Nie Huaisang more of him to work with. "A-Sang, I'm gonna f—" He cuts himself off as he overbalances and drops onto his face, gasping.

Nie Huaisang doesn't stop fucking him, pushing his fingers faster, deeper. "Are you almost ready for me now, A-Yao? I've been patient with you, but it's been so long, I've wanted you for so long. I've imagined how you'll feel around my cock." There is something raw and primal in his voice as he says it, and it makes A-Yao's balls tighten.

It is embarrassing how much he wants this. He doesn't care.

"I don't—fuck, yeah, do it," he says, making a decision halfway through the sentence. "Fuck me, just fuck me."

This time he is ready for the loss, when Nie Huaisang pulls his hand free and lets go of it, letting A-Yao pull his arm back to a more comfortable position. He manages to get back up onto his elbows and off the rug when he feels the head of Nie Huaisang's cock rubbing against his hole; not entering him yet, just teasing.

"Please," he says, canting his hips back. "I want," and inspiration strikes him like lightning, burns through his blood, "oh, oh, I want to fuck you human again. Let me do it, A-Sang. Let me show you I can do it."

Behind him, Nie Huaisang's breath stutters, and then he seizes Meng Yao's hip with one paw and pulls him back hard as he thrusts inside him.

It makes him gasp for a moment: the speed of it, the stretch as he is filled. There is a flash of pain, momentarily, but it is not too much. In some respects it is not enough. "Oh," he says, "oh."

The pace Huaisang sets is punishing, the snap of his hips as he bottoms out with each thrust driving every thought out of Meng Yao's head until the only thing he knows is the sensation of Nie Huaisang's cock inside him, sparking pleasure that radiates out through his entire body. The idea that he learnt how to fuck like this from his brother, the staid and solemn Nie-zongzhu, is intoxicating.

"Feels good," Huaisang pants, "you feel different, tighter."

"Tighter than Nie-z—tighter than da-ge?" A-Yao says coyly, like his brain isn't leaking out of his ears. He digs his nails into his palms and arches his back, angling his hips up to meet Huaisang's movements.

"Fuck," he says, the reverence in his voice a sharp contrast to the increasing force of his thrusts. "Yes, A-Yao is tighter than da-ge, so tight around my cock. Feels like I could break you, but you're—you're stronger than you look, I know you won't break."

Meng Yao tries to reply but all that comes out is a long, low whine as Huaisang's cock drags over the place inside him that feels like it could make him come untouched. He might come untouched, he realises; he needs both arms on the floor to stay upright and Huaisang is making no move to stroke him, and yet despite it all he can feel the slow build of an orgasm in his belly and his balls. It might take longer this way, but Nie Huaisang does not seem to be in any hurry now he is inside him. He seems more than satisfied with using Meng Yao's body as a tool to chase his own pleasure.

That, too, lends itself to A-Yao's building orgasm, and he turns his head to sink his teeth into his own bicep, muffling a groan.

"No," Nie Huaisang says sharply. His claws dig into Meng Yao's hip, his control slipping. "Let me hear you."

So he does, feeling like he's watching himself from the outside. He is not normally loud during sex, but it doesn't feel like a performance to let go this time, to moan and gasp and pant and keen. His orgasm feels like a wave crashing over him when he didn't even realise he was by the sea, sudden and unexpected, overwhelming, and he shouts nonsense vowels into the rug as he comes in shuddering spurts.

"Up," Huaisang says, pulling Meng Yao's unresisting body vertical, so he's standing on his knees, and then continues fucking him, panting against Meng Yao's ear. "So good to me, my A-Yao. Did you mean it?"

"Wh...at," says Meng Yao, stupid and overstimulated.

"Are you loyal to me? Do I have your fealty?" Huaisang's thrusts are beginning to grow erratic, little jerks of his hips as he stays deep. He drags his claws down the front of Meng Yao's chest, blood beading along the thin scratches. "Will you swear it?"

Meng Yao hisses, reaching for his paws—hands, they look more like hands now. Still shadowed, still clawed, but the shape has changed without him noticing the tipping point. "Please," he says, squirming beneath the unrelenting sensation of Huaisang inside him, Huaisang pressed up against his back, A-Sang under his skin.

"A-Yao," Nie Huaisang moans into his ear. "Will you?"

"I—I swear it, I'm yours." The words spill out of his mouth, easy as breathing. Easy as anything.

Nie Huaisang makes a triumphant noise, like he has just won a prize of immeasurable value, and fuck, A-Yao can feel him pulsing as he comes, hips flush against his ass. He presses kisses to the side of A-Yao's neck, and they feel like human lips again.

If he turns his head, which Nie Huaisang will he see?

He doesn't turn. It doesn't matter.

Nie Huaisang talks him into spending the night with him in the north wing. It isn't much of a challenge, admittedly. Meng Yao is exhausted in more ways than one, and Nie Huaisang is so gentle with him, washing him clean for the second time and then carrying him to the bed. He is not entirely human again, not yet, but the shape of him is what it was, pale skin occluded by lingering, twisting shadows at the edges. His hair is unbraided, loose around his shoulders, and altogether the effect makes him look younger, unfinished somehow.

There is no dinner delivered that evening, for obvious reasons. Huaisang, who is not hungry for different obvious reasons, finds a box of sweets that Nie-zongzhu brought him at some point, and feeds them to him one by one.

"You like feeding me," Meng Yao says, as he has yet another piece of candied fruit held up to his lips.

"Maybe I think someone should take care of you for once, A-Yao," he says primly.

"Mm." He eats the sweet. Nie Huaisang is being conscientious and loving, but Meng Yao has seen how quickly his mood can change when he is challenged. If he needs to be the grateful recipient of this treatment, he will be.

Not that he doesn't appreciate it. It has been a long time since anyone has acted like he is worth being cared for, even if it does make him feel uncomfortably like a cosseted pet being spoiled with treats.

But that is not the only way Huaisang cares for him. He touches A-Yao's face very gently, and he feels a surge of warmth, a prickling itch across his eyelid.

"Spiritual energy," Huaisang says in answer to his questioning look, kissing the corner of his mouth. "To heal the scratches she left. People might ask questions, otherwise."

"I didn't—you can cultivate?"

"A little," he says. "Da-ge taught me. It's boring, though, so I usually don't bother. But I suppose it's very useful if it can help me fix you." Huaisang leans his forehead against A-Yao's jaw. "I don't like seeing marks on you that I didn't leave," he says, soft and possessive.

A-Yao shivers faintly. "A-Sang—"

"What are you going to do with this?" Huaisang asks suddenly. His attention has been pulled elsewhere, and he toys with the key on the chain that Meng Yao now wears around his neck.

Meng Yao exhales, buying himself a moment to think. "Someone needs to be in charge of letting the girls in with your meals. I suppose I'll have to 'find' it in her belongings when people realise she's gone. If she left, she wouldn't have given it to me, so I can't say that's what happened." He's thinking aloud, playing with the scenario until he can come up with a believable lie. "We haven't had any visitors since the Lan left, so it's too risky to say she left with someone, forge a note saying she fell in love or something. I'll have to remove some of her personal effects before I search her room with witnesses... maybe that will be enough."

Nie Huaisang is watching him closely, rapt. "A-Yao, you're so clever. I knew you'd think of something."

He flushes slightly. "Necessity. This is the only way to protect us both."

"Da-ge will protect us, when he gets back."

"He will protect you," Meng Yao says too quickly, then sucks in a breath, remembering how Huaisang has reacted in the past when the topic has arisen.

"He might not be happy with us, but he can't throw you out. Not when you are my second friend in the world." Huaisang leans in to kiss him again, sucking sugar off his lower lip. "You're practically our third brother now."

There are worse things to be, he thinks, parting his lips beneath insistent swipes of Nie Huaisang's tongue. He has always been fond of physical touch, but now they have broken the last, largest barrier between them, it is as if Nie Huaisang cannot stop himself from wanting more, more, more.

Meng Yao is not unhappy with it.

"I wonder how we should tell da-ge," Huaisang says a little while later, after he has had his fill of kisses and returned to feeding Meng Yao sweets.

"You know him best. It would make sense for you to tell him. He won't be angry with you."

"He has been angry with me before."

"He won't stay angry with you," Meng Yao amends. "He is a good man, but he still considers me nothing more than a servant, and himself my master. It would be well within his rights to terminate my employment and send me away for disobeying him."

Nie Huaisang's jaw sets, his lips petulant. "What if we told him together? Seeing us together would assuage any fears he might have. He has seen what happens to me before; he would recognise how different that makes you."

"There would still be the matter of my disobeying his orders."

"You were obeying mine. I am Nie-er-gongzi, aren't I? You would have to obey me if I were like any other second son."

"You are like no other second son," A-Yao says, looking at him with soft eyes.

"Flattery," he says, but he is clearly pleased. Good. "When da-ge returns, he will come to me the same night. You should already be here when he does, and we can show him everything is even better now." He raises his eyebrows meaningfully. "He cannot possibly be angry when he sees he can have us both at once. I know he's thought about it."

"How can you know that with any certainty?"

Nie Huaisang looks at him like this is the most idiotic question in the world. "Because we've talked about it. Some of us talk about things, A-Yao. Of course, before I knew you were safe, I told him he wasn't allowed you. It would have been very unfair on me."

"I... see," he says, not seeing.

"He gets so much that I cannot have," Nie Huaisang says. "He can go wherever he chooses, make friends and see beautiful things, all while I'm trapped in here forever. And I don't mind it, most of the time. I understand why things have to be the way they are, but... what da-ge and I share, it is one of the few things I ask him to keep just between us. He wants but he cannot have, at my request."

"He gets proposals for marriage alliances sometimes, and he always tells me to reject them. I've never seen him show interest in any man or woman since I've been in Qinghe."

Except you. And, apparently, except me.

"So you see," he says, stroking a stray lock of hair out of A-Yao's face, "in some ways, you are a gift to him as much as to me. Would you like it if I fucked him open for you? Da-ge is so good like that, and if you keep fucking him after he comes, he makes the most delicious noises. We could take turns until he's insensible with it."

"You've thought about this," Meng Yao says, a slow throb of arousal making itself known in the pit of his stomach.

"I have nothing but time. Time and that naughty little book you bought me. Did you read it before you brought it here?"

"No, I—it was recommended by the bookseller. She said it was tasteful." He realises now that he shouldn't have taken her at word, but he wasn't thinking particularly clearly at the time.

"That," says Nie Huaisang with a dark little glint in his eyes, "very much depends on what your tastes are. We can read it together before da-ge gets home; it's given me all sorts of ideas and I can only imagine it would do the same for you, since we're so alike. Practically twins."

"Practically," A-Yao echoes, reaching for Huaisang's hand and smiling at him.

They fuck again the next morning in the last few kè before dawn, Nie Huaisang sleepy and pliant as he spreads his legs and lets Meng Yao open him up carefully with his fingers. They fuck face-to-face, so Meng Yao can watch the last lingering shadows dissipate into the muted morning gloom as he slides into Nie Huaisang and loses himself in the tight embrace of his body, the way Huaisang clings to him with arms and legs and gentle teeth.

It is difficult to be certain in the half-light, but there is something about Huaisang's face that is not the same as it was. His cheekbones might be a little sharper, his face more angular when he tilts his head back in pleasure. Perhaps he is misremembering.

(But Meng Yao remembers everything.)

He dresses in borrowed robes just in case anyone sees him between Nie-zongzhu's study and his room—unlikely but possible, and he cannot explain away the amount of blackened blood on his robes. Then he changes again, back into his own clothes, before going to Nie Xiang's room and—after first making sure he is not observed—letting himself through the unlocked door.

Meng Yao has never been into her room before, but it is exactly the kind of room he would expect from the kind of woman she was: fussy decor, too many trinkets. He searches her drawers and pulls out clothes, the things someone would wear on a long winter journey. She has two finely embroidered qiankun pouches, and he fills them with both the clothes and any belonging that looks like it might have emotional significance, though of course he has to guess at that. There is a dresser with a jewellery box, and Meng Yao removes the key from around his neck and trades it for the most expensive-looking jewellery pieces in the box before closing it again. There is a small pouch of silver stuffed between her mattress and the headboard which he takes as well, for the sake of appearances.

With one final scan of the room, Meng Yao decides he can do no more and slips back out with the pouches tucked inside his sleeve. He will dispose of them later, when he's certain he can do so without being observed.

When he reaches the kitchen, it becomes apparent that Nie Xiang's absence has already been noticed. Nie Mei and Nie Ming are bickering about not wanting to go into the north wing if she is not there, while Li Chengmin stares determinedly into space, clearly wishing she was somewhere else. When she sees Meng Yao, her expression flickers to can-you-believe-this? before she remembers she's unhappy with him as well and schools her face back into forced neutrality.

"She didn't let me in last night," Nie Ming whines. "Not that I ever want to go, but Zongzhu will be furious if he hears about his precious brother missing a single meal, let alone two."

"She's been in such a mood since Zongzhu went to Gusu and didn't leave her in charge like he normally—oh," Nie Mei says, finally seeing Meng Yao is there.

"What's going on?" he asks.

The two maids exchange a look. They are clearly deciding if they want to actually tell him what is going on, but Nie Mei huffs out a frustrated breath. "Guanjia isn't here with the key," she says. "She wasn't here last night either, apparently, and no one knows where she is."

"That doesn't sound like her," he says, pasting vague concern across his features. "Does Nie Jian know where she is? Or at least have a spare key to let you in with Nie-er-gongzi's meal?"

"Guanjia always says she has the only key," Nie Ming says.

"She does," Li Chengmin puts in.

"This one thinks speaking to Nie Jian might be the most expeditious path forward," Meng Yao says. "Perhaps I should fetch him?"

"I'll go," says Li Chengmin. "I've finished eating anyway."

Nie Jian was already on his way to the kitchens for his own breakfast, as it turns out, so he is able to confirm he does not possess a second copy of the key. "This is very unlike Nie-guanjia," he says, unknowingly echoing Meng Yao's earlier words. "When was she last seen?"

There is some discussion and eventual agreement that she has not been seen since breakfast yesterday, and she did not inform anyone as to what her plans for the day were. As one of the higher-ranking servants in the Unclean Realm, it is not unusual for her to go about her tasks without involving others, and Meng Yao is relieved to hear that no one knew she was intending to clean Nie-zongzhu's chambers.

"Could she be unwell?" Nie Ming says fretfully. "What if she's sick in bed and we didn't think to check?"

"Don't be stupid, she never gets sick," Nie Mei snaps, but she looks doubtful even as she says it.

"If she is sick, she may be willing to allow Nie Jian the use of her key to let one of you in with Nie-er-gongzi's meal," Meng Yao says. "She wouldn't want him to go without, after all."

"I'm sure Nie-guanjia wouldn't object," Nie Jian agrees. "Meng Yao, would you accompany us? It might be better if you took the key temporarily, as your duties have you in the kitchen at the appropriate times more often than mine do."

"This one wouldn't want to presume," he murmurs, allowing some doubt to creep into his voice as he casts his eyes down.

"Nonsense; Zongzhu trusts you enough to leave you in charge while he is away. This is just an extension of that."

Nie Jian is making this so, so easy. Meng Yao would feel bad about it if he didn't instead feel surging triumph at the way all the pieces are slotting into place this easily, just as he had hoped they would.

They make their way to Nie Xiang's room, all five of them, and Nie Jian knocks on the door. When there is no answer he frowns, knocking again.

"Nie-guanjia?" he calls. "I'm coming in."

The room is exactly as Meng Yao left it not two kè ago. It is very apparent that its occupant is no longer here, despite many of her belongings remaining.

Nie Jian directs the maids to check Nie Xiang's personal effects, as it wouldn't be appropriate for him or Meng Yao, and they uncover the missing winter-wear, as well as the half-empty jewellery box and the key on the chain, which even Li Chengmin hesitates to touch, as if the key itself is the cause of Nie-er-gongzi's confinement—or Nie Xiang's disappearance.

"It would appear she left in a hurry," Meng Yao says, his eyes wide with concern as he picks up the key and turns it over in his hands. "Surely she would have spoken to someone otherwise."

"I have to agree," Nie Jian says. "I cannot begin to imagine why, though. In all the years we have worked together, she has never done anything like this. Nie-guanjia has always been dedicated and reliable."

Nie Ming clasps her fingers together anxiously. "Not... always," she says, and Nie Mei elbows her in the ribs, but it is too late. They all heard it.

"Speak up, girl," Nie Jian says, frowning.

"It's just... I heard Zongzhu speaking with her, once, about his brother's laundry. And she told him she makes sure we collect it every day, but we never do; I don't even know where it is and I don't know who does." She twists her hands over each other like a fly. "If she would lie to Zongzhu, what else was she lying about?"

Nie Huaisang always has clean sheets on his bed, perfectly laundered robes. The only person who could be carrying them back and forth is Nie-zongzhu himself, and that means—oh, Meng Yao could not have wished for better than this. It means that Nie-zongzhu knew Nie Xiang was a liar all along. It doesn't even matter that he is not here to voice this, because Meng Yao is here, and Meng Yao is his proxy in his absence.

He clears his throat lightly and waits until all four are watching him before saying, "I believe I can answer that question. Nie-zongzhu has Nie-er-gongzi's clothes and sheets laundered with his own; it has been one of my duties since I was brought on. I suspect he has been doing so for years, and asked Nie-guanjia that question in order to confirm her dishonesty for himself." He keeps his eyes on Nie Jian as he says this. The maids don't matter; he is the one Meng Yao must convince.

The atmosphere in the room feels stagnant and close as Nie Jian mulls this over. "I do not like this," he says finally. "I wish," he adds, looking at Nie Ming, "that you had brought your concerns to me sooner. Perhaps we could have avoided this situation."

She colours a violent pink and bows to him. "This insignificant one begs your forgiveness."

"Ah, girl, it is not your fault. The fault lies with someone who appears to have cut and run rather than face the consequences of her actions—and inactions."

Meng Yao's only external concession to the joy that swirls through him at those words is a single, slow blink.

When Meng Yao unlocks the kitchen door with the key he wears on a chain around his neck, he steps through it to guide the hand of Nie Ming to the rope on the wall.

He burns the two qiankun pouches, along with the robes that were too thoroughly soaked in Nie Xiang's blood to risk taking to the washerwomen. He uses her silver to buy a full set of replacements, more layers than he has ever worn before in his life. The first time he wears them into the north wing, they play the game where Meng Yao gives orders and Nie Huaisang obeys them, their roles reversed.

He undresses Meng Yao layer by layer, as if he is the loyal servant, and then takes his cock into his mouth with such reverence that Meng Yao cannot bear to look down at him and meet the dark intensity of his gaze.

There is enough silver left over for him to buy Nie Huaisang more books—more spring pictures, which are specifically requested and then utilised ruthlessly by Nie Huaisang in his ongoing seduction of A-Yao.

It is a wonder, he thinks, that Nie-zongzhu ever gets anything done. It is a wonder that Meng Yao gets anything done, when all his waking thoughts are consumed by Nie Huaisang as easily as he swallows down Meng Yao's cock.

The earliest signs of spring have not yet arrived when Nie-zongzhu does, barely a day before the one month mark he predicted. It is late afternoon by the clock, early evening by the angle of the sun.

Meng Yao meets him coming along the corridors towards his chambers. He is wearing plain travelling robes that still have a few stray flakes of snow on the shoulders, and Meng Yao almost reaches up to brush them away without thinking. It has only been a month, and yet he had forgotten how much space Nie-zongzhu takes up without meaning to, physically imposing in an entirely unfair manner.

He looks travel-worn and tired. There are dark circles beneath his eyes that were not there when he left. It is difficult to tell, but his cheekbones seem more pronounced than before as well, and Meng Yao wonders if he has lost weight.

"Meng Yao!" he says, and if Meng Yao were a more easily flustered man, he would have blushed at the clear pleasure in his voice.

He bows. "Zongzhu. It is good to see you home at last."

"It is good to be home," he says, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a smile that does not reach his mouth. "I always feel so much better the moment I walk through the gates. I'm sorry to say—well, let's speak in the study. I trust you are well prepared to catch me up on whatever I missed while I was away."

"Of course." He steps aside to let Nie-zongzhu past, then pauses and follows a pace or two behind. "Would you like me to have a servant bring a meal to your study?"

"Yes, I haven't eaten since breakfast." He chuckles lightly. "I was a fool to leave you behind, Meng Yao; I must admit I skipped more than one meal while travelling without you there to remind me to eat."

Meng Yao catches the arm of the first servant they pass and says in a pleasant sotto voce, "Please tell the cooks that Nie-zongzhu has returned and would like to eat as soon as possible. He will take the meal in his study."

The man actually bows to him before scurrying away to follow the order. It is satisfying.

"Let me change out of these robes and into something more comfortable," Nie-zongzhu says as they enter the study. "Or rather, something that I haven't been wearing for the best part of the last week."

"I will wait as long as Zongzhu requires," he replies, moving to shuffle some papers on the desk. "Your meal should be here soon, and I will prepare my report in the meantime."

"Meng Yao, I do not doubt that your report has been prepared since the moment you heard I was back. I won't keep you waiting much longer." Nie-zongzhu goes through the door to his chambers but does not close it again behind him. It remains cracked open a few cùn, just enough to see through. There is a measure of trust in that, even knowing he would not visit Nie Huaisang with Meng Yao awaiting him in the study. To do so would be careless, and Nie-zongzhu is not careless.

And if it were Meng Yao, kept apart from Nie Huaisang for a month, he would not be satisfied with a brief visit. No, their reunion will take place tonight, at length, and Meng Yao will not interrupt it. He has made this very clear to Huaisang, who is still set on showing his brother exactly what has bloomed in his absence but had finally agreed that perhaps the first night was not the time for it.

Meng Yao sits and waits, idly rubbing his thumb and middle finger together, until there is a knock at the door and he takes delivery of the food, which is clearly less a cohesive meal than it is a mish-mash of whichever dishes were nearest to being ready when word reached the kitchens: fresh bread, cold meat, a winter soup with thick noodles added to the bowl, and a small bottle of wine. It smells delicious, and there is only enough for one.

Of course. Meng Yao is not eating with Nie-zongzhu. That would be absurd.

Nie-zongzhu is not long, as he promised. He sits at his desk and pulls the food closer to himself, gesturing to Meng Yao to begin.

Most of what he has to say is expected: reports on the running of the Unclean Realm (nothing out of the ordinary), correspondence from other sects (none arrived), reports of anything untoward in the wider Qinghe region (only once, which was resolved by Nie Zonghui and a small group of disciples with ease).

"Unfortunately," Meng Yao says, when he can no longer delay any further, "Nie-guanjia left unexpectedly a few weeks ago."

He pauses with a hunk of bread between the soup and his mouth. It drips noisily. "Explain," he says.

"Ah... I am not sure I can explain. She did not inform anyone of her decision prior to her departure. She did not... inform anyone of her departure, either. It was only when the maids brought to my attention that they had been unable to deliver Nie-er-gongzi's dinner the previous night and I spoke to Nie Jian that we checked her room and found her gone."

Nie-zongzhu makes a face that Meng Yao cannot quite identify, though it turns almost immediately into a scowl. There is a sudden tension across his shoulders that was not there before. "And when you say 'gone'..."

"Though some of her personal effects remained, she had taken winter clothes and her more valuable jewellery. The key to the north wing was in her jewellery box, so we at least did not need to send for a locksmith." Meng Yao pulls the key out of his robes. "I have been personally ensuring Nie-er-gongzi gets his meals on time since."

The tension eases when Nie-zongzhu sees the key, and Meng Yao tucks that away to analyse later even as he returns the key to its place against his chest.

"She did not appreciate that her duties involved Huaisang and the north wing," Nie-zongzhu says, finally. "I knew this for some time, but I didn't anticipate she would use my absence as a reason to resign said duties without notice." He sighs, rubbing a hand across his eyes. "I am grateful that you were able to step up and ensure Huaisang was still cared for. If you would prefer, I can give the key to someone else and allow you to return to your actual job."

"It is no bother, Zongzhu," Meng Yao says with a small bow. "Nie Jian and I discussed it when we found the key, and it is easy enough for me to be in the kitchen at the appropriate times."

"Then I am doubly grateful to you," Nie-zongzhu says, reaching out to lay his hand on Meng Yao's wrist. "It is a weight off my shoulders to know I can rely on you to care for my brother if I am unable to do so."

"It is my duty."

"It is not, Meng Yao, and that's why it is appreciated." He takes back his hand and uncorks the wine, drinking directly from the bottle. "And there were no other problems? Regarding Huaisang, I mean."

"None," Meng Yao says, not lying. It is not a lie; Huaisang was not the cause of the problem. Huaisang helped resolve the problem that Meng Yao caused through his own carelessness, and though Nie-zongzhu might disagree, the time they have spent together ever since has been anything but a problem.

Nie-zongzhu exhales. "Good. That's good. Let me fill you in on what happened while I was in Gusu and Lanling, and then... you should take the rest of the day off. I cannot imagine you've had much time to yourself this past month."

"Zongzhu is very generous to this one," he says, "but I have found it is better to maintain my usual working hours and take time to myself only when necessary—and I do not believe it is necessary today."

"Your discipline is as exemplary as the rest of your work, Meng Yao."

It is nothing more than a platitude, and yet the praise fills him with a warmth so thrilling that he almost resents it.

Meng Yao sleeps very badly that night. This, in itself, is not unusual; he has been a light sleeper since he was very young, and even as an adult he has not been able to shake the feeling that if he sleeps for too long, he will awaken and discover everything has changed irrevocably. He is usually refreshed enough if he sleeps for three shí.

But tonight, he dozes fitfully, his mind full of the worst ways Nie-zongzhu may react to discovering what he has done. Not just that he has been into the north wing and met Nie Huaisang—and fucked Nie Huaisang, his treacherous mind adds helpfully, in every way it is possible for two men to have one another—but that the two of them killed a woman together and then Meng Yao covered it up.

He dreams of waking with Baxia at his throat, Nie-zongzhu only willing to offer him one chance to speak his final words before his head is cleaved from his body, and wakes.

He dreams of walking into the study to find Nie Huaisang waiting for him there, dressed in his mìlí, and when Meng Yao pushes the veils back, it is not the human Nie Huaisang, and the crimson that swathes him is the blood of a woman who did not deserve death at their hands, and wakes.

He dreams of Li Chengmin in his bed with her legs spread for him and her throat torn out, and the taste of blood in his mouth, and wakes.

He dreams of Nie Huaisang and Nie Mingjue entwined, the shared weight of their history in every movement of their bodies, and they look at him as if he is a stranger, and then they do not look at him because he is a stranger, and wakes.

He dreams, and wakes.

He wakes.

Meng Yao goes to the training ground at first light, as he has not done for the last month, and observes as Nie-zongzhu laughs and tells his disciples they have grown fat and lazy without him to keep them in check. They run through all the usual forms, and in truth Meng Yao thinks they do look a little less practiced than they had been before—but it is not his place to remark on such things.

He observes the fresh scratches on Nie-zongzhu's back and thinks that at least he is not the only one who spent the night restless and unsleeping. There are even more than usual; Nie Huaisang has missed his brother dearly.

"Would you like me to send for a healer?" Meng Yao asks when they are alone, and then gestures at his own back when Nie-zongzhu looks at him in confusion. He has never once acknowledged the scratches aloud before and he does not know why he decided to today.

(This is a lie. He is tired and feeling uncharacteristically reckless, and soon it will all come out anyway. He might as well dig his thumb into this bruise now, before he is exiled or dead. He wants to know what the excuse will be.)

To his surprise, Nie-zongzhu blushes. "Ah—no, that won't be necessary. It is a simple matter of spiritual energy; nothing of any concern."

Meng Yao knows this, because Meng Yao remembers everything. He knows such minor wounds should heal easily and rapidly in anyone with a golden core as developed as Nie-zongzhu, and he knows that they do not means Nie-zongzhu does not want them to heal.

They are alike in that. Meng Yao, too, enjoys knowing Nie Huaisang has marked him beneath his robes. He has the matching set even now.

"Forgive my impertinence," says Meng Yao, who cannot leave it alone, "but I have noticed such scratches on Zongzhu's person before."

"My brother—Huaisang's illness causes convulsions. Sometimes. Not always." He has never been a good liar, but now he cannot even look Meng Yao in the eye. "And so, sometimes, it is necessary to—to hold him down. To restrain him for his own safety."

"How unfortunate," he murmurs. "And yet how fortunate for Nie-er-gongzi to have a brother who cares for him so deeply."

"We are the only family the other has," Nie-zongzhu says stiffly.

Meng Yao touches the back of his hand lightly, briefly. It could have been an accident; he picks up the letter that sits between them on the desk as if that is why he reached out. "It is admirable."

"We need to discuss the disagreement between the farmers' and merchants' guilds. Has there been any word?"

"Not as yet," Meng Yao says, smoothly shifting to the new topic. "I believe the deadline is likely to pass without a resolution. What would you like to do if that happens?"

The routine of the Unclean Realm settles back into its usual shape. Meng Yao's routine settles, and he is glad of it. While the freedom he enjoyed in Nie-zongzhu's absence allowed him to spend his days doing as he pleased—as long as things continued to run as they should—there is a different kind of freedom in knowing things do not rest upon your shoulders alone.

He is happy to be the silent hand making things happen without bearing the responsibility if they do not happen as they should. He is less happy that the whispers about his relationship with Nie-zongzhu continue, even with their source long gone, but such is the nature of a rumour.

Meng Yao has long known that the way to stop a rumour in its tracks is to replace it with one even more scandalous, and enough time has passed since Nie Xiang's disappearance that he feels secure enough to begin dropping hints here and there, to one person or another, about what really led to her disappearance.

All lies, of course, but lies run on swifter feet than truths ever will. They breed like rabbits, growing more outlandish with each telling.

Meng Yao hears, from various people, that Nie-guanjia was carrying on with a Lan cultivator and left to follow him after discovering she was with child. He hears that she was embezzling money from the clan and ran with her pockets full of stolen gold. He hears that she was a traitor and Nie-zongzhu allowed her to leave with her life if she never let him see her face again.

Wherever she is now, Meng Yao hopes she knows how low he has brought her. It is exactly what she deserved, after all.

Meng Yao does not get to visit Huaisang for almost a full week. Nie-zongzhu is certainly visiting his brother every night, making up for the time he lost, and the last thing Meng Yao needs is to get caught where he shouldn't be again.

So he waits for an opportune moment, certain that one will arise eventually.

A letter arrives from Sisi and he sets it aside unopened. It can wait. If it was urgent, she would have written before now. In any case, he has few thoughts to spare for anything that is not Huaisang.

He feels like a lovesick teenager, forbidden from seeing his lover. It is not a role he ever expected himself to fill, but he misses Huaisang. He hopes Huaisang misses him too. He hopes he wasn't simply a temporary distraction during Nie-zongzhu's absence.

There is a hungry ghost in a village half a day from the Unclean Realm by horseback. It has resisted attempts to lay it to rest by lesser cultivators, and Meng Yao suggests Nie-zongzhu take care of it himself.

"You have been absent for a month," he says. "The common folk would be bolstered to see the great Chifeng-zun helping with his own two hands. Not everyone is so lucky to see him every day."

"Mm," he says, eyes half-closed. The great Chifeng-zun appears to have been sleeping almost as badly as Meng Yao has of late. Yesterday, he caught him dozing at his desk. "Do I have much scheduled tomorrow, Meng Yao?"

"Nothing that cannot be moved with ease. Should I inform Nie Zonghui you wish to go?"

"En."

And so the next day, with Nie-zongzhu duly redirected out of the Unclean Realm—and out of the way—Meng Yao hurries along the corridors of the north wing in search of Nie Huaisang.

He finds A-Sang in the reception room he seems to prefer over the others, making himself a pot of tea.

It is thrilling, the way his eyes light up when he sees A-Yao.

"Did you forget about me?" he asks, his pink mouth pursing into a perfect pout.

"I could never," Meng Yao says, sitting beside him and lacing their fingers together. "Your brother has been keeping me busy, and I suspect keeping you company."

Huaisang sighs gustily. "Yes, but you could both be keeping me company, A-Yao. When will you let me show him how good you are?" He leans in to press a kiss to the soft skin behind A-Yao's ear, whispering, "I've missed having you inside me."

"I," he says. He should have expected this, and did not. "Ah. You must know I have missed that too, A-Sang."

"So stay with me until da-ge comes tonight." He turns A-Yao's head towards him with the hand that is not being held and kisses him hungrily, his tongue pushing past his lips and tasting the depths of him.

It is difficult to formulate an argument under these conditions, but Meng Yao has had a week of not being kissed by Nie Huaisang to spend thinking.

"I don't think that would be fair to Zongzhu," he says, once Huaisang lets him come up for air. "He may need time to process the knowledge that I can see you without harming you, time that you and I have had but he cannot if he is confronted by it so boldly."

"He'll be happy," Huaisang says, but there is hesitancy in his voice. "He will be happy, A-Yao." He combs his fingers through A-Yao's hair, rearranging one of his braids.

"Mm. You can be the one to tell him, if you would prefer that? I think it would be better, coming from you." Then, at least, if Nie-zongzhu exiles him from the Unclean Realm, it won't be in front of Nie Huaisang. "You can tell him how our friendship has grown. You told me, once, that you came to know me through his eyes. I would like him to come to know of this—of us—through yours."

"Using my own words against me is very unfair of you." But he does not look entirely displeased with the idea.

"Forgive this one, A-Sang," A-Yao says softly, pressing closer to him.

"Very unfair." He begins unfastening the front of Meng Yao's robes.

They do not talk for a while, then. A-Yao is reassured that despite the week of having his brother back, Nie Huaisang's appetite does not seem to be sated. He presses his fingers inside A-Yao and then pulls him into his lap and fucks him slowly, biting and sucking bruises into the hollow between his collarbones, the lean muscles of his chest. He reopens the scratches on A-Yao's back and leaves fresh marks alongside them, swallowing every soft cry of ecstatic pain he wrings from A-Yao like it is the finest delicacy he has ever tasted.

A-Yao would kill a hundred people, a thousand. He would raze cities. Anything for this moment. Anything for the next moment with Nie Huaisang.

"There are no visitors at the moment, are there?" Nie-zongzhu asks one morning. He is wearing an expression that Meng Yao recognises. If he is not mistaken (and he is not mistaken), Nie-zongzhu is suffering from a particularly unpleasant headache but is trying to work through it.

"No, Zongzhu." He turns a paper on the desk and pretends to study it before adding, "And nothing on your schedule until wèi zhèng, when you have an appointment to speak with Wang Hua from the artisans' guild about the underpayment of taxes."

He sighs. "Thank you, Meng Yao. Please let the kitchen know I will take lunch in my chambers."

"Would you like me to also speak with the healer? Perhaps she can bring her needles."

"Is it that obvious?" Nie-zongzhu says wryly, pinching the bridge of his nose. "I would prefer not to spend my lunch being stabbed by the healer, but this headache is lingering. If something to eat and a quiet room doesn't do the trick, I may have to yield to the needles."

Meng Yao goes over to his desk and holds his hand out. "May I?"

Nie-zongzhu looks at him for a moment, and then places one hand, palm raised, in Meng Yao's.

"This may feel a little uncomfortable," he says, aligning his fingers on the meat between thumb and forefinger, "but when my mother had headaches, applying pressure to the hégǔ point often eased her pain." He pinches hard, squeezing for a count of twenty. "Other hand," he says, a command that is obeyed, and repeats the process.

"That does feel better," Nie-zongzhu says, not removing his hand. He keeps not removing his hand, which is very large and golden compared to Meng Yao's small, pale fingers, and Meng Yao dares to brush his thumb across the palm.

"You can do it to yourself, but I find it is easier for another to apply the appropriate amount of pressure," he says. "It is difficult to tell your body to cause itself pain."

"You didn't hurt me, Meng Yao." He closes his fingers, clasping Meng Yao's thumb gently, like he is holding a baby bird. "Thank you for the assistance. It is most appreciated."

"Zongzhu—"

"When we are alone, you may call me Mingjue. If you wish."

Meng Yao feels like the breath has been punched out of him. "Mingjue," he says, very softly, feeling the weight of each syllable on his tongue. He has thought it before, turned it over in his mind to examine it, but this is the first time he has ever spoken it aloud. "Assisting you was my pleasure, Mingjue, as it always is."

Nie-zongzhu—Mingjue—releases his hand. "I will need you at the meeting later. To take notes."

"Of course." He goes to the door. Pauses. Looks back. "If there is anything else... I am always at your service."

"I know. Thank you."

Meng Yao slips out and, in an act of supreme restraint, goes to the kitchens to let them know about Nie Mingjue's lunch instead of to his room to masturbate. He feels giddy, unmoored. He wishes he could go to A-Sang to tell him what just happened, but of course he cannot. Nie Huaisang will be eating lunch with his brother before long.

He is not hungry enough to want to endure lunch with the other servants in the kitchen, so he prepares himself for the meeting that will take place that afternoon. He already has all the necessary paperwork pulled out, though it is still in Nie-zongzhu's study and he will have to return to pick it up before the meeting begins.

He could return early—but that is a foolish thought. There is no chance he would even be able to see A-Sang, and he would risk crushing the fragile flower that has bloomed between him and Nie Mingjue. A-Yao cannot, will not risk that.

But he allows himself to think about A-Sang and Mingjue together. They will be eating, that is all; if someone needs Nie-zongzhu, they must be ready for Huaisang to slip back through the third door for his own safety.

They will only be eating. Nothing more.

Meng Yao climbs to the very top of the wall that surrounds the Unclean Realm and turns his face towards the chill northerly wind, lets it blow away the heat that fills him from head to toe. If his face is red, it is from the cold. If his breathing is unsteady, it is from the climb.

No one will ask about either. He is making excuses to himself.

He returns for the paperwork a kè before wèi zhèng, the earliest he can reasonably justify. He does not listen at the door to see if anyone is still inside; he simply collects the papers from his desk and leaves again for the Blade Hall.

The head of the artisans' guild arrives shortly before the wèi zhèng bell, and Meng Yao shows her inside, offering her tea. "Wang-zunjia, Nie-zongzhu will join you momentarily," he says, and returns to the corridor to wait for him.

He doesn't have to wait long: Nie Mingjue appears just as the bell chimes in the distance.

"Is she here?" he asks. There is colour on his cheeks, fading, as if he too has been outside, and the pained expression of before has smoothed into something softer. Not quite a smile, but close.

"Waiting inside," Meng Yao says, reaching for the door handle to admit them both. "I take it lunch with your brother has eased your headache?"

Everything stutters to a halt.

Meng Yao is so fucking stupid.

Nie Mingjue's face changes imperceptibly. His expression hardens around the eyes, turns brittle around his mouth. "What did you just say, Meng Yao?" he asks, his voice deceptively calm.

"I—I didn't—the head of the guild is inside," he says. "Please. Not here."

"Not here," he agrees, after a pause so long that Meng Yao can feel the exact moment when he begins to sweat. "But soon."

"Yes, Zongzhu."

And he sweeps past Meng Yao into the room without further acknowledgement, greeting Wang Hua so stiffly that it's a wonder she doesn't flee at the sight of him.

Meng Yao considers, with the kind of seriousness he reserves for matters of life and death, leaving the Unclean Realm entirely. Only the thought of A-Sang alone in the north wing prevents him.

Only for A-Sang is he willing to face down a very large, very angry Nie Mingjue.

The guild leader can't get out of the meeting quickly enough—a boon, as it turns out, because she agrees readily that the guild does owe more taxes and they will pay them immediately and with interest—and then they are alone together in the Blade Hall.

Meng Yao doesn't say anything, because he suspects anything he does say will only make things worse. He has already looped the noose around his own neck but does not intend to hang himself.

"Tell me," says Nie Mingjue, "why you said what you said about my brother."

He spent the entire meeting trying to think of a believable reason why—that doesn't incriminate himself further—and failing miserably. There is nothing. Any lie he tells would be laughably hollow, easily seen through.

"I have no explanation you want to hear," Meng Yao says, eyes cast to the floor.

"When you came here, you were told the rules of this place." Nie Mingjue's voice is tight and painful, like he has to force every word out. "You were told how important it was for you to never enter the north wing. And yet you speak of a thing that only two living people could have told you, and I did not tell you. Your disobedience has harmed the most precious person in the world to me."

It is not just anger in his face, his voice, Meng Yao realises with a start. There is anger, yes, but underneath it there is another emotion, just as primal. He should have seen it before: Nie Mingjue is terribly afraid.

"I understand you are protective of Nie-er-gongzi—of Huaisang—but I did not harm him. I swear to you."

"But you did!" Nie Mingjue roars. "You meddled in things you do not understand and you have caused pain that I have spent years trying to protect him from! Is this truly all you have to say for yourself?"

"Speak to him," Meng Yao says, quietly but firmly.

"How dare you tell me—"

"If I cannot convince you," he interrupts, which is only the second most stupid thing he has done today by dint of the sheer idiocy of the most stupid thing, "then speak to Huaisang. I have not hurt him. I swear it to you on my life. He will tell you the same. I could not—"

Here, Mingjue tries to interrupt him back, but he keeps talking, the words spilling out like a dam has burst.

"—I could not speak to him to learn of your lunches together if doing so would hurt him. You must see that. I could not, would not, have not hurt him." And just like that, his words run dry. His heart is thundering, his chest tight. Meng Yao has never lost control like that, not even when he was a child. Every emotion he has bottled up for years and aged like wine is exposed at last to the air, and he finds they have all turned to vinegar.

"Do not—" Nie Mingjue stops abruptly as that truth permeates through his anger. "Even if what you say is true—"

"It is true."

"Shut up!" he blurts, like a child. "Meng Yao, if you say another word—" He pulls himself together with visible effort, swallowing and then swallowing again. He is red-faced and looks on the verge of tears. "If what you say is true, you had no way to know it. You disobeyed me and did not care about the potential consequences. You would have hurt A-Sang simply to satisfy, what, your curiosity? A desire to see how much you could get away with, after you had won my trust?"

Meng Yao does not say another word.

"I will speak to my brother. Give me your keys. The kitchen door and the study."

Meng Yao flinches like he has been struck, opening his mouth to protest and then catching himself at the last moment. Reluctance sits heavy in his limbs as he slowly, agonisingly, removes both keys from his person and places them on the table.

"Get out of my sight."

Meng Yao goes.

I will find a way to fix this, Meng Yao thinks feverishly. But he is not stupid enough to believe it. He knows there is no way for him to fix this. Everything—his future here and possibly even his life—rests in Huaisang's soft, dangerous hands.

A-Yao swore him an oath, but A-Sang never promised him anything in return.

The days tick by like clockwork. Days of someone else letting the girls take Huaisang his meals—Meng Yao doesn't even know who, because he barely eats, barely spends any time in the kitchen at all. Days of restless sleep and dreams that leave him feeling haunted even as the specifics slip away with the coming of the dawn. Days of doing his job with his usual efficiency, but Nie Mingjue does not speak to him unless it is absolutely necessary, and then when he is no longer needed, he walks the halls of the Unclean Realm like he is searching for something he has no hope of finding.

He walks the city streets as well, bundled up in a cloak thicker than anything he ever needed when he lived in Yunmeng, when he lived in Yiling, when he lived in Ezhou. He walks until his fingers turn pink, and then white, and then stop feeling like fingers at all. He walks to the edge of the city, to the road that leads back to more civilised lands, and feels faint, his head swimming and his vision blurring until he can't even see the road in front of him. Walking suddenly seems impossible, so he doesn't, though Meng Yao does not specifically remember making the decision to stop.

It is very cold.

Someone finds him there, half-slumped against the nearest wall, and slaps his face until he rouses.

"You'll freeze to death," they say, hauling Meng Yao to his feet. "Don't you have a home to go to?"

"Sorry," he mumbles, and turns himself back towards the Unclean Realm. This time, the walking clears his head instead of clouding it, and by the time he enters the gate, passing the stone-faced guards, he feels like himself again. Mostly.

He does not pick the lock of the kitchen door. He wants nothing more than to go to A-Sang in that moment; he feels the pull of him in the pit of his stomach, the hollow space below his lungs.

He goes, instead, to his bedroom, and falls asleep—true, deep sleep for the first time in days. For the first time in days, he does not dream.

"Come with me," Nie Mingjue says.

It is growing late. The sun has set; the candles have been lit. Meng Yao was about to take his now-customary wordless leave for the night.

"Zongzhu?" he asks, tentative.

"I'm going to see Huaisang. He told me I should bring you, so I am bringing you."

The relief that floods Meng Yao at his words is almost painful, a release of tension that has become so much a part of him that he had forgotten how it felt to be without it. He sags, one hand against the wall and his eyes closed, just for a moment, and then straightens.

Nie Mingjue is studiously not looking at him when he opens his eyes again. "Whenever you're ready," he says, an edge of impatience in his voice.

Meng Yao does not make him wait. He takes up the position he often does, a few steps behind, and together they enter Nie Mingjue's chambers. Together, they go through the door into the north wing.

A-Sang is not waiting there, and A-Yao feels a little pang of disappointment, though it is soon dashed away by his rising anticipation. Any moment now, he will see him again. Any moment, he will get to touch him.

He is led to the room where he first shared a meal with Huaisang. The low table is set for three, but no one is seated there.

"Sit," Mingjue says.

"Where is A-Sa—Nie-er-gongzi?"

"Sit." He sits. Nie Mingjue looks down at him. "Don't get up." Then he returns to the door, blocking it with his arm, and calls into the corridor, "Huaisang."

There is a rustling of silk from outside. A-Sang, veiled in his mìlí once more, with the bulk of Nie Mingjue an impassable barrier between them. Meng Yao catches the inside of his cheek between his teeth, digs his fingers into his knees. He will maintain control. His eyes strain to make out the familiar contours of Huaisang's face through the layers of veils and flickering candlelight shadows. He thinks he might be able to see his eyes, briefly, but then the shadows shift again and there is nothing there to see.

"Da-ge, it's fine," Huaisang says, irritation plain in his voice.

"There's no pain? No discomfort?" Nie Mingjue asks.

Nie Huaisang's only response is to sweep the mìlí off entirely in one dramatic motion, letting the hat fall to the ground. "I'm not a child any more! I know what I'm talking about. When I told you A-Yao was safe, I meant it."

Mingjue grips his face between both hands, staring intently into Huaisang's eyes. Whatever he is searching for, he does not find.

"No pain," A-Sang says, and he presses a kiss to the tip of his brother's nose. "Are you satisfied enough to let me greet our guest?"

He makes a noise of assent, stepping aside to admit Huaisang into the room with Meng Yao, whereupon he practically throws himself into the seat next to him.

"A-Yao," he says, beaming, "A-Yao, A-Yao, Yaoyao. I thought I was meant to be the one to tell da-ge! We had a plan."

"I, ah." He looks up at Nie Mingjue, who is not looking back. "I made a mistake. A slip of the tongue. It would have been better, had you been the one to tell your brother."

"Maybe; maybe not." He sets his jaw obstinately, looking up as well. "Da-ge didn't believe me when I told him everything."

"Everything?" Meng Yao croaks. His gaze flicks between them both, back and forth. Everything?

"Well," Nie Huaisang murmurs, his eyes very dark as he turns them back to A-Yao. "Almost everything." And he leans in to kiss him, open-mouthed and dirty, heedless of the way Nie Mingjue's cheeks colour up and the noise he makes. The noise A-Yao makes at the very intentional slip of his tongue.

Meng Yao breaks away reluctantly, licking his lips. His cock is stirring beneath his robes and he does not think this is the time to pursue that. "Ah, there—the meal will get cold."

"Yes, yes, our first meal as three," A-Sang says. He holds one hand out to Nie Mingjue, beckoning him imperiously. "Come and sit with us, da-ge, before the food gets cold."

Mingjue is still flushed pink but he doesn't say anything, and he does move across the room to sit at the table with them, taking Huaisang's delicate long-fingered hand in his own. Meng Yao considers again the contrast between the two of them. There are obvious differences; those he noted before, the few times he saw them together.

But those were both at a distance. Sitting here, next to them, it is just as obvious that they are as alike as they are dissimilar. Their faces could be the same face, and Meng Yao suddenly appreciates exactly why Mingjue grew a moustache. Would anyone take a young sect leader seriously if he looked like Huaisang, soft lines and pouting lips? He wonders, too, if Huaisang would have the same freckles scattered across his cheekbones, were he ever allowed to see the sun.

"I know you are still upset with us for keeping this from you, da-ge," Huaisang says, picking up his chopsticks with the hand that Mingjue isn't holding. "But can't you see how wonderful it is? You don't have to worry about leaving me alone any more, not when I have A-Yao to keep me company. And I don't have to worry about you being alone when you're doing boring sect things, because you will have him too."

"You didn't have to worry about me before," Nie Mingjue says, plaintive. "You are my only didi; da-ge is supposed to worry about you."

"Didi will worry if he wants to worry."

A-Yao does not speak. He feels like he is intruding, and he is certain that Nie Mingjue is still very unhappy with him. Without the same years of shared history between them—it has barely been months, and one of those was spent without Mingjue entirely—this peace between them seems as fragile as spun glass. A careless touch could easily shatter it again.

So he listens, and he eats. His body has finally remembered that it requires more than a few snatched mouthfuls of congee every day, and as with the meals of A-Sang's that he has tried before, this food is so much better than anything the cooks make for him and the other servants.

"A-Yao," Huaisang says suddenly. "What do you think of staying here with us tonight?"

Meng Yao's eyes flick to Nie Mingjue immediately. "This one would not want to overstep," he says, and Huaisang lets out a huge sigh.

"Aren't we past all that? Why won't the two of you just make up already?"

"Huaisang, it is not so simple," Mingjue says.

"It could be," he mutters belligerently. "There was a misunderstanding but we all know everything is better now, so why can you not kiss and make up? I think everything would be better if you'd just kiss."

If Meng Yao were a man with less control, he might have reacted to that. Nie Mingjue is a man with less control, so he does. He chokes on a mouthful of wine, losing some of it in the process, and A-Yao instinctively holds out a napkin for him to clean up.

"Da-ge," Huaisang continues, his voice turning soft and tempting. It takes on some of the choral quality it had when it came from his other form, and it curls around something deep in A-Yao's chest. "Didn't you know A-Yao wants you the same way you want him? We talked about it when you were away, just as you and I discussed A-Yao. He would be very happy, and so would I."

"Meng Yao," Mingjue says, his voice a little hoarse from the wine mishap. He clears his throat. "Is this true? Or is didi telling stories again?"

"He is not," he says. He weighs it for a moment, and then adds, "I have wanted you from the moment I saw your face."

Mingjue blushes and Meng Yao relishes it. He wants very much to do it again. He wants to take Nie Mingjue apart.

"But I know I hurt you," Meng Yao continues, looking down at his meal contritely. "I know it is not so easy to forgive a betrayal such as mine. I meant no harm but I caused it, and for that I do not expect things to be as they were, or could have been."

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees A-Sang's smile turn sharp and horrid, and perhaps approving. A-Sang, for all his sheltered upbringing and the limitations it has imposed on him, sees right through the act and is happy to let Meng Yao do it. And Mingjue, for all his strength and righteousness, does not even realise it is an act.

"You're right," he says eventually. "You did cause harm. But... Huaisang is right, as well. It is a comfort to me that there is another who can come to love him as I do, after so many years of thinking it was me alone."

"I do love him," A-Yao says, and then pulls himself up short in confusion. The way he feels about A-Sang is a conflicting stew of lust and fear and desire and warmth and dreadthrill, but he has never considered it love until the words had already left his mouth. To love someone and to confess to it so easily are both things he did not expect from himself. They are things he did not allow from himself before meeting Nie Huaisang.

They are both looking at him now, with very different expressions but equal amounts of intensity. Their scrutiny makes him feel trapped and overheated, outnumbered, and he digs his nails into his palm under the table.

"Do you mean it, A-Yao?" A-Sang says, a little breathy. He puts his hand on Meng Yao's thigh.

Do you mean it?

"Yes," he says. "I do."

Huaisang laughs with delight, with satisfaction. "Da-ge, did you hear? How fortunate we are to have found A-Yao."

Something passes between the brothers that Meng Yao cannot possibly begin to decipher.

"How fortunate," Mingjue echoes. He seems—not relaxed, not yet, but whatever went unsaid in the look they just shared has changed something in him.

Meng Yao might not be able to identify it yet, but he will.

"You didn't really answer my question, you know," A-Sang says with a gentle squeeze of his hand. It is high up and he has his fingertips positioned just right for his nails to dig into the sensitive flesh of Meng Yao's inner thigh. "You avoided it, which is quite rude of you. I won't hold it against you, though."

"Which, ah—which question?" He remembers, of course. Meng Yao remembers everything.

"Will you stay? Do you want to stay?"

He doesn't look at Mingjue. "Yes."

Nie Huaisang leads them to his bedroom once they have all eaten their fill, each of their hands in one of his.

Meng Yao doesn't know what to expect. It is clear from the look on his face that Nie Mingjue doesn't know either, and that is almost enough to make Meng Yao laugh. He doesn't, but he does smile at Mingjue, small and genuine in a way he rarely allows from himself, and it is gratifying to see Mingjue's expression soften around the eyes after so many days of icy distance between them.

They stand there like statues after Huaisang releases them and drifts around his room, preparing himself for bed.

"Meng Yao," Mingjue says softly. "You do not need to do anything you do not freely choose."

"I have chosen him already," Meng Yao replies, furrowing his brow.

"No, I..." He trails off, clears his throat, then tries again. "I am not deaf to the gossip of the palace. I know people believe you—that your position is not because of the quality of your work, but that I favour you for, uh. Salacious reasons."

Ah.

"I had hoped you were unaware," he says quietly. "It is an unpleasant rumour and I did not ever want the nature of my parentage and my upbringing to damage your reputation as a fair and honourable man. I am truly grateful for this job and all you have done for me, Mingjue."

"I could have done more. I could have told people to stop talking about you like that."

"And if you had, would it have stopped them? Or would they have seen your defence of a servant and the son of a whore as confirmation of their worst suspicions?"

Mingjue blinks, taking in his words. "Oh," he says finally. "I hadn't... thought of that."

No, Meng Yao thinks. Why would you? Aloud, he says, "But in answer to your concerns, as I said: I have wanted you from the first, since before I knew of A-Sang. Since before he told me you had similar wants."

"Oh," Mingjue says again, more faintly.

Meng Yao sighs. "I do not need any protection from you, if we do this or if we don't. It should not change how you treat me."

"I wish I understood you," he says, mostly to himself. "Meng Yao, I—"

"Have you finished talking yet?" Huaisang calls then. He is stripped down to his inner robes, sitting on the edge of the bed and finger-combing his hair free of its braids. "Surely there is nothing left to talk about. I'm beginning to feel very left out."

There is no chance, in a room of this size, that he could not hear what they were saying. Still, the attempt at subtlety is appreciated.

"We can't have that," Meng Yao says smoothly. He begins to unfasten his robes as he crosses to the bed, though he does not know exactly what Nie Huaisang expects of them tonight.

"No, A-Yao, let me," Huaisang says, his eyes lighting up.

A-Yao lets him. He lets Huaisang undress him like a doll, unbuckling his belt, untying his ties, loosing his hair from its braids, turning him around as he strips him of his orderly layers. He is pliant and unresisting, because that is the role he is expected to play in this game.

Nie Mingjue is watching. Meng Yao does not look back at him but he feels the dark heat of his eyes, the back of his neck prickling with gooseflesh.

"Perfect," A-Sang murmurs when he is done. "Your turn, da-ge."

From behind, there is the rustling of cloth as Mingjue begins to undress. Huaisang pulls A-Yao into his lap and with one hand turns his head so they are cheek-to-cheek, their turn to watch.

By now, Meng Yao has seen Nie Mingjue shirtless many times on the training ground. It is nothing new, but it is always thrilling in a way he keeps close to the chest. But he has never seen him in the act of disrobing. It's a new kind of thrill, the grace of his movements as he reveals less skin than Meng Yao has seen before, but more of himself.

"Isn't da-ge pretty, A-Yao? He's undressing just for us."

"Yes," A-Yao breathes. "Da-ge is pretty."

Mingjue's breath hitches pleasingly and his eyes snap to A-Yao's when he registers what he called him. There is a wildness around the edges of him, a sudden loss of control that his face betrays as clearly as if he had spoken it aloud. As if any of them have any control here but Huaisang.

Still, Meng Yao files it away. Some things are worth making note of.

When Nie Mingjue is down to his inner robes, he comes to the bed as well. "Would didi mind finishing for da-ge?" he asks, touching his guan.

There is some rearranging of bodies to allow for this. Meng Yao moves away while Huaisang kneels on the bed behind Mingjue, removing jewellery, extracting hair pins and unpicking braids with his nimble fingers.

This part is wholly new to Meng Yao. He has never before seen Nie Mingjue with his hair unbound, unbraided.

He wants to fist his hand in it and pull Mingjue's head back to expose his throat, then suck a mark in the shape of his mouth into the long column of his neck. He wants.

But he has to be satisfied with watching for now. He can be satisfied with it. What is one more hour after he has already waited this long? What is one more night?

The bed is spacious enough for them to lie side by side by side, though while Huaisang takes the position in the middle, he doesn't lie down. He sits, absently stroking Meng Yao's hair like he is petting an animal. He would bristle at that from anyone but Huaisang, but it is Huaisang, and a warm glow suffuses his chest as he leans into the touch.

Everything will be alright, just as A-Sang said it would be.

"Da-ge," Huaisang says, his fingers still in A-Yao's hair, stroking lazily. "Do you want to see me kiss A-Yao? Do you want to know what makes him hard? I can show you."

The jagged edges of the breath Mingjue lets out are sharp enough to slit a throat. A-Yao can't look at either of them.

"Da-ge," he says again, his voice low.

"Yes," Nie Mingjue says, the weight of the word like a blow. "I want you to show me."

A-Sang hums, a pleased little sound. He urges Meng Yao into his lap, one knee on either side of his hips. He guides their mouths together, gentle kisses that soon deepen into something open-mouthed and wanting. Their chests are flush and A-Yao is sure Huaisang can feel the frantic pace of his heart as it pounds against the inside of his ribs like it's trying to force itself into Huaisang's body.

It belongs to him, anyway.

Beside them, Meng Yao can hear that Mingjue is breathing more heavily. Not as fast as either of them, but the tone of it suggests he is not averse to what he sees.

They kiss for what feels like a long time and also no time at all, until the glow in A-Yao's chest has deepened into an aching want and he is panting against Huaisang's parted, perfect lips.

He holds the flat of his hand up to Meng Yao's mouth and says, "Get me nice and wet for you, A-Yao." Once A-Yao has—licking messily over his palm again and again—Huaisang slips his hand into the front of his trousers.

He is already half-hard when A-Sang curls his fingers around his cock and it doesn't take much more—a few overhand strokes, Huaisang's thumb playing lightly with his foreskin and slit—to bring him to full hardness. Then he stills the movement of his hand. A-Yao pants against his ear, pushing into his grip with incremental thrusts of his hips. "A-Sang," he says, pleading. "A-Sang."

"Shh. I know, but I need you to lean back so da-ge can see you."

His words send a rush of heat through Meng Yao, a heightening of tension. Reluctantly, he sits up, placing a hand behind himself and leaning his weight on it. Huaisang pulls A-Yao's dick out of his trousers and readjusts his grip, making sure Mingjue can see everything.

"Good," he says. "Isn't A-Yao good, da-ge?"

"Yes," Mingjue says. He grips his own cock through the thin fabric of his trousers; not stroking himself yet, but he is very clearly hard. The cloth is wet where his tip tents it outward, and Meng Yao shivers, running his tongue across his lower lip. He doesn't quite dare to make eye contact with Mingjue, and it's immaterial when Huaisang starts stroking him again, because his eyes close of their own accord.

By now, Huaisang knows exactly what A-Yao likes. He knows how to tease him, to give him just enough to bring him closer and closer but not send him over the edge. Meng Yao rocks into the circle of his fingers, but it's slow, less urgent now he knows Huaisang is taking care of him.

"You should open your eyes again," A-Sang murmurs. "Look at da-ge like he's looking at you."

Opening his eyes feels like a herculean task, but he manages it, blinking them a few times before he can focus on Mingjue.

Mingjue is—fuck. He's pulled his cock out of the front of his trousers and has one hand around himself, stroking at the same pace that Huaisang is stroking Meng Yao. The other hand is clenched tight in the sheets. His eyes are flicking between Huaisang's face, Meng Yao's face, and Huaisang's hand on Meng Yao's cock, like he can't decide which is the best part of the scene before him.

"You see, A-Yao? I told you he'd be happy to see us together. Didi knows how to please his da-ge." He tightens his hand with each downstroke, loosens it on the upstroke. It is maddening in the best possible way.

"Is, ah—is da-ge pleased by this one, as well?" A-Yao asks, his voice roughened by arousal.

"A-Yao, yes," Mingjue says—moans, really, and A-Yao moans too, his cock twitching in Huaisang's grip, leaking another sticky gush of precome over his fingers. "Yes, both of you are very—p-pleasing."

Meng Yao lets his eyes flutter shut again, tilting his head back and giving himself over to the sensation of Huaisang's hand, the sound his cock makes as he thrusts into it. The noises all three of them are making in the otherwise silent room, gasps and groans and skin against skin. He sucks in a breath and holds it when he comes in heavy, pulsing spurts, his thighs trembling as he spends himself across Huaisang's hand and the front of his inner robes.

"So good," A-Sang says, stroking him until the last of his orgasm has passed and he can breathe again. Then he gathers Meng Yao up in his arms and kisses him.

It doesn't take A-Yao long to realise Huaisang's erection is trapped between them, pressed hot and hard against his belly, and he extricates himself from the kiss, moving down to lie between his legs.

"A-Sang," he says, nuzzling against his cock through the cloth, "can I...?"

"Yes, show da-ge how good your mouth is," Huaisang says with a soft laugh and a dark look directed at Mingjue. "And maybe next time he can have it, too." He threads his fingers through Meng Yao's hair, dragging his nails lightly over his scalp.

"Fuck." Mingjue groans under his breath and digs his heels into the bed, leveraging himself to fuck into his fist as if moving his hand alone is no longer enough.

A-Yao allows himself the count of three to watch and burn the image into his mind before he frees A-Sang's cock from the confines of his trousers and wraps his mouth around the head. Huaisang hisses softly, his fingers closing tight around a fistful of hair. He is heavy against Meng Yao's tongue, salty and a little bitter where he laps at his slit.

He uses his hand and his mouth in concert, not bothering to try and take Huaisang deep, but nor does he tease him. The time for that is long past, with Mingjue jerking himself to orgasm beside them and Huaisang already having been so good to A-Yao. He's not precious about his teeth, either; A-Sang likes it a little rough, doesn't mind if A-Yao leaves marks on any part of him.

(Meng Yao has got the impression, before, that Mingjue is more careful with him. That he is giving A-Sang something his brother does not.)

It is not long before he is spilling into A-Yao's mouth, panting his name as he comes. Next to them, Nie Mingjue is beyond saying either of their names, but from the sound of it, he comes just as hard.

(A-Yao does not look. A-Yao cannot look anywhere but up at A-Sang.)

He swallows everything, easing off A-Sang's cock with a final delicate kiss to the head.

"Good," Huaisang says when he has had a chance to catch his breath. He unclenches his fingers, lets go of Meng Yao's hair so he can caress his cheek instead. "Now, A-Yao, I think you should give da-ge a taste of me."

A-Yao is moving before he really registers the words. He leans over Mingjue, who still has his softening cock gripped in one hand, and kisses him. He is cautious, in case—but Mingjue licks into his mouth without hesitation, seeking out the taste of Huaisang that lingers there. The moustache is different—Meng Yao has never kissed anyone with facial hair before, beyond the rasp of a day's end stubble—but it is not unpleasant. He lets his mouth fall open, lets him in as deep as he wants to go, and it would seem that Mingjue wants. It is a messy sort of half-kiss, more about who else has recently been in A-Yao's mouth than anything, and it is over all too soon.

"Good," Huaisang says again, reclining against the pillows. He sounds on the verge of sleep and it is all too easy for the three of them to curl up together, sticky and sated, and drift off.

In the morning, A-Yao is the first to wake, his nose pressed into the nape of Huaisang's neck. When he sits up, Huaisang makes a sleepy noise of unhappiness, uncurling himself from where he is plastered against Mingjue's broad back. Mingjue stirs in his turn with a hitch of breath, then a slow, deep sigh.

"It's morning," A-Yao says softly. He leans back down to kiss Huaisang, ignoring the voice in his head that urges him to get back into bed, fall back to sleep, spend the day here, spend his life here.

The voice sounds like Huaisang. It is hard to ignore.

On the other side of him, Nie Mingjue sits up as well, digging the heel of his hand into his eye and yawning. His hair is a mess, but then A-Yao is sure his own can't be in a much better state.

Huaisang, of course, is perfect.

Meng Yao slips out of bed, suppressing a shiver at the chill in the air. It feels worse than normal, but maybe that's an inevitable consequence of sleeping in a bed with two other warm bodies, pressed against and wrapped around one another. He dresses quickly but it is no real substitute for what he is leaving behind.

"This is so unfair," Huaisang says, a whine creeping into his tone. "It's so much worse than just one of you leaving me alone."

"I'm sorry, didi," Mingjue says, his voice sleep-rough. He takes his turn kissing Huaisang, then gets up as well and begins collecting his clothes from where he left them the night before.

A-Yao helps; he is not a valet and it has never been part of his duties to do this sort of thing, but he helps. It is too odd to stand and watch Nie Mingjue get dressed, though it's clear that Huaisang feels no such compunction as he luxuriates in his bed and observes them both. A-Yao finds Mingjue's guan, his hair ornaments, and presses them into his hands wordlessly.

"Thank you, Meng Yao—A-Yao—Meng Yao?"

"Meng Yao," he says, and pauses for the smallest moment to appreciate the dawning panic on Mingjue's face before continuing, "is better kept for other people who may overhear. Here, or when we are alone, you may call me A-Yao—if you wish."

Huaisang giggles quietly, turning his face into the pillow. "A-Yao! Don't tease da-ge like that."

"My apologies," A-Yao says, curling the corners of his mouth into just enough of a smile for his cheeks to dimple slightly. He knows people find that appealing, but he has rarely had occasion to try it on Mingjue.

Mingjue flushes pink. "I thought I had my hands full with just Huaisang," he says, a little strangled. "Now there are two of you."

"Oh!" Huaisang says, sitting up suddenly. He climbs out of bed and crosses the room to a chest of drawers, digging through it with single-minded focus and making a noise of triumph when he finds what he is searching for. "A-Yao, I want you to have this. To make up for not getting to spend your birthday together."

He presents A-Yao with a guan: smaller and more delicate than the guan Huaisang favours, and far smaller than the heavy guan Mingjue wears, but so much finer than the unadorned leather A-Yao uses to secure his hair. Finer than anything Meng Yao has ever worn. His throat tightens.

"I cannot—"

"Yes," Huaisang says firmly, "you can."

"I gave you that guan, didi," Mingjue says mildly.

"And I never wear it any more! Why not gift it to A-Yao? That way," he says, his eyes glinting darkly, "whenever you see him wearing it, you will think of me. That way whenever you wear it, A-Yao, you will think of me. You will carry a piece of me where I cannot go."

"Thank you," A-Yao says, because there is nothing else to say. He closes his fingers around the guan. The iron is worn soft and rounded with age and use, and it does not bite into his hand when he squeezes. "I will wear it and think of you."

Huaisang straightens the collar of Meng Yao's robes, then throws himself into his arms, kissing his cheek, his jaw, his ear. "Good," he breathes. "Then come back to me tonight and show me how you look in it."

Fondness warms A-Yao's chest like embers that have just been stoked. "If not tonight, then soon," he promises, and Huaisang's mouth finds his for a deep, claiming kiss. If he has any objection to A-Yao's sleep-stale breath, he does not voice it.

After Huaisang has kissed them both thoroughly and then returned to bed, saying it is simply too cold for him to see them off, A-Yao and Mingjue set off on a silent journey together, back to the door into Mingjue's chambers.

"I should return this," Mingjue says before he can quietly slip away into the corridor. He holds the key to the study in his hand. "I will retrieve the other key from Nie Jian later and you can resume your duties as before. If you still wish to—I understand if you would rather not. It was never intended to be part of your job."

"I would deliver A-Sang's meals myself if it would not rouse suspicion," A-Yao says. He takes the key, letting their fingers brush. "Thank you. For listening to him, and giving me this chance."

"Didi is very persuasive," he says ruefully. "But I suspect you have already noticed that, even before last night."

They share a knowing smile. An actual smile, the first one Meng Yao thinks he has seen on Mingjue's face. He has dimples, too, and it is almost enough to make Meng Yao forget what he wanted to say. He has to collect his thoughts.

"Last night," A-Yao echoes. "On that subject—"

"I would like to talk about that," Mingjue says quickly, "but I'll be late to training if I don't leave now. I'm sorry."

"No, I understand." And he does. He understands very well.

It still stings, small and needling under his ribs.

"We'll speak later." Mingjue takes his hand and squeezes, brief but unmistakable, and then he is gone.

When Meng Yao goes to the training ground a short time later, he is wearing the guan that Huaisang gave him.

Mingjue's eyes catch on it—just for a moment, barely noticeable—and his throat bobs as he swallows, but other than that, he gives no outward indication that anything has changed. He continues leading the disciples through their forms like it is any other morning. He glances at Meng Yao, but he often glances at Meng Yao and so this is not remarkable in and of itself.

Yet it feels like a victory, and A-Yao wonders exactly how he will react when they are alone.

"Will you come back after dinner?" Mingjue asks, late in the afternoon when most of the day's paperwork has been completed. "So we can talk. I understand if you have other things to do, but—"

"I don't," A-Yao replies, too quickly, and curses himself for it. "That is to say, I believe we have important things to discuss. Would you prefer me to come at a particular time?"

"Whenever you've eaten. I would—we can talk here, or you can come directly to my chambers, if—ah." The tips of his ears flush slightly and he stumbles over his words. "Not to—it would be more comfortable to talk there than to sit at my desk, I think? I meant nothing more than that."

A-Yao takes pity on him, though it is enjoyable to watch him squirm. "I will come to your chambers, through the study so there is nothing for anyone to remark on."

"How is it that you always know the best thing to do, Meng Yao?"

There are a number of things he could say to that and doesn't. "Am I dismissed for the day?" he asks instead.

"Yes, thank you." He nods to Meng Yao, who gets up and adjusts his robes before turning to leave. "And, A-Yao?"

He pauses, almost to the door. "Yes, Mingjue?"

"If you wouldn't mind... wear the guan when you come. It suits you."

"If it pleases you," he murmurs, and relishes the blush that spreads across Mingjue's cheeks.

It does not please the other servants. Between the loss of his keys and then their sudden return, along with the appearance of a guan that no servant should be wearing, the undercurrent of whispers has strengthened into a flood in the space of a day. It is the opposite of everything Meng Yao wanted, and he knows he should care.

He does not care.

Li Chengmin is the only one who dares to say anything to his face.

"If you don't want people to think you're fucking Zongzhu, you shouldn't wear that," she says as they stand at the door to the north wing. Her voice is low, so as not to be overheard. "I don't know if you are or not; it doesn't matter. But I saw the way people treated my mother when they believed the same thing of her and the previous zongzhu. It won't end well. If you are... he'll tire of you. Gentry always do."

"Thank you for your concern," he says mildly.

"I don't say this to hurt you, Meng Yao, but you're a servant. Eventually he'll marry some noble girl with a dowry worth more than ten years of your salary, a noble girl who can give him an heir, and then where will you be?" Li Chengmin sighs. "You won't have any friends left here. I don't think you have any now, besides me."

"I did not come here seeking friends," and this is not as mild. It is a rebuke and she takes it as it was intended.

"Whatever he has promised you, I hope it's worth it," she says with an unhappy twist of her mouth, and ties the blindfold across her own eyes.

He knows Li Chengmin means well. He knows she cares for him, despite the slow fade of their arrangement when he found his way to Huaisang. Part of Meng Yao even cares for her still, though of course she pales in comparison to Huaisang.

She has no idea what she is talking about. He will not hold that against her.

Onto the tray, A-Yao drops a single folded scrap of paper, marked only with the characters for tomorrow, and hopes that will be enough to mollify Huaisang. Then he guides Li Chengmin through the door and settles back to wait, counting down until her return, when he gets to go to Mingjue.

And she returns, and he goes, and he does not knock on the door between Mingjue's study and his private rooms before he opens it, and it is thrilling.

He is seated, reading what looks as if it may be a report on crop yields. No wonder Huaisang called his taste in literature pedestrian.

"Mingjue," A-Yao says softly, and he looks up.

"Meng—A-Yao," Mingjue says, breaking into a smile. Broad, genuine. Dimples again. He puts aside his report. "Come. Sit with me."

Meng Yao settles beside him, close but not quite touching. "Are you ready to discuss what happened last night?"

"Now there is nothing to divide my attention, yes. I'm sorry about this morning. You wanted to say something?"

"I wanted to thank you. I know I betrayed your trust—in truth, I expected you to send me away, or worse." Meng Yao catches his lower lip between his teeth and bites down. Mingjue's eyes flick to it. "I recognise that you would have been within your rights to do so, and the fact that you did not—well, I was surprised even before what happened after dinner."

"A-Sang is stubborn," Mingjue says when it is clear Meng Yao has finished. "He is like a dog with a bone; he would not let me even consider exiling you." He widens his eyes and imitates Huaisang's voice. "Da-ge! How can you be so cruel? Have I been a bad didi? A-Yao is the first friend I have ever made in this world, da-ge! Would you punish us both for daring to be friends?"

It is a surprisingly good imitation, and it startles a laugh out of A-Yao. "Then I owe him my thanks as well." He sobers quickly. "I would have been very unhappy otherwise. I was unhappy."

"I saw," he says. "I saw you were and I was so angry that I half-convinced myself that it didn't matter. What is one man's unhappiness compared to Huaisang's safety? But I was wrong," he adds softly. "Huaisang was never unsafe with you, and my protectiveness of him meant I treated you poorly. I'm sorry, A-Yao, for causing your unhappiness."

"He is your family."

"And I still wish to apologise to you." Mingjue sighs. "Do I wish you hadn't disobeyed me? Of course. That hurt me. And yet, I am glad you did. I am glad Huaisang has someone else, and I am glad—ah, I'm glad it's you."

"As am I," A-Yao says quietly. The words hang in the air between them.

"I think I knew something was different the first time I saw him after my return," Mingjue says, slow and thoughtful. He looks across at Meng Yao. "I know that must sound ridiculous, but there is truth to the story I tell about his health. He has always been—delicate. He can change his shape but it is not entirely under his control, and the longer we are apart, the harder he finds holding on to his—human self. I half-expected to return and find him changed, as I have before, but not only was he still human, he was stronger. And his face..."

A-Yao says nothing. He, too, has noticed a change in Huaisang's face. Since they—since what they did.

"I should have realised sooner," he says. "He looks more like you than he did before. Seeing you together last night... I don't know how I didn't see it until then."

He exhales sharply, off-balance. "Like me?"

Mingjue looks at him—really looks, his eyes piercing as they search for something in Meng Yao's face. It is uncomfortable, but he swallows the discomfort. "Yes, Meng Yao," he says, very softly. "Is that so hard to believe?"

Meng Yao prides himself on his ability to observe; he has done ever since he was a small child. How could he have missed something like this? He considers their faces, compares them. Mingjue could be right.

"I didn't realise," he says woodenly. He doesn't know how he is supposed to feel about this, and that makes it very difficult to know what to do.

"I don't think it's a bad thing," Mingjue says, still looking at him closely. "A-Sang likes you a great deal, and I think—it is probably unintentional, because of how he feels about you."

"He showed me his other self," A-Yao says. "I thought perhaps he was different afterwards, but I dismissed it as a trick of the light." He falls silent again, and he is grateful when Mingjue does not push him further. It gives him the chance to settle his mind, regain some control over his pounding heart.

He looks like me, he thinks, listening to the steadiness of his breath that feels like a lie.

"I have one more question, if you don't mind me asking," Mingjue says finally. "I asked A-Sang but he was evasive, and—I don't need to know, but I'm curious."

"I don't see any harm in asking." Behind the calm words, his mind races, trying to come up with what Mingjue might want to know that Huaisang would not answer. There is only one thing he can think of, but... surely he cannot suspect Nie Xiang's disappearance had anything to do with them...?

"How long were you visiting him before I found out? Since before my time away from Qinghe? You don't have to answer," he adds quickly. "It changes nothing."

The rush of relief is so strong that Meng Yao almost sways where he sits. "I am happy to answer," he says, trying to keep the giddy edge out of his voice. "The first time I found a way into the north wing was when the Lan delegation were here and you were often busy, but I did not speak to Huaisang until after you had left with them. The fourth day after your departure, to be more specific. And... he was waiting for me. He expected me."

"To think I spent that trip worried about him being alone for so long," Mingjue says, mostly to himself. "Thank you, A-Yao. For telling me, and for looking after him while I was gone."

"I am loyal to Qinghe Nie," Meng Yao says reflexively, and then he dares to allow a faint smile to creep across his lips. "In truth, my loyalty lies with you and with Huaisang. To me, you are Qinghe Nie."

"And now, are you also Nie?"

He presses one hand over his own heart. "I feel as if I am. I don't know if that's enough—"

"It is," Mingjue says instantly. Then he laughs, a sharp nervous burst. "If you want to be here, it is enough."

"Then," he says, slow and deliberate, "it is enough."

Mingjue looks as if he might say something, but he doesn't. There is a gathering of tension in his body, as if he is about to reach for A-Yao, but he doesn't. But last night he didn't either, and A-Yao is tired of waiting.

"Last night," he says. "You could have touched me, you know, from the start. I wanted your hands on me as much as I wanted A-Sang's."

Mingjue exhales shakily. "My brother is good at getting his own way. You kissed me because he told you to, and I—I am meant to be a better man than that. He can—I needed to know you weren't just going along with what he wanted."

"I could say the same for you." Meng Yao leans forward, looking at him intently. "Were you going along with his desires?"

"No," Mingjue says, soft. "Well, yes, but—I wanted to. I wanted you both."

"Then we are in agreement," he says. "I wanted you both as well."

"This is very strange," Mingjue says, rubbing both hands over his face. "I have spent years protecting Huaisang from the world, years where I was the only one who even knew he was alive. Before I inherited the sect, I could not even send servants with food for him; he ate only what I could sneak away from my own meals. I know he has told you something of his nature—that he survived what most could not at his age because of it—but from the moment I found him, it has been my responsibility to care for him the way our father did not. Without me, he would go hungry again, would be lonely again, and I couldn't bear that. But now... now you are here." He drops his hands, resting one on A-Yao's knee.

"I am here," A-Yao says, covering Mingjue's large hand with his own, smaller. "I know I don't have the years of history you share, but I feel as you do. I have seen what he is and he is terrible and beautiful. I don't know why you and I are the only ones who can see it, but I know we have to keep him safe."

"You," Mingjue begins, wonder in his voice. "Meng Yao, I don't know how you came to find us, what series of events led you to Qinghe and the gates of our home, but you are truly a gift from the heavens."

He blushes prettily, and it is almost entirely sincere. "I could not claim to be—"

"And yet. You see Huaisang and love him as I do. You see that we love each other as brothers should not and you are not repulsed, or driven to denounce me and tarnish my name."

"I think," Meng Yao says with a sideways glance from beneath his lashes, "that you love each other exactly as you should. If others wouldn't understand, then it is not theirs to know."

"A gift from the heavens," Mingjue says again, his voice so low that Meng Yao feels it in his chest more than he hears it. Their faces are very close.

The atmosphere in the room is subtly different than it was before. It feels like a tipping point. It feels like whatever comes next will matter.

Mingjue starts to lean in, and Meng Yao stands abruptly, facing away from him.

"Meng—A-Yao?" He sounds nervous, but like he is trying to control it.

Good.

Meng Yao rucks up all the layers of his robes and very deliberately straddles Mingjue's lap, letting the fabric fall and pool once he is seated. Mingjue's lips are parted slightly, and he does not allow himself to look at them for more than a moment.

"If we do this," he says, making unblinking eye contact, "I need assurances. I have no title to fall back on, no rank to protect me. I need to know what exactly I will be to you, and to the people of Qinghe Nie. I will not be Nie-zongzhu's whore."

"I would not ask that of you," Mingjue replies instantly. He settles his hands on Meng Yao's waist, his touch more delicate than the size of them suggests he is capable of. They are so big, Meng Yao wonders if his fingers could encircle him wholly and still touch.

He tilts his head in a way he knows is appealing. "Your... concubine?"

"No," Mingjue says, though his eyes darken at the suggestion and he slides his hands down to Meng Yao's hips, his ass, squeezing. "My deputy?"

"Is this a duty you expect from your deputies, da-ge?" He rocks his hips down slowly, grinding his half-hard cock against Mingjue through the layers of their clothes.

He groans. "No. No, I do not expect it... but I want it from you. Only you." Mingjue tries to kiss him then, but Meng Yao turns away.

"What will the people say?" he asks, sighing like he is torn. "If I am your deputy, your right hand? Will they still whisper that I warm your bed at night?"

"I don't care," Mingjue says. "It is none of their concern, and I will make it clear that they are not to talk about you like that. It is my right to take a lover, and if I am lucky enough to find one who is as much of an asset to me and my sect as you, so much the better."

"A deputy, not a concubine," Meng Yao says. "Your lover, your asset." He brings their mouths close together, so close he can feel Mingjue's breath, and murmurs, "Your Nie-furen."

The noise Mingjue makes is indescribable, wounded, wanting, and then he's kissing him; they're kissing each other like neither of them ever had another choice.

Mingjue kisses like Huaisang, though that probably shouldn't come as a surprise. It is also the last thing on Meng Yao's mind once Mingjue teases his lips apart with his tongue and slides it into his mouth as easily as he had the night before. It is deep and searching and sends a throb of arousal through him. It feels like his heartbeat; it feels like it has always been a part of him and he just didn't know it until now.

He wants Mingjue so much. He wants this so much. A-Yao moans into his open mouth, shameless. He wedges his fingers under the soft leather of Mingjue's belt, clings to it like an anchor, but makes no move to unfasten it.

If Mingjue stops kissing him so they can undress, A-Yao thinks he'll probably die. It is fortunate, then, that Mingjue seems to feel the same way. He bites at Meng Yao's bottom lip, tugs on it with his teeth and then soothes it with his tongue before he does it all over again. He kisses A-Yao like he wants to devour him.

Huaisang does that, too.

"Let me take you to bed, A-Yao," he says into Meng Yao's mouth between kisses. "Say you'll let me?"

"Yes." The word is scarcely out when Mingjue stands in one surging motion, as if the weight of A-Yao in his lap is nothing at all to him. He still cradles his ass in both hands, and Meng Yao wraps his legs around Mingjue's waist more because he has the opportunity than out of any need to support himself.

They do not stop kissing as Mingjue carries him to the bedroom. They do not stop when he presses him down into the bed. They do not stop, as A-Yao had feared they might, to undress—but they do undress, pulling at each other's robes until knots unravel and seams give way. Their noses bump, their teeth clash together; it is messy in a way that feels dangerously close to losing control, and Meng Yao doesn't care.

Mingjue's guan hits the tile with a melodious chime, but when Meng Yao tries to pull his own free, Mingjue groans and holds it in place. "Leave it," he says. "Suits you." He sinks his fingers into A-Yao's hair and tugs experimentally, then harder when A-Yao moans and rolls his hips up.

The slide of their cocks as they rut against each other is exquisite, the friction eased more and more by the slow leak of precome. The weight of Mingjue on top of him squeezes him tighter than a cunt between their bellies, and it is so close to perfect.

A-Yao wraps his fingers around Mingjue's wrist and moves his hand from his hair to his throat, bracketing the underside of his jaw with those long, strong fingers. The curve of his throat fits so perfectly inside the vee between Mingjue's thumb and forefinger, like they were both made for this.

"You want...?" Mingjue says. He does not take his hand away, though.

"Please," Meng Yao breathes, and then he does not breathe.

Mingjue does not squeeze hard, but he squeezes hard enough. A-Yao's eyes are shut, but it is as if lights are flaring behind his eyelids, and the pleasure builds and builds until it threatens to overwhelm him, and when it does he comes so hard he loses all sense of himself, of Mingjue, of the world.

When he returns to himself, Mingjue is mouthing carefully at the hinge of his jaw, his body still covering A-Yao but no longer moving, no longer frantic. A-Yao is almost sorry that he missed him coming, but there will be other chances. Maybe even other chances tonight.

"Is Zongzhu pleased with this one?" Meng Yao purrs into his ear, winding an arm around his neck.

Mingjue startles. "You don't—that's not—" He sees the smirk on Meng Yao's face. "Oh, very funny. Are you alright? I didn't... hurt you?"

"Not in any way that was unwanted," he says. "It heightens the pleasure. But I should have asked first, instead of—"

"No, it was—" He laughs awkwardly. There is a patchy blush spreading across his cheeks.

"Tell me," A-Yao says, carefully pushing a braid out of Mingjue's face and tucking it behind his ear.

"I liked that you told me what to do."

"Oh," he says delicately. "I think we can work with that."

Mingjue groans and buries his face in the crook of A-Yao's neck. When his next words come, they are muffled. "I have wanted this from the moment you came to the training ground, the very first day. You reminded me of him from the very first day. I never imagined I could have you, for so many reasons, and yet here you are."

"Here I am," Meng Yao agrees. He smooths his palm over Mingjue's shoulder blade, down his back. "I have wanted this for a long time as well, as I said before. Much as I tried to be professional, to hide my thoughts, I could not help the thinking of them, and I was sure you saw it on my face every day."

A half-truth. He is sure Mingjue saw what Meng Yao wanted him to see. That the feelings were real is irrelevant.

"I don't know what Huaisang has told you about our—about us. It has always been him, for me, and never anyone else."

"He mentioned it. Your loyalty to him is admirable."

"I cannot believe I get to have you both," Mingjue says against his throat. He sounds awed; far younger than his years.

"I find myself thinking the same thing," A-Yao confesses.

They sit together in front of the mirror, one in front of the other, A-Yao cross-legged between Huaisang's knees. Huaisang's fingers are deft and sure as he braids A-Yao's hair, and he does not waste time by asking if A-Yao understands the necessary motions. He just makes them for him to see and trusts he will remember—and he is right to.

In truth, this lesson is unneeded. He has seen A-Sang wearing this specific pattern of braids enough times to be able to replicate them with ease, even without a demonstration. But A-Sang wanted to teach him, and so A-Yao is his willing student.

There is also pleasure in having his hair combed out by another. It has been a very long time since anyone but Meng Yao himself has cared for his hair, not even when he was with Li Chengmin and she was teaching him about the braids, demonstrating on her own hair or simply describing how the braid was done. She never offered, but nor did he ask her to.

Fucking is one thing. Braiding someone else's hair is quite another.

He laughs a little in his chest thinking of this—the strange intimacies of Qinghe—and Huaisang presses a fond kiss to the back of his neck, just above the collar of his robes.

Huaisang is very good at this; there is some pressure, when the braids have to be pulled tight so they will not unravel themselves over the length of the coming day, but never pain. Huaisang knows unerringly how much leeway he has, and does not cross the line. There is love in it.

Though perhaps, later, he will ask A-Sang to pull on his hair until tears prick at the corners of his eyes. That would be a pleasant thing for them both, he thinks.

"You look so beautiful this way," A-Sang says when he is almost finished, settling the final pieces of hair into position and securing them with a series of pins. He puts the guan into A-Yao's hair last of all. "I wish I could see you beside da-ge like this," he adds wistfully.

"You can," A-Yao says. "You will."

"No, I mean—" He cuts himself off with a sigh, meeting A-Yao's eyes in the mirror. "Out there. I should like to see Nie-zongzhu and Nie-furen, leading Qinghe together."

"A-Sang."

He raises an eyebrow. "Which part are you objecting to?"

"I am not objecting to anything." He turns around, kneeling between Huaisang's spread legs and kissing him carefully. "I am yours as much as I am his, and you are his as well as mine. It is not him and me, and then you. It is all three of us, and I wouldn't have it any other way."

"Oh," Huaisang says faintly against his mouth. "But—"

"No," A-Yao says, kissing him again, then once more. "There is nothing else to be said. We are yours, A-Sang, and you are enough for us. We think of you whenever we are not with you, and I know I can speak for us both when I say that."

If Huaisang could stamp his foot, A-Yao gets the impression he'd be doing it now. "You're going to make me cry. Kiss me some more and maybe I'll forgive you."

"Yes, my love," he says between kisses, "mine, ours, our Nie-furen."

"Your room," Nie Mingjue says one morning. "It is very small."

"I am comfortable there," Meng Yao replies automatically. It is not entirely false; he has grown accustomed to it in the months he has lived here, and he has always relished having a space of his own to retreat to in times of need. Mingjue is not wrong, however: it is very small.

"If you wish to remain there, I won't ask you to move. But there are rooms on the other side of mine—they would belong to my wife, if I had one." The tips of his ears are gradually reddening, and Meng Yao observes the process with interest. "Unless what you said, when we—if that was just in the heat of the moment, I understand."

It has been on his mind, A-Yao realises. The way Mingjue reacted in the moment, when he called himself Nie-furen, had been more than simple arousal. He tucks this knowledge away.

"And do these rooms share a door with your own?" A-Yao asks, stepping around the real question as if he is tiptoeing delicately across a field of flowers. "So, for example, no one would see me entering your study after the day's end?"

Mingjue huffs out an embarrassed sigh. "I'm not ashamed of you," he says.

"I know." He brushes his fingers across Mingjue's jaw, feather-light. "It would be as good as announcing what I am to you, if I were to use those rooms. There would be no plausible deniability."

"I don't want that," he says in a rush, leaning into A-Yao's touch. "To deny it—would feel very bad. It would make me feel bad."

"I only want to make you feel good." This, with Huaisang, would be laying it on too thick. But Mingjue is a simpler beast. It would be so easy to hurt him, if Meng Yao wanted to hurt him.

(He doesn't. But he could, and there is a certain heady pleasure in that knowledge.)

"A-Yao," he says, turning to kiss Meng Yao's fingertips, one by one. "The rooms are yours if you want them. But only if you want them."

He pushes two fingers against the soft curve of Mingjue's mouth, gasping faintly when his lips part and they slide into the wet heat, scraping lightly past his teeth. "Yes," he says, locking eyes with Mingjue. "I want them. And it wasn't the heat of the moment. I meant it. I want to make the bows with you—and with Huaisang. I want to be your Nie-furen. Belong to you both."

Mingjue's eyes darken as his pupils dilate, slow enough for A-Yao to watch them swallow his irises. His tongue moves under A-Yao's fingers, and he withdraws them—as slow as his eyes changed—to let him speak.

"Huaisang will be pleased," he says, licking his lips. "It was his idea, a way to have you closer."

"A-Sang is so thoughtful." He leans down to kiss Mingjue. "Da-ge is, too."

Meng Yao stops eating in the kitchen with the other servants after he moves into his new rooms. There is no longer any benefit to pretending he is like them, not when it is so clear to everyone that he isn't.

He wears a Nie guan. He wears the braids of Nie-furen and lives in the rooms that have stood empty and waiting for years. Everyone in the Unclean Realm knows the position he occupies now, the esteem in which he is held by Nie Mingjue. Whatever their feelings on his meteoric rise, their whispers are silenced by Nie-zongzhu's favour.

They are silenced by the way Nie-zongzhu looks at his A-Yao.

Nie Huaisang likes to watch.

He likes to participate as well, of course, but he is more than happy to lie back and work his hand over his own cock while Meng Yao and Mingjue kiss beside him. His other hand is curled possessively around Mingjue's hip.

"This must be what it looks like when I kiss you, da-ge," he says dreamily, fucking the narrow channel of his closed fist with lazy thrusts. "So pretty."

Mingjue shivers against A-Yao's lips. All three of them are entirely naked, though it is still early in the night and kissing is most of what they've done so far. "It doesn't seem fair," he says a little plaintively, turning to look at his brother, "that I don't get to see what it looks like when I kiss you."

A-Yao laughs softly and begins pressing kisses along his jaw.

"Aw, da-ge," Huaisang coos, sitting up and shifting closer so he can nuzzle into Mingjue's neck on the other side. "I know it's not the same, but what if we show you how Yao-ge took care of didi while you were away? Didi is so lucky to have two big brothers to look after him."

"Fuck," Mingjue says on a harsh exhale. He pulls Huaisang up by the chin to kiss him properly, licking into his mouth.

Meng Yao is always impressed by the extent to which Huaisang has managed to condition Mingjue to be aroused by their blood relationship instead of disgusted. Not that A-Sang has ever said that he did in so many words, but it is clear to A-Yao whose hands are on the reins.

Mingjue has only ever wanted to care for his didi. He wonders when that desire was twisted from filial to lustful.

He supposes, when he stops to consider it from somewhere outside himself, that Huaisang has done the same to him. Or—was he always ready to fall to this particular perversion? It didn't bother him the first time he saw Mingjue and Huaisang together, though he had never considered it before. It had never crossed his mind. Meng Yao would remember if it had.

A-Sang is making small, ecstatic noises into Mingjue's mouth as they kiss, and A-Yao reaches between them to drag his fingertips along his length.

"Oh," Huaisang says, breaking away from the kiss with a gasp. "I know, I know I said we should show da-ge, A-Yao, but would you mind if he kept kissing me while he watches? I have so little, normally; would it be so bad if I could have you both tonight?"

Mingjue just looks at him, his eyes half-lidded, his lips parted and slick with spit.

"Let me get you where I need you," A-Yao says, "and then you shall have whatever you want, A-Sang."

"So good to me," he murmurs with the sharp smile that means he is getting exactly what he wants.

And so the three of them rearrange themselves on the bed. Meng Yao kneels and Huaisang lies down again, his hips in A-Yao's lap. The angle means he is tilted up, presented like a gift, and he lets his thighs fall outward, splayed wide and inviting.

"Like this, Yao-ge?" he asks, his eyes innocently wide.

He looks to Mingjue instead, stroking his thumb over the soft meat of Huaisang's inner thigh, just by his balls. "Da-ge, is this good? Can you see everything?"

"Very good," Mingjue says with only the smallest hitch in his voice. He turns onto his side next to Huaisang, spreading one hand across his belly, close to—but not touching—his cock, and Huaisang whines.

"Da-ge—"

"Only when A-Yao says I can, didi," he says, his voice deceptively mild, and oh, that does something to A-Yao.

"You're both horrible," Huaisang snaps, but he's smiling. He's still smiling the same smile as before, all teeth and wicked joy.

Meng Yao ignores him, secure in the knowledge that this is what A-Sang wants from him. He has a vial of oil to hand, but he presses the dry pad of his thumb against Huaisang's asshole and rubs lightly until the muscle quivers under the gentle pressure. It doesn't take long.

"I've forgotten," he says when Huaisang whimpers and bears down, "did we do it like this?"

"A-Yao..." The look he shoots Meng Yao is halfway between lust and frustration. It is enough to stop his breath in his lungs.

"Silly me." He withdraws his hand, pours the oil liberally across his fingers, and resumes the slow circling of his thumb.

They did not do it like this, not exactly. They are rarely this patient, too overcome by their desire for one another, but A-Yao wants to show Mingjue how much he cares for A-Sang. He will linger at this task and open him up with the devotion he deserves.

It is not easy to take his time with the way Huaisang's heat and weight presses into his lap; the way he rocks down against A-Yao's hand when he slides the first finger inside; the way his cock, flushed pink and very hard against his abdomen, twitches and releases a pulsing gush of precome across his belly and Mingjue's hand; the way he pants in time with the pistoning thrusts of two fingers, three, knuckle deep in his hole.

"Please—ah, please, Yao-ge, Yaoyao," A-Sang says, his face flushed and his thighs trembling. He looks like he is coming undone, and perhaps he really is.

"Da-ge would know better than me if A-Sang is ready," Meng Yao says, thoughtfully meeting Mingjue's gaze.

He swallows, his throat bobbing. "How many fingers?" he asks in the same tone of voice he would use to ask Meng Yao how many more meetings he has to sit through that day.

"Three."

"Yours are smaller than mine," Mingjue says, not unkindly. "I think didi could take a fourth."

Huaisang moans, his chest heaving.

"I think so too," A-Yao agrees. "If you want to touch him now, you can—in case it's too much. We should make it good for our didi."

Mingjue nods and wraps his hand around Huaisang's dick, giving him an experimental stroke, and he spasms around A-Yao's fingers with another sharp moan, his face going slack with pleasure. A-Yao has to pause and wait for him to relax before he can add the fourth, though as it is his smallest, it really doesn't take much to slip it inside him with the first three.

"A-Sang looks so beautiful like this, all stretched open for me," A-Yao murmurs. He rubs Huaisang's hip with the hand he is not using to fuck him. "Is this what he wanted?"

His mouth works on nothing for a moment. "Want your cock," he manages eventually. "And da-ge's mouth."

"Ah, of course," he says, exchanging another look with Mingjue. "You did ask, before. I think that would be alright."

The words are scarcely out of A-Yao's mouth before they are kissing again, messy and desperate and fucking gorgeous. He has to take a moment to grip the base of his dick because the sight of them is too much, even without any physical stimulation. Then, after one final thrust of his hand, he pulls his fingers out and prepares himself.

There is enough oil left in the vial for A-Yao to smear over his cock, though he could probably get away without using anything. Huaisang is surely stretched enough—but it still might cause him discomfort, even slight, so he will use the oil. Once he is thoroughly slicked up, he takes his dick in hand and presses the head against A-Sang's hole, using his fingers as a guide so he can rock his hips and push inside him in incremental motions.

Huaisang takes him so easily after four fingers. It would be simple to just—fuck into him, bottom out immediately in the sweet clutch of his body.

But he is showing Mingjue how he cares for their didi, so he will be caring. He will be slow and gentle. If it has the side effect of teasing Huaisang, that is just an added bonus.

The noises Huaisang is making into Mingjue's mouth turn reedy and frantic, and he wraps his legs around A-Yao's waist, trying to pull him in faster, harder. He resists, gripping Huaisang by the hips as best as he can, but it is futile. A-Sang is deceptively strong, and Meng Yao doesn't really want to hold him off. He doesn't want to miss a moment of this, of A-Sang spread out for him like a banquet, of Mingjue stroking him with an experienced hand that makes him judder and tremble around Meng Yao's cock.

No, A-Yao cannot deny him what he wants.

The pace they set is uneven, driven more by the clench of Huaisang's thighs pulling Meng Yao in than any movement Meng Yao himself makes; a necessity of their position. His hips are flush with the curve of A-Sang's ass, barely pulling apart enough to allow for any real thrusting, but the rocking motion of their bodies is enough to ratchet the pleasure building in Meng Yao's balls higher and higher. His eyes drift, wandering across the pale expanse of Huaisang's body, and next to him, Mingjue—the sun to his moon.

Mingjue's cock is within reach and sorely neglected, the colour so dark that it looks almost painful, and Meng Yao curls his fingers around it without thinking. His hand is still oily from when he opened up Huaisang, and it slides smoothly down his length. The sound Mingjue lets out is obscene and his hips buck immediately, seeking more. A-Yao is happy to give it to him.

He loses himself in it, the weight of Mingjue's dick in his hand, the tight heat of Huaisang around his own dick. The wet sounds of mouths and holes, fucking and being fucked; the smell of sweat and arousal that pervades the room.

The two beautiful men who are his, as much as he is theirs.

A-Sang comes first, shaking and crying out as he spills across his belly and up his chest, but the contractions of his orgasm wring A-Yao's out of him soon after. He is aware, vaguely, of Mingjue's fingers closing over his own, holding his fist tight as Mingjue fucks into it, and A-Yao comes back to himself in time to see the look on his face as he spends across their joined fingers. It's enough to make his own softening dick twitch inside A-Sang.

He unwinds Huaisang's legs from around his waist and withdraws as carefully as he can. One of his feet cramps uncomfortably and he places it onto the floor, leaning his weight onto it until it eases enough for him to stand properly.

"A-Yao," Huaisang says, his voice very small and sad. "Are you leaving? I don't want you to leave me, ever."

"Just to get a cloth," he says, gesturing vaguely between Huaisang's chest and his thoroughly used hole. "You can't sleep like that."

"I can," he says mutinously.

"Let A-Yao clean up," Mingjue says. He leans his forehead against Huaisang's jaw and murmurs something that Meng Yao cannot hear, and Huaisang laughs.

"Yes, yes. Thank you, A-Yao."

Meng Yao does not allow himself to think about what Mingjue might have said. He fetches a basin of water and a cloth, but Mingjue takes it from him when he gets back to the bed.

"Let me," he says. "You rest."

This is unexpected and somewhat discomfiting for that reason, but A-Yao reclines next to Huaisang and lets it happen. Mingjue cleans up his brother first, but then he carefully wipes down A-Yao as well, cleaning his cock and his oily hand, pressing kisses between each knuckle. A dark little part of him likes it, being served like this by Nie-zongzhu.

It feels right.

"You took such good care of me, A-Yao," A-Sang whispers, nipping at his earlobe until A-Yao shudders. "But you always do, don't you? And you always will?"

"Always," he says as sleep draws over him like a blanket. "Always."

When Mingjue smiles at A-Yao, he cannot help but smile as well. It is strange, now, after these long months in Qinghe where he had to be careful with even the false smiles he used to use like currency. The false smile feels ill-fitting on his face, like it was made for a different man altogether. He does not think the smile has changed. He does not think he has changed.

But he does not use the false smile for Mingjue or Huaisang. When he smiles at them, in private, in Mingjue's chambers, in Huaisang's bed, it is as if he is painting the contents of his heart across his face. It is raw and earnest and—embarrassing.

No. He would be embarrassed by it if he didn't see it reflected back at him, but he does.

He is kissing Mingjue in A-Sang's bed, and Mingjue keeps smiling against his mouth, which makes A-Yao smile, and that makes both of them laugh. Rinse, repeat. Across the room, Huaisang is sketching them, his expression easily slipping between concentration and wry amusement whenever A-Yao glances across at him.

Every so often, he directs them to move to a new position.

"Didi, I'm comfortable like this," Mingjue complains after the fifth time. They are sitting side by side, backs against the headboard, and Mingjue has one arm around A-Yao's shoulders and the other hand resting on his hip, tracing minute patterns there as they kiss slowly.

"Then it's a good thing I'm not asking you to do anything uncomfortable," A-Sang shoots back mercilessly.

"Da-ge, it's fine," A-Yao says. "You stay where you are." He slides his leg across Mingjue's lap, straddling him and effectively blocking Huaisang's view with his body—though considering all three of them are entirely unclothed, his body should be enough of a view in and of itself. He cups Mingjue's face in both hands and kisses him again.

"Hello," Mingjue murmurs against his lips. "Is this allowed?"

"I think we'll hear about it if it isn't."

Huaisang says nothing, so A-Yao takes advantage of his position and starts rubbing himself against Mingjue's belly, rocking his hips in a way that must be particularly obvious when viewed from behind. Beneath him, he feels Mingjue stiffening as well, the tip of his cock poking up into the crease of A-Yao's thigh.

He hums with satisfaction and kisses Mingjue harder.

The mattress dips under Huaisang's weight as he deposits himself beside them, flopping like he's been dropped from a great height. "I've drawn enough for tonight," he says. "The view was nice, but I think I prefer it up close."

With some reluctance, A-Yao breaks the kiss and stops the motion of his hips. "Were we very bad models?" he asks. "We did keep getting distracted." He exchanges yet another smile with Mingjue.

"It's very unfair of you to keep doing that," Huaisang says, pouting.

"Doing what, didi?"

"Smiling like that! Dimpling at each other. Why do you both have dimples and I don't?"

"Can't you just...?" A-Yao trails off and waves his fingers in the air, attempting to convey whatever it is Huaisang does to change his shape.

"No!" he wails. "It doesn't work! I keep trying and I can't get it right!"

Mingjue guffaws and turns his face against A-Yao's shoulder to try and muffle it. "Oh, A-Sang, da-ge is sorry."

"Da-ge is not sorry!" His outrage is plain on his face, his cheeks flushed pink and his eyebrows knitted together.

A-Yao cannot remember why he was ever unsettled by Huaisang. No, surely he was never unsettled by him, never afraid. He remembers everything, and he does not remember fearing A-Sang. Who could fear someone so sweet, so silly, yet still so loving?

Not A-Yao. All he has ever felt towards A-Sang is desire: first to learn about him, then a baser, more primal desire. He remembers these so well. He remembers everything.

"A-Sang, A-Sang," he says, keeping a tight grip on his own laughter. "Come here, beautiful boy." He begins pressing kisses to Huaisang's heated cheeks, the corners of his mouth. "You are perfect as you are. Don't change a thing."

Huaisang snuffles quietly, though A-Yao does not think he is actually crying. "Do you mean it?"

"A-Yao is right, didi," Mingjue says, once he has control of himself. He joins A-Yao in kissing Huaisang, starting with his shoulder and working his way up his throat to his jaw. "We love you like this, just as you are."

And then they spend the rest of the night showing him how much they mean it.

A-Yao slips into the role of Nie-furen with surprising ease. It helps, he thinks, that he has already been doing much of the work as Mingjue's secretary. His new position simply means there is less oversight, less seeking answers from above and more making the decision he thinks is best.

A-Yao is very good at his job.

One of the more pressing tasks is promoting or hiring a new housekeeper, but it is also one he has been putting off. He has given serious consideration to promoting Li Chengmin into the position. She is certainly capable, and A-Yao still feels—not guilt, not exactly, at the way their relationship ended, but he is aware he was not as kind as he could have been. Elevating her to a role that suits her talents better than simply fetching and carrying might go some way to smoothing over the broken edges of their friendship.

On the other hand, she would be very young to take such a role. She is only a few years older than Meng Yao himself and there are other, more senior members of the household staff who would take it badly if they were passed over in favour of Li Chengmin. They wouldn't be half as good at it as she would, but the social repercussions must be considered.

And even if he offered her the job, she might even turn it down, and that would make its own ripples among the servants. No, it would be better for everyone if Meng Yao found someone else. He will have to make amends with Li Chengmin in some other manner.

He wants to make amends, if only for the sake of not leaving the bridge burnt. But when it is her turn to deliver A-Sang's meals, she does not speak to him beyond what is strictly necessary, and he never sees her otherwise.

All things in time, he supposes.

There are a number of other benefits to his new role. Mingjue seeks his counsel in meetings, in front of visiting cultivators and gentry alike, giving his words as much weight as anyone who can chart their lineage back a dozen or more generations. And those visitors can no longer look past Meng Yao like he is of no consequence. They have to treat him with respect, because he is important.

His pay increases as well—Mingjue is very insistent that he still be paid for the work he does—but he has less to spend it on, because Mingjue is also very insistent about buying him gifts. He pays for the tailor who makes his own robes to outfit A-Yao with a whole new wardrobe more befitting his station.

A-Yao is not entirely comfortable with this at first, but it makes Mingjue happy. It makes his eyes darken when he sees A-Yao enter a room.

It is worthwhile, for that. He grows used to fabric so fine he cannot feel the weave against his skin. He grows used to the layers, and to being unwrapped like he is the gift.

No doubt people think when they are alone in Mingjue's office, A-Yao is on his knees beneath the desk instead of working. They're not entirely wrong, but if it does happen, it is more likely to be the other way around: A-Yao works diligently while Mingjue kneels reverently between his legs and sucks his cock until he can no longer hold his brush.

He rarely sleeps in his own chambers. If he is not with Mingjue in his, they are both with Huaisang.

A-Yao is so happy.

He runs his thumb over the hollow of Mingjue's cheek, down to the lewd stretch of his lips around A-Yao's cock. "Beautiful," he murmurs.

Mingjue moans as he is pushed further onto A-Yao's cock by Huaisang's steady thrusts from behind. He is on all fours, taking them both at once, and from the glazed look he is giving A-Yao from beneath his eyelashes, enjoying it very much. There is a thin, sticky trickle of saliva and precome leaking from the corner of his mouth, and almost absently, A-Yao wipes it away with his thumb.

"Who would imagine Chifeng-zun could be this eager to have his holes filled?" he asks conversationally, looking up at Huaisang.

"They don't know da-ge like we do," A-Sang says, eyes half-closed with pleasure. "They don't know how good he can be. Ah, you are going to be good for us, aren't you, da-ge?"

A-Yao eases his dick out of Mingjue's mouth to allow him the opportunity to reply, one hand cupping his jaw to stop him from chasing it.

"Yes," Mingjue rasps. He leans into A-Yao's touch, panting. "Don't—don't stop."

Huaisang digs his fingers into his hips for leverage—it will probably bruise, A-Yao thinks, and makes a mental note to overlay his own bruises in the same place—and speeds up his thrusts. "Da-ge," he says. "Da-ge, uh, you're so good to didi, he's going to come. Is that what you want? Do you want didi to come inside you?"

"Tell A-Sang what you want," A-Yao says, with an encouraging brush of his fingers against Mingjue's mouth.

"Didi, please—that, I want." He stumbles over the words, slurring. Huaisang moves one hand down from his hip to—presumably—wrap around his cock and stroke him, and Mingjue lets out a shuddering groan, his head dropping as he arches his back to meet Huaisang's last few thrusts.

They are both so beautiful. Huaisang's lips part in a perfect circle of ecstasy as he comes, his hips pressed against Mingjue's ass. And then, almost as soon as he has finished coming, he pulls out with a shaky exhale and one hand on the small of Mingjue's back.

"Your turn, A-Yao," he says, blowing a sweaty lock of hair out of his eyes and lolling gracelessly onto the mattress, jostling all three of them.

A-Yao still has his hand on Mingjue's jaw. "Can you turn over for me?" he asks, stroking the underside of his chin gently. "I want to watch you come."

"Uhn," says Mingjue, and carefully lowers himself to the bed before rolling over onto his back. His cock bounces against his firm belly with a wet slap. It doesn't look like it will take much to make him come, and A-Yao cannot resist running a teasing finger along the length of him. "Nnh," says Mingjue, clutching at his wrist and shooting him a wild-eyed look.

"Shh," A-Yao says, closing his fingers around Mingjue's cock and stroking him only twice before he is crying out shakily and coming over himself in thick spurts.

"Lovely," A-Yao says, a soothing hand on Mingjue's hip. He is still breathing heavily, still trembling, when A-Yao pushes his thighs apart to expose his fucked-out hole, clenching around nothing but the slow seep of mingled come and oil as it drips out of him. He's sweating, too; a thin sheen that covers every fraction of exposed skin, glistening where droplets catch and gather in the hair on his chest, his belly, between his legs.

"Messy," A-Yao says, faintly reproachful, but he directs it at Huaisang, not Mingjue. This part of the game will not be nearly as fun if they make Mingjue feel bad.

Huaisang shrugs, playing along. "I thought you wanted me to get da-ge ready for you. Don't you think he looks pretty, all oiled up and open?"

"Da-ge is always pretty," A-Yao concedes. He pulls one of Mingjue's thighs up further, hooking his knee over his shoulder, and pushes inside him with easy rocks of his hips. Mingjue is so wet. "Oh," he breathes, almost in spite of himself.

Beneath him, Mingjue whines, the sound trailing off into ragged gasps as A-Yao begins to fuck him in earnest, one arm still curled around his thigh to hold him in place. He has no need to take his time, no need to be careful; da-ge is as ready for him as he will ever be.

Huaisang once told him Mingjue would make noises like this. Pleasure flares in A-Yao's chest as he replaces that second-hand promise with first-hand knowledge of those overstimulated gasps and whimpers, a memory to treasure. He remembers everything, and he will remember this. Mingjue is not tight—isn't that the whole point?—but he is hot and wet and his slack muscles make a valiant attempt to clutch at A-Yao every time he pulls back for another hard thrust, burying himself to the hilt with a satisfied grunt of his own.

His eyes are closed, his mouth reddened from using it on A-Yao before. There is no one else who gets to see Nie Mingjue like this. This, too, is something to treasure.

"Are you getting hard again? You are," Huaisang says with delight. "A-Yao, da-ge likes it so much."

A-Yao has been watching his face, not his cock, but when he looks down farther he sees that A-Sang is right. Mingjue's dick is stirring again in spite of how recently he came. "Good," he says, speeding up the pace of his thrusts. "We want this to be good for da-ge, don't we?"

"Of course," Huaisang says, practically purring. He seems to be recovering just as fast as Mingjue, one hand on his own cock as he sits up. He palms himself lazily, shuffling closer to them.

"Can you see, didi?" A-Yao asks, solicitous in his concern. "Do you need us to move?"

"No, I can see. A-Yao is so good to his didi." He wraps his arms around A-Yao from behind, hooking his chin over his shoulder and peering down at where their bodies are joined, where every thrust forces out a little more of the spend he left inside Mingjue.

"Is da-ge tight enough for you, Yao-ge?" Huaisang says into A-Yao's ear. He is quiet enough that there is little chance Mingjue would hear his words over the wet noises of A-Yao's cock sinking into him again and again, even if he has enough awareness of anything else to listen at the moment. "Didi can help if he isn't. No, no, don't stop," he adds when A-Yao slows the relentless snap of his hips, unsure of where exactly he is leading them.

He touches Mingjue's knee where it is caught over A-Yao's shoulder, dragging his hand down the length of his thigh and bringing it to rest just beside where A-Yao's cock slides inside his hole without any real resistance. That, apparently, is enough to make Mingjue open his eyes and look blearily between them.

"Da-ge," Huaisang says fondly. "Do you trust me?"

Mingjue's answering nod is slow but definite.

Huaisang sinks two fingers into him alongside A-Yao's cock. He is not shy about it; there is no hesitation in the motion. There is a difference between tightness and less space than before, but A-Yao would be hard-pressed to articulate it currently. He would be hard-pressed to do anything; he loses all semblance of rhythm, clinging to Mingjue's thigh and grinding his cock helplessly against Huaisang's fingers. The contrast of the slippery heat that surrounds him versus the blunt intrusion of those fingers makes A-Yao's breath catch and his balls tighten.

"I wonder," says Huaisang in the airy voice he uses when he is about to say something particularly devastating, "if we could stretch da-ge enough to take us both in the same hole at once."

"Fuck," A-Yao says succinctly, and comes.

He is insensible with it, lost to the roiling waves of pleasure that flood through him, one after another after another. He is gasping words he has no comprehension of in the moment, or perhaps they are just syllables that carry emotion with all the artifice stripped away. It doesn't matter, really; nothing matters beside the way Huaisang is touching him, the way Mingjue is enveloping him.

He loves them. He loves them both. He loves them.

When A-Yao's mind clears, Huaisang is stroking his back in small circles, but it is clear his attention is focused on Mingjue.

He pulls out and brings a wet trickle of come with his softening cock, dripping down into the crack of Mingjue's ass and soaking into the sheets. It's a filthy sight. It is also arousing in a way he did not expect. A-Yao stretches out on the bed, on his side so he can keep watching as he catches his breath.

Huaisang still has his fingers inside Mingjue's hole, and he thrusts them slowly, the movement pushing out more of A-Yao's come. Mingjue is panting and rock hard, his fingers gripping the sheets so tightly his knuckles blanch.

"I think I could fuck you again, da-ge, if you wanted me to," he says thoughtfully. "But I need to hear you say it first. Only if you want it."

Mingjue's chest heaves as he gasps for breath, desperate. His eyes are wet with tears, glistening dark and beautiful. He's so beautiful. "I can't," he says, finally, sounding wrecked.

A-Sang hums softly, a comforting hand on his brother's thigh as he carefully withdraws his fingers. Mingjue lets out a whine of protest, but his hands slowly unclench from the sheets and his breathing steadies. "You did so well, da-ge," he says. "You took us both so well. Do you want to come again or do you need to rest first?"

"En," Mingjue says.

"Which one?"

"Ah, uh. Come."

"Good," Huaisang says. "You've been so good for us; you deserve to come as many times as you want." He sinks his mouth down onto Mingjue's cock, takes him deep right away, his lips stretching easily to accommodate the girth of him.

As far as A-Yao has been able to determine over the past few months, Huaisang doesn't have a gag reflex.

Meng Yao exhales and shifts closer, gently turning Mingjue's face towards him so they can kiss. He whimpers into A-Yao's mouth, returning the kiss with surprising fervour. He still tastes faintly of A-Yao, from before.

"Da-ge has done so well," A-Yao whispers, stroking his jaw. Below, he can hear Huaisang making some truly sordid slurping sounds as he sucks his cock, and from the way Mingjue is trembling beside him, he does not think it will take long for him to come again. Looking down, he can see the blissful expression on Huaisang's face, the motion of his shoulder and arm as he jerks himself off at the same time.

Without thinking, A-Yao reaches to thread his fingers through Huaisang's hair, feel the motions of his head as he bobs. At his touch, A-Sang moans around Mingjue's cock, and then Mingjue is moaning as well, his body drawing itself into a ratcheted line of tension that inevitably snaps.

A-Yao knows they'll regret it in the morning, trying to scrub off dried semen and sweat, but he and Huaisang are too exhausted for any kind of clean-up, and Mingjue is drifting so deep he is as good as asleep already. Fortunate, as he is the one occupying most of the wet spot. A-Yao and A-Sang curl up—one on each side of him—and hold hands across his chest.

They are beautiful, both of them, and A-Yao is theirs, and they are both his.

Spring is lengthening inexorably into summer—the dark, long winter little more than a distant dream, sun-faded and forgotten—when the letter arrives for A-Yao. It is the first such letter since he has lived here, which is no real surprise. He did not leave many friends behind when he left Yunmeng, and he did not make any to replace them anywhere else on his journeys, not until he found Huaisang in Qinghe.

He does not know why Sisi would write to him now, after this long.

His mother taught them both to write together. They kneeled side-by-side in his mother's room, once there were no more customers for the night, and practised until their fingers were ink-stained and cramping. Sisi's hand was never as good as his, but he can still see the familiar strokes his mother taught them both in Sisi's clumsy characters. It was never this bad, either, and the contents soon explain why.

Sisi is dying. She would like to see him again, if he can be spared, though she knows he must be very busy. She is so proud that he has found work with one of the great sects, though she wishes he wasn't so very far away. The healer says she will likely not see spring to its end. If he can come, she begs him to come now.

The latter is dated almost a month ago. A-Yao doesn't know when his hands started shaking, but they are.

He sets the letter down on his desk, smoothing out the creases left by his trembling fingers without really thinking about it. There is comfort in the motion, in the tooth of the paper against his skin. Mingjue finds him there two kè later, hardly blinking as he stares through the letter into nothingness.

"A-Yao?"

A-Yao looks up at him, surprised. He is normally not so distracted to miss Mingjue entering the room entirely, and yet he has the impression that this isn't the first time he has said his name.

"My apologies, I—did you need me for something?"

"Is everything well?" Mingjue asks, frowning. His eyes drop to the letter, and Meng Yao hands it to him wordlessly. "Who is she?" he asks when he has finished reading, his voice very soft.

"An old friend," A-Yao says. "She knew me as a child."

"Then you must go," Mingjue says. As simple as that.

Oh. A-Yao loves him. What an inconvenient time to come to this realisation.

"Thank you," he says, and it feels insufficient. "I should—the sooner I leave, the better. It is a long walk to Yunmeng."

"What?" Mingjue says. "No, you're not going to walk, don't be ridiculous. I'd take you myself on Baxia, but it is a bad time of year for me to be away and I don't think there's any way around it. You can ride one of the fastest horses we have, or take a carriage, and I can send an escort as well. You will," he says sternly, when A-Yao opens his mouth to protest. "Let me do this small thing for you, A-Yao. I wish I could do more."

"I don't know how long I will be gone," he says. "It has been a month since she sent this letter and I don't know how her illness will have progressed. She may have already—" Meng Yao sucks in a shaky breath.

"It doesn't matter." He cups Meng Yao's face in his hands and looks at him very seriously. "As much as I need you here, we will get by without you until your return."

"Thank you," A-Yao says again.

"Stop thanking me. You don't need to do that. I just wish I could come with you," Mingjue says, leaning in to kiss him. It is unlike their usual kisses—so light and gentle, but no less full of feeling for it—and it is the thing that brings Meng Yao the closest he has been to tears since reading Sisi's letter. "You know that, don't you? I would stand beside you and be your strength."

"I know." He smiles weakly. "Da-ge has enough strength for ten men."

"No, just for you."

And then A-Yao finally cries, messy and open-mouthed and gulping for air. He wishes it was artifice, but instead he is exposing himself like the soft underbelly of some crawling thing. He stains the shoulder of Mingjue's robes with tears, saliva, and, very attractively, snot. Mingjue makes soothing noises and strokes his back, his hair, petting him gently while he gets it out of his system.

Once it has gone on for long enough, he straightens up and exhales, reasserting control over his emotions. His face feels tight, his eyes sore, but that will fade soon enough. "I should tell Huaisang before I leave," he says, and his voice is so steady that Mingjue just looks at him.

"I can talk to him," he says after a long moment. "I'll explain why you had to go so suddenly; he'll understand."

A-Yao nods. "I will take a horse."

"Then I'll have Nie Zonghui meet you at the stables."

He doesn't need to pack much. He changes into travelling robes and takes a second set for the road, and a pouch of silver; enough for medicine to ease Sisi's passing if she still lives, or enough to bury her with the honour she deserves if she does not.

Then he goes to the stables, not quite running.

Meng Yao wouldn't consider Nie Zonghui a friend, but they have worked together enough times that they are friendly. While there are many in the Unclean Realm who believe Meng Yao's relationship with Nie Mingjue is mercenary in nature, Nie Zonghui either doesn't see it that way or hides it well enough that even Meng Yao cannot see it in their interactions.

They have never spoken of it directly, of course. Nie Zonghui simply treats him with respect.

"How well do you ride?" he asks when Meng Yao arrives at the stables.

"Well enough to get by, and no more," Meng Yao admits.

He nods faintly. "I thought that would be it. Zanbo is saddled for you—the bay with the white star between her eyes. She's steady, and she's got stamina. Follow my lead, don't try to outpace us, and she'll get you to Yunmeng faster than most."

"This one is grateful for Nie Zonghui's expertise and guidance."

"Zongzhu gave an order." His eyes soften a little. "He told me about your kinswoman. I'm sorry to hear that she—"

"Mm," says Meng Yao, who does not want to talk about it and risk losing his tenuous grip on his emotions. "Do we have food for the journey?"

"Some, but there are enough inns along the way that we ought to be able to get a room and a meal every night, so we shouldn't have to rely on it."

Zanbo is large, and Nie Zonghui interlocks his fingers to make a cup for Meng Yao's foot, then heaves him up onto her back. She doesn't seem to object to him clumsily attempting to seat himself, at least. He presses his hand against her neck, soft hair over hard muscle, and she flicks her ears back towards him. "Zanbo," he murmurs. "Be kind."

Nie Zonghui mounts his own horse and glances across at him. "Ready?" he asks.

He nods, and without further ceremony they nudge the horses into a trot.

There is—at the back of Meng Yao's mind—an encroaching feeling of dread, as if there is a storm on the horizon, so far away it is barely noticeable, and yet some part of him is still aware that it looms ever closer.

It may be grief, he thinks. Incipient, anticipated, but grief nonetheless.

He does not know if it will be worse to arrive in time to say goodbye to the last other person who knew his mother as more than her profession, or if he arrives too late to say anything at all.

Now spring has arrived, the city streets are busier than Meng Yao has seen them before, with people outside because they want to be and not because they have to be. As a consequence, it takes them a little longer than he would have expected to make their way out towards the road heading south.

There is an acrid scent on the air, the smell of something burning that should not be burning. It makes him feel quite unwell, his stomach churning. Between the smell and the stress of the day, Meng Yao's head swims unpleasantly as they approach the road, and he grips the pommel of the saddle with both hands, breathing deeply. It does not seem to matter to Zanbo that he is no longer directing her with the reins; she follows Nie Zonghui and his horse regardless.

This is fortunate, because quite suddenly his eyes lose focus, everything blurring around him. Only the rhythmic rise and fall of Zanbo beneath him remains, and even that is beginning to feel oddly distant.

"Nie Zonghui," he tries to say. He tries, but what comes out is, "Nehzzng." His voice sounds like it is coming from someone else's mouth, someone who is very far away.

Now it is no longer just dizziness and the roil of nausea in his belly. Now there is pain, wrapping around behind his eyes and to the base of his skull, like his head is being inexorably crushed by an iron band. Meng Yao cannot feel his hands. He was gripping the saddle before; he does not know if he still is.

His heart pounds in his chest, uneven and stuttering. There are illnesses—is he dying? He knows—but right now he does not know, because he can't think. He can't see. He can't breathe.

He is on the ground, gasping like a fish in the bottom of a boat.

Meng Yao does not remember when he fell. He does not remember hitting the ground.

His awareness shrinks down, smaller even than his own body. He does not know anything, and worse, he does not care.

When he was a child, three older boys knocked him into one of the lakes and held him beneath the surface until he thought he would surely die. He remembers hearing his mother calling his name, muffled and distorted by the water that pushed its way into his ears, his nose, his throat. She and Sisi had pulled him to safety, scolding the other boys and making things immeasurably worse for A-Yao the next time they caught him alone.

He hears her voice again now, that same warped quality to the syllables of his name.

No.

She has been gone for seven years, and it is a man's voice he hears now.

"Meng Yao," he says. "Meng Yao, can you hear me? Meng Yao, open your eyes."

He does not remember closing them.

"What is this?" he tries to ask. The slurred noises that make it past his lips are barely recognisable to his own ears.

Meng Yao has a detached sort of awareness that things are happening around him, but it is not until they are halfway back to the Unclean Realm that he is conscious in any meaningful way. He is, somehow, sitting on Nie Zonghui's horse in front of him, one arm wrapped around him to prop him upright against Nie Zonghui's chest.

"What happened?" he tries again, and this time the words are coherent enough, if still a little soft around the edges.

Nie Zonghui exhales harshly. "You had some kind of fit and fell off. I couldn't wake you up."

"I don't understand," Meng Yao says carefully. His mouth feels numb and alien, but if he speaks slowly he has some measure of control over it.

"Nor do I, but Zongzhu would have my head if I let anything happen to you, so I'm taking you back."

No, I have to go, he thinks, but there is another dizzying wave of nausea and he closes his eyes against it, and says nothing at all.

By the time they reach the stables, A-Yao feels—not better, not by a long shot, but more anchored within himself. He is able to dismount from the horse with only a little assistance from Nie Zonghui and one of the stableboys.

"Let me take you to the healer," Nie Zonghui says.

"No," he says. "I'm fine." But he sways as he says it, and Nie Zonghui has to catch him by the elbow.

"Again. I'd rather keep my head."

"I want to go to my rooms. I can lie down there. If I still need to see the healer after that, I can send for her."

His mouth thins into a displeased line. "I will take you to your chambers, and then I will tell Zongzhu what happened, and it is his choice if he wants to send for her or not."

"That's fair," A-Yao says finally. He waves Nie Zonghui away. "I can walk by myself."

He does walk, though he has to stop more than once to rest and catch his breath, one hand against the cold stone wall. Nie Zonghui hovers behind him the entire way, and the irony of that is not lost on A-Yao even now.

"Here it is," A-Yao says, opening the door to his chambers. "You have discharged your duty admirably and seen me safely to my room. If Zongzhu attempts to take your head, I will intercede on your behalf."

"Mm," Nie Zonghui says. He crosses his arms and doesn't leave.

"You are dismissed," he says flatly, but he still feels absent from his body in a way that makes it difficult to find gratification in Nie Zonghui's answering flinch. He knows, and does not care, that word of this will spread.

Nothing they can say will touch him. They would not go against Nie Mingjue like that.

He wants to be alone. He shuts the door in Nie Zonghui's face.

A-Yao's robes are muddy from where he fell, and he strips off the outer layers mechanically. At least he was wearing travelling robes and not some of the finer ones Mingjue has gifted him. When he checks in the mirror, he sees there is mud on his face, too; mud and clotted blood that has dripped from his nose and out of both ears. A-Yao has to scrub hard with a washcloth to get it off, and he watches it rehydrate and disperse in the cold water that fills the basin.

He wants A-Sang to tell him that all is well.

He understands a little more now why Nie Zonghui was so set on taking him to see the healer. But—he does feel better. Tired and weak, but his head no longer feels like someone has split it open with an axe. His body obeys him once again when he directs it.

Perhaps there are illnesses that could cause this, but he is not ill.

A-Yao remembers that night he walked through the city. He remembers reaching the road, and being able to walk no farther. He remembers that when he returned to his home—to the Unclean Realm—the feeling abated. He remembers dismissing it as a lack of sleep.

Is this your home?

A-Yao—Meng Yao—remembers everything.

You should remember why this is wrong.

He dresses again in the white and silver robes that Mingjue paid for, the ones that make both his and Huaisang's eyes darken with lust. He feels better in them. This is the role he plays for them; that he loves to play. This is who he was meant to be all along.

This was never who you were meant to be.

Mingjue is not in his chambers when A-Yao enters, but that is fine. He is Nie-furen and he may go wherever he chooses, and so he goes to A-Sang through the silent and unlit hallways, feeling stronger with every step he takes.

Turn around and leave.

Warmth fills him when he finds his A-Sang curled up with a book by the fireplace he so favours.

"A-Yao?" he says, tilting his head curiously. "Da-ge said you had to go away."

I tried and I couldn't, he says. But his mouth doesn't shape the words right. "No, I didn't. It wasn't important."

"Oh, how odd that da-ge got it wrong." A-Sang sounds confused, but there is no deceit in his tone. Why would there be deceit? "But... I'm glad you stayed. You would have missed my birthday, otherwise." He smiles and holds out one hand to A-Yao, who crosses the room to take it, lacing their fingers together. The chair is not big enough for two, so he kneels, resting his cheek against A-Sang's thigh.

He didn't get it wrong. I tried to leave. Sisi is dying and I want to go to her, he does not say, because the words twist and become something else between his mind and his tongue. "I'm glad as well. My place is with you."

Something deep within A-Yao's chest feels like it is tearing. He is so happy it hurts. He is so happy. It hurts.

It hurts.

"Yaoyao," A-Sang says fondly, combing his fingers through A-Yao's hair. "I do love you."

He leans into the touch, closing his eyes with a smile.

"I love you too, A-Sang."