#*slaps one of those baby on board stickers onto shuanghua*

[disastermages]

y’all asked for part two of the au where xiao xingchen raises wei wuxian

--

“Take it easy, A-Ying, Shuanghua won’t let you fall off.” Xiao Xingchen says, even as he keeps both of his hands on his nephew. “Just focus on going in circles.” The sword only hangs a few feet off the ground to begin with, just low enough to nix any possible injury as Xiao Xingchen starts moving the three of them slowly.

Shuanghua hums in the back of his head in answer, working to steady the wobblings of Wei Ying’s feet, refusing to even dip underneath his weight. “One must trust their sword before they can begin to fly.” Xiao Xingchen says, navigating a turn as they circle back around to their tent. Wei Ying already understood the basics of talismans and temperature regulation, sword riding had to be next, right?

He’d learned on Cangse’s sword, and if it hadn’t matched his sister’s energy, Xiao Xingchen wasn’t sure what would have, he’d fallen off of it more times than he cared to remember only to be put right back on it. At the time she’d told him she was making sure he could hold on through anything.

They make a few more passes around their little camp before Xiao Xingchen brings them to a stop again. “I’m going to let go now,” Wei Ying looks up at him now, his eyes big in the face of Xiao Xingchen’s smile, “Shuanghua is going to take you around a few more times, let him lead and concentrate on keeping your balance.”

“Uncle Xiao,” Wei Ying starts, but Xiao Xingchen only puts his hand on top of Wei Ying’s head.

“Shuanghua hasn’t ever let me fall off, A-Ying, it won’t let you fall either.” Wei Ying looks scolded for a moment, and Xiao Xingchen still doesn’t take away his hands. If Wei Ying really didn’t want to, he wouldn’t force him, but he hadn’t made any moves to get off either.

“Okay.” Wei Ying says finally, his eyes focused on Shuanghua’s blade while he readjusts the position of his feet, one right behind the other, just like Xiao Xingchen had taught him.

“Okay.” Xiao Xingchen says, taking both of his hands away completely, and stepping back before he directs a jolt of spiritual energy into Shuanghua’s pommel.

He doesn’t need words to tell Shuanghua to take Wei Ying to the treeline, but no further before circling back around, though he still watches them until they disappear around an evergreen only to reemerge from behind a different one a few moments later. There’s an even bigger smile on his face as he turns to start packing up their things, Shuanghua was having fun, and after the first few passes, so was Wei Ying.

His own sword had surprised him. It wasn’t that Shuanghua disliked children, it just simply hadn’t vibrated with interest at the suggestion of playing with them the way Cangse’s had, but it already taken to Wei Ying without a second thought. Xiao Xingchen was grateful for it.

Wei Ying and Shuanghua are already on their way back to the treeline when Xiao Xingchen calls his sword back, beckoning it with his hand and chuckling to himself when he hears Wei Ying’s delighted surprise when the sword begins moving backwards.

“Did you have fun?” Xiao Xingchen asks as he lifts Wei Ying off the sword and holds him up to eye level for a moment. He was heavier than he’d been six months ago, his eyes were brighter, and he was somehow even more energetic than he’d been that night. Good, that was a good thing, even if Xiao Xingchen was exhausted by the end of most days now.

“I didn’t fall off!” Wei Ying says, grinning and watching with rapt attention as Shuanghua sheathes itself across Xiao Xingchen’s back, the humming in his mind fading back into peacefulness. Shuanghua would be a good sword for Wei Ying to learn with, it was steady and firm in it’s position, even when it wasn’t in his hand, but Wei Ying would have to build that kind of relationship with his own sword one day.

This won’t be the first or last time Xiao Xingchen wished he knew what had happened to his sister and brother in law’s bodies and their swords, maybe Wei Ying could have carried one of them, maybe even Cangse’s if Xiao Xingchen commissioned a new grip for it, one that would fit Wei Ying’s hand when he was old enough.

Those thoughts wouldn’t reveal the locations of neither the bodies nor the swords, and Xiao Xingchen knows that. It could even be better that way, he thinks, for Wei Ying to have his own sword to name and bond with, rather than chasing after the bond the sword had had with the parent it belonged to.

Suddenly there are hands on his face and Xiao Xingchen is pulled out of his head. “Uncle Xiao looks sad.” Wei Ying’s eyebrows are knit together when he speaks and Xiao Xingchen shifts him onto one hip to run his thumb between them and smooth out the crease.

“Uncle Xiao isn’t sad, A-Ying,” Xiao Xingchen says, pinching Wei Ying’s cheek just a little, “I’m only thinking about how you won’t want to ride on Shuanghua anymore when you have your own sword in a few years.” It was true enough, there had been a few times where Xiao Xingchen had felt selfish enough to want his nephew to stay as small and sweet as he was now.

Wei Ying was only going to get bigger and older, soon enough Xiao Xingchen wouldn’t even be able to carry him like this anymore. Would he let him call him A-Ying still? Or would he want Xiao Xingchen to call him by his courtesy name?

Before those thoughts can truly take root, Wei Ying speaks again, squirming in Xiao Xingchen’s arms to try and get him to look at him again. “My sword will be friends with Shuanghua!” Wei Ying declares, holding onto the lapel of his uncle’s robes now, tugging just a little bit.

A flood of relief hits Xiao Xingchen then. Of course it would be that easy, Wei Ying made friends everywhere they went, his sword, though currently nonexistent, should be the same, shouldn’t it? “My nephew is smarter than his uncle sometimes.” Xiao Xingchen says, pressing his forehead against Wei Ying’s as he starts walking back towards their tent.

“Can my very wise nephew help me finish packing so we can make it to the next town before sunset?” Xiao Xingchen asks, setting Wei Ying down on the ground and kneeling before him, smiling when Wei Ying nods his head and sets about packing what he can manage. They should have left an hour ago, but he’d needed to teach Wei Ying what he could during their down time.

And perhaps, Xiao Xingchen thinks, it had only been a little selfish of him to let the ride go on longer than truly necessary.

~

They meet Song Zichen when Wei Ying is six and Xiao Xingchen has been asked to assist on a nighthunt under Baixue Temple’s jurisdiction.

“You don’t leave your nephew somewhere safe while you’re nighthunting?” Song Zichen asks, eyes cast down to the boy walking between the two of them. His temple had offered to watch the child, but Xiao Xingchen had refused and taken Wei Ying’s hand in his.

“The safest place for Wei Ying is with me.” Xiao Xingchen says, squeezing Wei Ying’s hand in his and glancing down at him. Back when Xiao Xingchen had first taken him, he’d tried leaving Wei Ying behind under the care of innkeepers and village aunties, but it never went over well. Either Wei Ying would wait by the door the whole night for his uncle to come back, or he would have nightmares that the same monsters that had taken his parents had come back for Xiao Xingchen too.

Xiao Xingchen couldn’t and wouldn’t fault his nephew for his fears, even if he did promise that he would come back each and every time he’d left him before.

“I hide behind rocks and in caves when the monsters come out.” Wei Ying says, sounding just the smallest bit insulted that it was implied he shouldn’t be here. “I can climb trees too.”

“And then Uncle Xiao has to come get you down when you climb too high.” Xiao Xingchen says fondly, looking over when he hears Song Zichen snort, his own hand covering the smile on his face.

“He’s laughing at me!” Wei Ying says, tugging on his uncle’s hand, though he doesn’t look the slightest bit mad, especially since he’d been trying to get a reaction out of the man since they’d met him. “Song-gege is laughing!”

And what a wonderful laugh it is, Xiao Xingchen finds himself thinking. He should probably scold Wei Ying for the over familiarity, but before the words can even come out, Song Zichen is already turning his attention back to Wei Ying, the smile still on his face.

“Apologies, I was only thinking about the sight of your uncle climbing after you in his nice white robes.” Even in the barely there moonlight, Xiao Xingchen can see Song Zichen’s shoulders shutter just a little and he hopes the color on his face isn’t as obvious as the heat spreading across his cheeks.

“Perhaps Song Zichen will get to see it for himself tonight.” Xiao Xingchen says, though something else entirely burns in his throat as he walks ahead and pulls Wei Ying along with him, only managing to look back once to see if Song Zichen was still following them.

His nephew truly could make friends anywhere they went.

~

“I didn’t figure you to be the fatherly type, A-Chen.” His grandmaster’s voice says from behind him, and he freezes before he turns slowly towards her. He’d noticed her, of course he’d noticed her, but he’d been ordered not to speak to her if he did when he’d left the mountain.

Baoshan Sanren stands with her arms behind her back, her face strict, but softening when her eyes take in Wei Ying’s face the same way it did when she looked upon her youngest disciples.

“Grandmaster.” Xiao Xingchen greets, bowing at the waist and peeking over to see Wei Ying do the same. Baoshan Sanren inclines her head before she comes closer, her eyes looking between Wei Ying and himself as though she were trying to solve a puzzle. “Wei Ying is Shijie’s son.” Xiao Xingchen explains, resting his hand on the back of Wei Ying’s head.

“Cangse? She’s here as well?” Slowly, Xiao Xingchen shakes his head, hoping that his grandmaster will understand without him having to say it.

There’s a split second where Baoshan Sanren’s eyes widen with understanding and her shoulders fall, but it’s gone as fast as it had come, her gaze entirely focused on Wei Ying now. “She always did so well for herself.” She says finally, blinking something away as she looks at him again.

“Have you found anyone to forge his sword yet, Xingchen?” She asks, coming to kneel down in front of Wei Ying, perhaps to look at him better, but then Xiao Xingchen sees her take something out of her sleeve and offer it to him.

Wei Ying looks back at him to ask permission and Xiao Xingchen nods his head once, his hand dropping down to his nephew’s shoulder.

“Not yet, I’ve just started looking.” He answers honestly, something warm uncurling in his chest when he sees that Wei Ying has only been given a piece of candy.

“You may both visit the mountain in a year’s time, I’ll have something made for him by then.” Baoshan Sanren says, no room for any kind of argument in her words as she rises back to her feet. “My grandchild will have a proper sword.”

Xiao Xingchen’s throat is too tight to speak as he nods, moving to bow again, but when he looks up, Baoshan Sanren is already gone, leaving Wei Ying looking up at him with eyes as big as plates.

“Was that really her? Was that our grandmaster?” At eight years old, Wei Ying should be too old to be pulling at his uncle’s sleeves like he is, but Xiao Xingchen can’t deny him this.

“Yes,” Xiao Xingchen answers finally, when his throat has loosened, “We should tell Uncle Song your sword is taken care of.” He means to ask if Wei Ying has any questions, about the mountain, about Baoshan Sanren, about his sword, but the words stick and Wei Ying is already talking. Xiao Xingchen suspects that if his nephew does have questions, they’ll come in the middle of the night as usual.