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The Dozing General favors finches. All the Luofu denizens know that, from the children swinging models of the General’s glaive on their front porches, to Qingzu cleaning up yet another stack of documents at the office. She sighs and says “General” in a warning tone, not unlike an overly henpecked grandmother (though the General is at least centuries older than her), then watches as her boss laughs and shakes his head, finches falling out of his hair left and right, like round and feathery fruits from a tall and fluffy white tree.
Similarly to Qingzu, most people who frequent the General’s presence have already developed their own attitudes towards the General’s ever-present feathered entourage. Fu Xuan had long since given up commenting on their propriety (or lack thereof), and whenever she hears a muffled chirp during the meetings of the Six Charioteers, she only pops a vein or two and gallantly carries on. Yanqing is fascinated by them, though he has yet refused to admit that out loud to anyone—something about how only children are fascinated by small, fuzzy things, and Yanqing is a proper Cloud Knight Lieutenant now! Yukong seems to have her own soft spot for them, and she will at times stare up at them with this brightness in her eyes, watching quietly as they take flight.
~
Jing Yuan had not always favored finches. Way back when, when he was not yet the General of the Divine Foresight, much less earned himself any monikers, he had still seen them around often. They sang cheerfully outside his barracks when he woke up at dawn for his drills, and they would wander about his boots as he wolfed down his lunch during break times, fishing for crumbs. He would flick off a few extra grains of rice for them, watching as they hopped about on their thin, fragile little legs. Then, if he was in a particular mood that day, he would set down his food basket, wave his arms about and give a great shout. They would scatter then, taking to the skies in an explosion of feathers and scolding squawks. In mere moments it would be as if they were never there, save for a few tufts of down and the remnants of his lunch on the ground.
Sometimes he’d see them lying limply on the ground, those finches. Perhaps a cat or other had gotten to them, or maybe they had flung their little bodies into the windows or the walls of the Luofu’s many buildings. Or perhaps a starskiff had run into them, its comparatively massive form heedless of the tiny creatures in its way, too insignificant to even be deemed obstacles. Or perhaps they had simply grown too old, until their wings could no longer keep them in the skies. He would gaze at them for a moment, transfixed, before taking a step and moving on with his day, forgetting all about them until the next morning or lunch time.
Yes, Jing Yuan had not always favored finches.
“Ah, but are you not like a finch yourself, with how you’re always chittering away over my shoulder?” Yingxing had told him one day, on a day like any other, so long ago that the background of the whole conversation had by now fallen away. Only Yingxing remained, with his then still-dark hair looped into a neat coil behind his head, his hairpin gleaming like a star. Perhaps they had been at the apprentices’ forge then, since the Yingxing he remembered here had still been a youth. He too, had been so young then, that he could still spend nearly every waking moment with that person not far from his mind, such that Yingxing’s comparison had quite literally ruffled his feathers.
His retort was reflexive, instantaneous. “Who are you calling small?! You’re not even that much taller than me!” He realized only after speaking that he was all puffed up, standing on the tip of his toes with his hackles raised, and his cheeks reddened upon realizing he was only proving Yingxing’s point.
The other youth had not missed his reaction, and he looked more amused than anything else. He’s not playing fair, he had thought back then, looking up at the other youth’s smiling face, bright-eyed with just a touch of mischief.
“If you have to compare me to a bird, at least do one of those ones that you liked from the Zhuming,” he said, deflating. It’s not fair. He wanted to be the soaring hawks and vermillion birds in Yingxing’s eyes, and he finished his thought with some feeling. “Finches are too small and cute. And they don’t even live that long. You want me to die early or something?”
“Ha! Compared to you, I may as well be a finch then.” Yingxing slapped his knee and laughed. He had a wonderful laugh back then—ringing and bright, as if he did not care if the whole Alliance could hear him. “After all, if all goes well, I will be gone long before you have.”
He swallowed. “Don’t be stupid,” he managed, his voice wavering on the last word. The finches, with their little bodies on the ground. Crumpled. Broken wings. He looked at Yingxing then and had an inkling then, of why his mother had kept her birds in cages during his childhood, those finches forever perched towards the sliver of sky beyond their green-shingled rooftops. He thought about cats, about windowed-walls, about star skiffs and the passage of time, and he heard himself say, “They’re too fragile. They die too easily.”
“But they are free,” Yingxing countered. He could not quite remember what Yingxing had looked like then, in that moment, but he could remember his voice soaring upward with quiet admiration. The other youth’s voice was not yet the deep baritone of his adulthood, but he remembered being held captive nonetheless, upon listening.
He heard Yingxing say, “They are fragile, sure, but they can go anywhere they please. They may seem insignificant, but their wings have brushed by clouds at heights that we can only dream of without the help of our creations. They have done that all on their own. Does that not make them hardy in their own way?”
“…I suppose so,” he said, begrudging, because he did not yet understand then.
“I may admire the hawks and vermillion birds of the Zhuming, but for you…I would rather you be a finch,” Yingxing continued. “The hawks and the vermillion birds are majestic, to be sure, but they are much harder to love, and far more tied down to their hunting posts and symbolic meanings. Wasn’t your greatest dream to be free among the stars and see all the worlds’ sights?”
“…I suppose so.”
“Then don’t forget that, and you will be just fine.” Yingxing smiled and wiped a hand across his forehead, the way he would at the end of a good day’s work. He glanced toward Jing Yuan once, with those bright eyes, devoid of mischief this time, and he said, “It’s alright to love them, you know. I’ve walked by your training grounds before and saw you feeding them your leftovers more than once. There’s nothing wrong with loving something even if it may be gone sooner than you.”
~
Years later, he had reminded Yingxing of his words then, after he had snatched that majestic glaive with its finch on the handle from the craftsman’s willing hands, stealing a kiss in the process.
~
And years after that, Yingxing was gone. Though not quite in the way he had promised, he had thought with some grim humor.
~
“General, you have so many finches following you around the whole time, have you ever thought about keeping them?” Yanqing asks him one day at the end of a particularly good campaign. Perhaps his success on the field had finally convinced the boy that even proper Cloud Knight Lieutenants can spare the time to look at small, fuzzy, cute things. It was good to see the boy show interest in a matter that wasn’t completely sword-focused.
“Do you like the finches?” He asks Yanqing instead, smile warming into something more genuine as he does when talking to the youngsters.
“Not particularly,” Yanqing says, biting his lip slightly. Ah, still shy about it then. It was rather endearing to watch. The boy seems to notice his knowing look, and he blusters, “I was just thinking, wouldn’t it be a lot easier if we just kept them around? You like them, and they won’t die as easily either.”
“Perhaps,” he agrees, and thinks again of cats, of windowed-walls, of star skiffs, of the passage of time. Of limp and crumpled bodies, of freedom, of fleeting things and times that have flown on by, like birds on the wing. Of two youths who had both thought themselves finches but who have both grown out of it instead—one no longer so free, and one no longer so fleeting, caged in this world respectively by responsibility and a life that refused to end, no matter how broken the owner’s body had become.
Then he reaches out, and pats Yanqing once on the shoulder. “Or perhaps, these little ones would prefer to be free to take their chances on their own,” he suggests with a smile. His glaive materializes in his other head, the finch on the handle long-removed to the drawer by his bedside, and he says, “How about a spar? That way you can take your chances too.”
Yanqing’s eyes light up, and he leaps to his feet in one nimble motion. Another little bird to watch out for, that one. “Yes, General!” He exclaims, and Jing Yuan laughs and lets him lead the way to the sparring grounds, all while the finches sing cheerfully outside the barracks, signaling the start of yet another sun-lit day.