#mdzs/au: fluff

[thebiscuiteternal]

meng yao: (watches huaisang break kitkats across the bars instead of between the bars to hand some to a now-freaked out acquaintance)

meng yao: (once the other person is gone) why do you do that with everyone who's not me? not that i *want* you to, it's creepy, i'm just curious.

huaisang: 'cause if i do it enough times, they'll quit asking me to share.

meng yao: ... (realizes this means he's the only one huaisang doesn't mind sharing with) o-oh...

[guqin-and-flute]

Holding Me Holding You–Ch. 7 [3zun Raise Jingyi Prequel]

[Chapter 1] [Chapter 2] [Chapter 3] [Chapter 4] [Chapter 5] [Chapter 6]

[Ao3 Link]

[Holy shit, how has it been 2 years since I last updated this fic?? ANYWAY HELLO HI I MISSED YOU. We're keeping the baby, guys. CW: Disjointed, slightly nonlinear narration; negative self talk; more talk of battle aftermath, bodies (gross but no more graphic than prev chapters), and death; focus on lots of trauma to do with death and grief; general Twin Jade parental trauma; vaguest mention of child death, in that he repeatedly tells himself there isn't one and remembers part of his nightmare about Wangji/A-Fu dying]

Who are you?

‘Wen Baiqi.’

What must be done for you to rest?

‘Say goodbye. Tell her goodbye.’

It’s raining in Qishan. It’s nothing like the rain in Gusu.

Who are you?

‘Hei Xuecen.’

What must be done for you to rest?

‘All my fault all my fault ALL MY FAULT--’

This rain isn’t crisp, but disconcertingly warm. It doesn't bring life. It soaks into the ground, milling the dirt back into the blood and gore bloated mud of that night, sucking at their feet. Reeking of putrefaction. It coats Xichen’s tongue and throat.

Who are you?

Each time, there is a chance he will receive a reply from the Yiling Patriarch himself. 

‘Ye Qian.’

He never does.

What must be done for you to rest?

‘Never apologized--’

What would he do if he did?

Who are you?

What would Zewu-jun do? Clan Leader Lan?

What must be done?

Would he soothe his spirit?

Who are you?

Ghostly fingers pluck at his sleeves constantly. 

Who are you?

‘Nie Zixing. Never knew him, tell them--’

When he had first arrived, the bodies of Wei Wuxian’s Wen contingent still hung from the gate to the battleground. Or what remained of them. After scavengers, time, and the elements had had their turn. Swaying in the warm, wet breeze along with carrion birds’ cries and the distant tunes of the guqin language. Grisly pendulums. Dripping.

There is no small boy among them. He had hoped against hope, but now he knew for sure. This secret is tucked deep, deep down beneath his heart.

Who are you?

The corpses on the ground are Wen. They are Lan. They are strangers. They are Da-ge, lying bloody on the floor of the Scorching Sun Palace. They are A-Zhan.

"We should burn them like they did to our people. Scatter their ashes, so they will never rest." A venomous whisper from his own disciples, a young man, face twisted in rage.

(“They’re killing everyone,” he had choked his sobs into A-Yao’s arms. “My people--my family are all dead and I did nothing.”)

A-Yuan had been so, so pale against the sheets. So tiny compared to the infirmary bed.

“These people?" Xichen’s voice is quiet. "These cultivators that studied healing? Miles and miles from Qishan?”

Silence.

“Did they destroy our home? Did we fight them in Sunshot?”

Too little, far too late.

There is no small boy among them. There isn’t.

A-Zhan, gray and slack, eyes glassy, head lolling--

He pushes the dream-memory away.

Who are you?

‘Jin Mingni. 

My father--’

"We will bury them and hold the proper rites, as we have the rest of the fallen. And I will ask you to swear yourselves to secrecy regarding their exact resting place. In case anyone later shares your thinking.”

‘Zhou Sanniang. Never wanted to come. Save me.’

“Help me bring them down.”

There may be no small boy among the Wen, but he sees corpses all day, every day. They're in his dreams. He cannot stop seeing them. And he cannot stop seeing a boy (Afuyuanzhan) among them, from the corner of his eye.

He can never quite catch the face before he realizes there is no one actually there.

A skeletal hand is unearthed when they lift a body--a remnant of the Sunshot Campaign, years before. There were plenty of partial skeletons from that time that the Yiling Patriarch had raised to fight them. It seems some didn't have the strength to fight their way out from the mud. The death here has layers. A slow growing mountain of violence and dead and blood instead of stone. The building of the Burial Mounds’ successor.

Do the Burial Mounds have as many crows? Is it a feasting ground, as this has become?

They carry the quiescent dead, cover them with cloth, lay them in rows. Those whose spirits have passed on easily. They lie with their Sect members--when they are able to discern who they are. Still, fields of undyed cloth mounds, waiting to be retrieved by their loved ones, if they still live. Somewhere out there, there must be people still alive, families whole and happy, living in the sunshine. Somewhere.

Who are you?

His fingertips bleed from days playing Linhai and Liebing.

What must be done for you to rest?

Even those here that are living shamble like the dead--the rogue cultivators, his Lan disciples, the handful cultivators from other Sects, all here for the same goal, all hollow eyed and pale. He is supposed to be here for morale. 

They work deep into the night, far from familiar, ingrained rules about schedule and tidiness, here. Adrift.

What must be done--?

The fierce corpse is not a powerful one, merely tenacious. Shuoyue snakes out. It crumples immediately with a muted splurch into the muck, halved.

‘Tell her I loved--’

The top half of the corpse writhes, still scrabbling for him. The sound it makes from its ruined face is horrid. It's a wonder it can sense his yang qi at all; no eyes, no nose. Its robes are a splotchy black and rusty brown-red, but the Lan ribbon around its forehead manages to show a ragged white through it, here and there.

The talisman sears, blinding. It is enough. The body slumps for the last time. He can settle into that mud, summon Linhai from his qiankun bag for the Songs of Rest.

Who are you?

‘Lan Ruicai.

Show them all--’

The blood of the walking dead is no longer life-hot, but the same, unnerving lukewarm as the rain. He cannot feel it. He can’t tell where it’s stained him until he reaches his tent each night. 

He is efficient. He is in control.

The rain here doesn't cleanse anything. It hasn’t stopped for days.

Everything is the same color; the sludge, the thick haze of lingering resentful energy, palms, boots, the hems and knees of robes. That old clotted wound color. Dirt repelling talismans can only do so much before they are overpowered by the sheer weight of yin energy permeating everything. Stained.

There's no use cleaning. He tries anyway.

‘I was so scared, so scared--’

Who are you?

Sometimes, the spirits do not answer. Sometimes, they speak first, before he can even start the questions, raking the strings repeatedly in their anguish. Sometimes, they try to tear the guqin from him, try to rend his clothes, squeeze his throat. Sometimes, banishment is the only way. 

The sudden shrieks and roars at night startle everyone from sleep. If Wangji was well, he would be here. He is known for going where the chaos is.

Is that what had led him to this? To Wei Wuxian? An affinity for soothing chaos? For chaos itself?

Who are you?

‘Don’t know. Want to go home--’

"I can't anymore, zongzhu, I-I--"

"It's alright. Return to the Cloud Recesses. You’ve done enough."

Sometimes, he wakes in the night to find that he is in the middle of dressing, having no memory of doing so, a clump of cleansing talismans clutched in his numb hands. He has cut down so many fierce corpses, he’s lost count.

Who are you?

Food is tasteless glue in his mouth.

Who are you?

Every night, he is sure to take the medicine that gives him no dreams.

‘Oh gods oh gods ohgodsohgods--’

Every night, he prays that he has not left Uncle overwhelmed, that his people are being cleansed and healed back home, that Wangji has stopped bleeding, that A-Yuan is healing, that A-Fu is….

Who are you?

(What right do you have?)

What must be done?

He has been here for days that run into one, long, dark, meaningless drain. 

‘Son. Baby. Where is he?'

Who are you?

‘Pan Liu.’

His raw fingers pause on Linhai’s strings, still humming. Rain patters quietly on the hat that shields his face from it.

He knows that name. How does he know that name.

There have been plenty of others he had recognized among the dead, from different Sects and his own, from childhood, from Cultivation Conferences, from class. But each time, he must pull himself back to that life to remember, away from the rain and the red and the dead.

He can’t place it.

What must be done for you to rest?

‘My baby. Safe.’

The spirit is a thin wisp of light, playing about the strings, shining on the dark wood. Focused. Waiting.  

Who is your son?

‘Lan Fu.’

His mouth is dry.

("A-niang?" A hopeful little voice. The memory of a crumpled form in the blood-churned muck, a shoe print between shoulder blades….) 

It is cruel, endlessly cruel that he is the one alive. That he is the one sitting in the mud across from this poor young mother’s spirit. That he is the one with blood enough in his hands to leave rain blotted stains on the strings as he tells A-Fu’s mother; He is safe.

(Shrieks of raw sound as they carry him away. Echoing off the trees. Reaching back for him.)

A hesitation. Then, ‘Who are you?’

Lan Xichen. Zewu-jun.

‘Zongzhu.’

He will be safe. I swear. 

‘...Safe.’

Rest, now.

‘...Rest….’ The notes are quiet, exhausted. Longing.

Then, silence. That pale light is gone. 

She is gone.

He sits, still and silent as the soft caverns in the clotted mud continue to patter around him. His face is wet--mist and rain and blood. He almost wishes it was tears. 

He aches in a new, terrible way, now.

Oh, little one. You were so loved.

He has been witness to both sides, now, of this small, destroyed family reaching for each other through the dark. And how useless he has been in the task of bringing either of them lasting peace. 

To bring anyone lasting peace. 

(Useless.)

And do you serve anything so fiercely that it would be your last thought, taken across into death? 

It is irrelevant. The soul quieting ceremony had been performed on them as children, with all the other inner disciples. He will not linger as a ghost, even if he were to be struck down by a fierce corpse this instant.

He finds himself trying to remember if his mother had ever mentioned having had such a ritual performed on her….

Selfish. You would have your own mother suffer and linger as an unquiet ghost for some sort of twisted confirmation that you were loved? 

Xichen remembers childhood before the death of his parents. The infinity of all of it. It probably never crossed A-Fu’s mind to beg her to stay with him. (“No, no go! P’ease!”) She had always returned before. 

The memory of A-Fu clinging to his hands so tightly he had drawn blood with his nails is inescapable. 

During that final farewell at the Jingshi, A-Huan too had had no idea it would be the last time he would ever see his mother’s face. He didn’t know what creeping death looked like, then. She was simply her, smiling, twinkling at them.  He had kissed her cheek and taken Wangji’s hand and waved to her through her ornately carved window screen as Uncle led them away. Wangji had always been the one to pull back, to fuss over leaving. Uncle had always made sure that Xichen set a good example for him.

The snowy day she had left this world, cold and dry, so far from the warm wet muck he was in now, something in him hadn’t believed it. Hadn’t believed that someone could just…no longer exist, just as suddenly as a storm might blow over the mountain summit with no warning. 

He saw her so sparingly, it seemed impossible that she wasn't just simply waiting in her front room for them to visit with a smile and open arms.

How? he had asked. When? Why?

Uncle had said that it was not for children to know. This pulled it even farther into the unreal, stretching his comprehension. It felt like a dream, a lie. A story. But if he could just see her…if he could just prove that this was some sort of…misunderstanding--

(Xichen had never asked again after that first refusal sat in his gut like a chilly stone. He suspected that Wangji had not either. Even now, decades later, he still did not know how his mother had actually died. 

He suspected enough, however. 

He knew it was sudden. He knew it was unexpected. He knew no one spoke of it. He knew it had broken his father beyond any hope of repair. Uncle had not volunteered the information, even now, when they were both grown. And Xichen will not allow useless rumination. Rule 60.)

 He remembered he hadn’t been able to stop crying. A-Huan had always hated crying--he always tried to hide away and not bother anyone with it, but this had been constant. 

Uncle had squeezed his shoulder and spoken softly, and reminded him after hours of stopping and starting that he must not grieve in excess, that he would make himself sick, that he was agitating Wangji, that he needed to calm himself, death was a natural passing, like the moon or a river, one must not let their emotions control them.

But still, that something in him that just knew it wasn't true waited until it was dark, until curfew set in and the snow lit the night full-moon-bright, reflecting the stars and lanterns. He had pulled on his boots and slipped from his window, cautiously darting across the paths of the Cloud Recesses in just his pajamas and his blanket wrapped tight around his shoulders, shivering from more than the cold. 

This had to be a trick that he didn’t understand; a joke or a punishment for something he had done wrong. When he figured out what to apologize for, he would be able to see her again. 

The fear of being caught breaking the rules was washed away when he crossed beneath the familiar bower wound with skeletal winter vines. His mother’s house stood dark. All around it, snow was churned and broken, as if many people had been there. In all his memory, no one else had ever visited the Jingshi. The door was unlocked. 

It opened onto emptiness and moonlight. 

Everything was gone.  Her plants. The blue cushioned couch. Her desk and papers. Her dragon incense burner. Her tall candlesticks. Her big, thick, round rug they laid on and played games. The pictures he had painted for her.

He had drifted, stunned, through the shell of his mother’s home. The only proof that she had ever even been there were the scratches on the floor from where furniture had been dragged. That, and the scent of her that still lingered underneath the smell of whatever they had scrubbed the floor and walls with. They had erased her completely. Like she was never there in the first place.

Then it had settled on him like a cloak of lead, dropping him to his knees; the understanding, the true deepness of what this meant.

She was really gone. Forever. 

The ‘always’ was gone. The ‘next time’ and promises. That warm, constant presence on the rim of the Cloud Recesses, the visit that marked his days as cyclically and surely as the sun had simply...vanished. In just one moment, the world was made completely lightless. Incomprehensible. It had a hole ripped in its center, cold and inescapable.

She would never brush back his hair and kiss his forehead. She would never pout when she lost a game. She would never squinch up her nose and do an accidental snort-laugh.

If he had only known that it could happen so fast…if he had only known that people could leave so quickly and completely, he would have taken something. A set of her dark, weighty chopsticks, one of her bracelets, a letter; anything. But there was nothing.

Somehow, he had found himself in front of the Hanshi, his feet numb, his face and hands frozen. Thinking back on it, he couldn’t remember what his 6 year old self had planned. He wasn’t sure that there had been a plan. Maybe he had just wanted a parent. Maybe he had been seeking out the one adult that might have cared as much as he did that his mother was gone. Uncle didn’t understand--A-Huan and A-Zhan had always known that he didn’t like her. He was always polite, because that was important, it was in the rules--but he was always stiff and short. He frowned the whole time--every time--picking them up. He hated talking about her.

But the father he had hardly met, that distant, hidden figure--he had married her. He had loved her.

He would care.

The Hanshi, too, had been dark--and he panicked. Had his father left--or died like his mother and no one had told him? He had yanked the door handle--and to his shock, it slid open. He had been expecting a lock like the one that he saw being done up behind them when he and A-Zhan left the Jingshi. (A choice, not a prison, he had realized as he got older. Not in the same way, at least. Other things kept Qingheng-jun bound.) 

It was dark inside, curtains drawn, vague shapes of things illuminated by the light creeping in behind him. He stood in that doorway, frozen in body and mind, unable to trespass that much farther. It smelled unfamiliar and sharp. He had never been in his father’s home before. 

It was so dark.

He had called into that darkness, choked and quiet; “Fuqin?“ 

Silence. 

“...Diedie?”

(“They made choices. These are consequences,” is all Uncle had told him when, younger, he had asked why both of his parents were locked away from him and refused to say more.

Afterward, A-Huan had always been afraid that he might accidentally make those same choices, that he would be kept from his brother and his Uncle and nannies for it. Because no one would tell him what those choices were, he studied the rules obsessively so he could be sure to follow every single one. So he would never be locked up.)

There was a rustle, a clink. A shape had formed in the shadows, someone sitting up from being slumped on a table. A pale hand swayed into the pool of silver moonlight, pointing. The voice that followed had been rough, slurred like a mouthful of rocks. “You are not supposed to be here. Go.”

A-Huan had fled as fast as his numbed legs could go. Stumbling, breaking through the crust of snow, falling and rising and falling, back up through his window to collapse on the floor. His breath had burned in his lungs as he coughed and sobbed as quietly as he could, hot tears stinging his frozen cheeks.

Not quietly enough, though. A-Zhan had eventually crept into his room and curled up next to him on the floor without a word, arm wrapped around his middle.  When A-Huan had rolled over and held him more tightly than he had ever held anything before, he realized that A-Zhan was the only part of his mother he had left in the entire world.

And now, what did A-Fu have left of his parents, of a life he knew? 

A story, at the very least. A reason. A goodbye. The truth. It was all he could offer. It was all he had left for the boy. These other spirits and their wishes can only be passed along to others, if they were attainable at all. But this, this he can do; this, he can set right. To make absolutely sure that her will is found and executed, that the family who cares for her son is told the story of her last farewell, so he will know, too, in time. 

So a son will never have to wonder.

This much peace, he can provide. With those who can bear this place no more and an endless caravan of cloth draped bodies, he returns to Gusu, leaving behind Qishan’s bleeding sky.

-

The quiet of home stuns him. There are no screams, no groans echoing down the mountain. The trees don’t muffle sounds of sword or talisman sizzle, merely birdsong and wind. There is beauty here, something he hadn't known his soul craved like water in a drought until he saw it in rich blues, blooming whites, lush greens. The coolness, the clarity of the water and the touch of leaves. Nothing here is red-brown. All that bleeds is hidden away behind pale bandages and pale walls.

It's almost too much. 

(His hands feel filthy, no matter how many times he scrubs them. Discontent among such blessings is an insult to those that can no longer come home to them. He will kowtow in the shrine for this disrespect later.)

Time has meaning once more. In theory. There are places to eat, to rest. 

(It hardly makes sense to him anymore, despite the schedule being as familiar as the stone beneath his feet.)

Home, in the Hanshi, surrounded by familiarity and comfort, sitting at his desk as the incense burner next to him delicately permeates the air with sandalwood and the trees outside rustle and no one screams at all, he holds Pan Liu’s will in his hands. It is a brief, frail little thing in the face of such sorrow. It must have been hastily written after her husband’s death, as she willed A-Fu and her remaining possessions to the care of her younger sister. Who upon brief investigation of his ever growing list of the dead was found to have been killed in the battle against Wei Wuxian as well. The sister, yet unmarried, had no will of her own--probably too young to have begun to even consider death as a real possibility before life and Wen and war swept their way in. Their house had been one destroyed in the Wen’s sacking of the Cloud Recesses, their personal possessions few. No one else remained of their immediate family.

Pan Liu clearly had not expected to die before she could update it.

In his heart, somewhere, he had known that something like this was the case; that A-Fu was truly alone. Xichen had carried him for days and no one had come looking? No one had wondered where he was, wanted him home safe, with them? 

He had not wanted to look directly at this, at the time, knowing he would have to give A-Fu back to that loneliness, that uncertainty. Even though A-Fu is not the only child in the Cultivation World or even the Cloud Recesses with the same fate, it had been…different. He couldn’t have said why--still can’t--but it had felt like a betrayal to the boy. A loss, savage and personal. Even when he knew any other choice came nowhere close to making sense.

Still. Even he and Wangji had had their uncle and the small, rotating cadre of minders that were familiar to them. He saw his mother once a month and knew his father was there, somewhere, out of sight. There had been a thread connecting them to their parents and the life they could have had with them. 

A-Fu has none of this. 

And yet he still cries, still calls out, because he trusts that someone he knows will come. Of everything in these last few days, this is what is almost too much to bear, a knife stuck in his ribs that gouges with every breath. He does not feel sadness or regret; only pain. Everything else has been out of reach for a while now.

The rattle of his door opening onto seeping sunshine and fresh, bloodless air has him looking up. His Uncle steps over the threshold. “You’re back,” he says warmly by way of greeting as Xichen rises.

“Shufu.” He bows, then offers him his customary seat, more out of habit than necessity; this teatime visit was a familiar ritual in a life not too long ago.

 They take their places at opposite ends of the low, square table at the center of his sitting room as Xichen opens his tea cupboard. “It’s been a while since we have been able to simply sit and have tea together,” Uncle observes, easily.

Yes; nothing has been right or normal for a long time. “Mn.”

When he continues to set out the cool porcelain cups and the dark pot with no further elaboration, Uncle watches him work, expression a thoughtful blur in his periphery.  “...The library is not where I expected your first stop to be.” 

He sounds only mildly curious, but Xichen knows that it is unspoken approval that he had not gone straight to Wangji.

He hesitates, then continues his methodical ritual of movement. “There was a time-sensitive matter that I wanted to attend to.”

In truth, after the bath he had taken upon his return--where he had had to call for 3 rounds of water (Do not be wasteful, Rule 23; broken) before it was no longer clouded dark with dried blood and mud and rot--Xichen had stood on the Hanshi’s front porch, staring down at the blindingly white path before him, forking off through the trees. 

His heart had tugged him one way and his cowardice in the face of pain another. The thought of seeing more bodies just lying there, of seeing those dear to him--Wangji, A-Yuan, those in the infirmary--suffering while he could do nothing to prevent it was….

It was not something he was capable of, at present. Just for now. Just for these first few hours. It was selfish, but true. And so, he had gone to their records room in the library to request Pan Liu’s will. Pain had won. His heart was weak, choosing the easier duty.

Unable to stop himself, though he knows it will cloud his uncle’s relaxed and pleasant demeanor, he asks; “Is Wangji…?” He trails off. 

Awake? Improving? Well? …Alive? A sharp internal rebuke at this last. Do not exaggerate. Rule 671. Uncle would not be so calm if things were dire. He is angry, not cruel. He would have been told.

(A heavy hand on his shoulder. An empty house. Churned snow.)

He would have been told.

Uncle’s face does, indeed, darken. “Hmph.” A mirthless, scornful snort. “He wakes on occasion. He refuses to speak, refuses to acknowledge anyone. He is simply lengthening his own punishment.” Uncle eyes him, adding, “You should be able to talk some sense into him. He always has listened to you best.” 

‘And so how could you have let this happen? How could you have let him do this?’ 

(When will you stop being angry and start being afraid for him?)

Xichen lowers his gaze to the dark wood of the table and scoops the tiny, furled up leaves of the tea into the pot, the smokey green scent tickling his nose

It’s true. Of everyone--their caregivers, teachers, and relatives, Wangji has always responded to him best. He would not always necessarily disobey outright, but he might frown or hesitate before complying or pretend not to hear--especially if he were called to come away from Xichen’s side. “Your class is this way, xiao-gongzi,” the minder would call and A-Zhan would continue his resolute little stride beside him, hand squeezing tighter around Xichen’s fingers the only indication he had heard anything at all. 

It was when Xichen squeezed back and knelt down to straighten his robes, smiling up into his serious face, saying, “It’s alright, ZhanZhan; I’ll ask if I can come out early to pick you up, mn? Go on, be good,” that he would allow himself to be led away with no further fuss.

 He had been the only one who could finally convince him that kneeling in the rocky ground every month when they should have been visiting their mother would not force anyone to bring her out to them. The first time, he had asked him to come in, come home. But knew his brother. He was not surprised when he silently refused to even show he had heard him. 

And so he hadn’t asked again, never having the stomach to fully destroy the hope that he would be let back into the Jingshi if he just waited long enough. 

But Uncle had become frustrated, their teachers and nannies muttering. They were impatient with his refusal, seeing it as disobedience. They didn’t see his mourning, only his stubbornness. So A-Huan had had to protect his brother's soft heart from those that didn’t understand. “We can kneel together, back at home,” he had whispered, his fingers screwed tight around A-Zhan’s cold hand. “I’ll wait with you as long as you want. But niang would--” his throat had caught and he had wrestled his tears from his voice. “Niang would hate if you got sick, sitting out here in the cold all day.”

A-Zhan’s dark eyes had bored into him, thinking. Reason and punishment and demands from adults had not moved his stubborn frame one inch, month after month after winter-to-spring month. 

Then, finally, this second and last time, A-Zhan had listened to him. Whatever it was about him was what finally got his little brother slowly, stiffly to his feet to hobble back home with him. Xichen remembered that he hadn’t felt relieved at all. He just felt like he had taken their mother from him all over again.

“I will speak with him, shufu.”

 Uncle nods, then heaves a sigh. “What news is there from Qishan?”

Mechanically, as if operating his own mouth from across the room, Xichen relays numbers, movements, and times. He almost reflexively scolds himself for lying; the mundane description of dry duty and the lived horror so far from one another that they were entirely irreconcilable. Just words passed across a shining table over fragrant tea, cool wind brushing the sun-pale windows serenely with tree shadows

When he reaches the final fate of Wei Wuxian’s executed Wen contingent, Uncle approves. “It was wise to swear the disciples to secrecy. This has all gotten so inhumane. Denying them burial was an unnecessary cruelty,” he says heavily as he shakes his head, eyes closed in weariness. “I pray that we are done with this madness at last, with that Wei Ying finally taken care of. What a mess.”

There is silence. Xichen cannot fathom what his response to that could possibly be. Should possibly be--as Wangji’s brother, as the Lan Clan Leader, as his uncle's nephew. As Wei Wuxian’s…what. Friend? 

…As one who cannot delight in his death, in any case. 

Despite the period of kneeling before the Jingshi, Wangji had never been a troublemaker growing up. He was always the Jade who grasped the Lan way of life more easily, molded himself to the rigidity of the rules with that same stubborn tenacity. 

It was Xichen who failed in that, who smudged the black and white lines to gray, bent them so they were slightly more comfortable around him; bearable--once he discovered that they could be. 

He was the one who accidentally got drunk trying to see if he could filter out alcohol with his core, he was the one to kiss Mingjue first in the Jin Gardens during a Cultivation Conference. The one to urge his brother to befriend a talented teenager who was gleefully and repeatedly stomping all over their Clan’s ancestral rules.

He was the one who had told Wangji to step outside his rigid view of the world, to see people for their hearts. And then Wangji's own heart had been torn out. As his uncle said; Wangji had always listened to him best. This much would never have happened without Xichen's deliberate meddling. 

All those years ago, when Wei Wuxian had first cannonballed into their lives, Xichen had just wanted Wangji to be happy. To have friends. Alone didn’t always mean lonely, but he knew he saw it in his brother. Saw Wangji with peers who were merely in awe of his talent, who respected but did not like him, love him, know him, want to spend time with him. He knew the difference, no matter what Wangji showed the rest of the world. The older he got, the less he smiled--the soft, secret ones that so many others failed to see. Xichen had missed them, dearly. And so he had pushed.

Everything that has happened sense feels as if it’s unshakably all his fault.

As the tea is poured, they speak; it passes over him like clouds. Which elder is still in which stage of recovery. The smith they called to repair swords and assess the spirits of those now without a handler. 

Something touches him.

 “Xichen!” 

His hand burns. He is on his feet. Shuoyue’s naked blade buzzes, ready in his hand. He does not remember moving. Every fiber of cloth on his skin feels alive and writhing. Blood courses. Scalding tea is cooling, dripping from his knuckles.

The touch had been spiritual, not physical. From the corner of his awareness and the Cloud Recesses boundary wards at once; a warning, tasting of wild metal (close to blood, so close). 

The Western Wards, crossed.

“Do not unsheathe your blade in a residence!” Uncle’s face crinkles from shock to a wince. “And contain yourself, this is not a battlefield.”

It takes a moment. His killing intent is up, streaming from his core like a river of blades, of blood. 

Sucking in a breath, he takes the torrent in internal hand and yanks it back, firmly, like the reins of a horse, winding the silk rope of it over again and again in the palm of his concentration, until the thrum of it eases. The pressure that had filled the room with the promise of death ebbs. Shuoyue hums warm, expectant. When he does finally sheathe her, the connection between them flickers, confused. 

Above his hammering heart, he hears Uncle continue, frowning, “I felt it, too. Was it someone passing outward or inward?”

His tongue, his mind is mud-stuck slow.

Focus. There is no battle here. You are home. Get a hold of yourself.

“...Outward. Less resistance. Nothing powerful.”

Oddly, at this Uncle’s frown deepens, shadows of concern replacing mere puzzlement. “Hmm. Those were in the West…far….” After a moment of thought, he rises.

As he steps out the door and calls for a servant from the Hanshi’s porch, Xichen continues to try to pull in slow, deep breaths.

Have you regressed to being such a novice that you cannot control your own qi? Your own battle intent? Are you a child? Though his uncle's voice is low and his attention is divided, the words ‘searchers’ makes it through the pounding blood in his ears. Strange.

When Uncle slides the door back open, Xichen asks, “Searchers?”

His silhouetted form hesitates, framed by the sunlight that pours in behind him and dazzles Xichen’s eyes, leaving his expression briefly in shadow. “...Yesterday evening, a child managed to wander into the woods alone.” A spike of cold worry threatens to heighten the wild surge of energy within him once more as his uncle continues, stepping inside and closing the door behind him. “We have had several teams scouring the backhill and the whole of our land since then. They are young enough that their spiritual signature isn’t strong enough to register on normal tracking talismans.”

“Why was I not told?!” 

It burst from him, harsher from shock than he had meant and Uncle blinks, pausing in settling himself back onto his seat, brow furrowed.

But he cannot bring himself to care about disrespect, just now. Any child alone and lost is terrifying, awful. There is something, though…something about his tone, his expression that has breath caught in Xichen’s throat as slow, glacial horror creeps up from the depth of his gut. He is avoiding specifics. 

Why.

 “It is being handled already; why would I distract you from your duties? You’ve only just returned and you must--”

“Who. Which child.”

He huffs in irritation, brow furrowing further. And he shuts his mouth, lips compressing.

Xichen no longer needs an answer.

Behind him, he can hear Uncle’s voice raised in startled alarm, but he is already out the door, already leaping from the porch onto Shuoyue. The wind howls in his ears as shoots upward, speeding west to where he had felt the wards ring within him. To where A-Fu has just crossed beyond their safety.

He knows. He doesn’t know how, but he knows.

Xichen can barely breathe around the air battering his face and his own terror. The shrieking sky threatens to rip him from Shuoyue’s blade. Everything at once feels heightened, his awareness expanding to notice how chilly it is despite the sun, how the damp of the wind tearing at his hair and clothes tells of rain in the past day, how dark the woods look beneath the thick canopy blurring by below his feet. He had been alone and cold and terrified, out all night. Had the boy been trying to find his mother? Xichen? The thought made his gut writhe within him.

(They peel his little fingers from Xichen’s sleeve as he clutches and screams…)

Please please please please please

How could this happen? How could he have ever allowed this to happen? There were rivers, cliffs, steep slopes of scree, ponds, caves, animals--gods, animals alone would--

He is well enough to move, to cross the wards.

If it was him. If it were not a strong enough spiritual animal to trigger the alarm. 

There is no boy hanging among them THERE IS NO--

The invisible boundary rears up in his senses, mere seconds full tilt sword ride from the Hanshi but so, so far for a tiny child, wandering in the night. Beneath the canopy, before Shuoyue even manages to drop to a reasonable height and speed, he has already leapt off, landing at a sprint. Internally, the memory of the disruption in the web of the spell warps around his spiritual awareness like a broken arch as he crosses in that exact place. The ground is not suddenly more treacherous, the trees no more menacing, but beyond the relative safety of the Cloud Recesses, his hammering heart sees the whole world is a death trap for this little child.

(He cannot bear to see a tiny body, he can’t, he can’t--)

Skidding to a stop, he wheels in place, eyes scouring everything at knee level and below. “A-Fu!” his throat is pinched, his mouth bone dry. “A-Fu?!”

The ground cover is thick with bushes, shrubs, trees both young and fallen. The sun shines spots into his eyes through the swaying leaf cover above, dappling the floor with shadow and light, dancing, blurring. Silence. Even the birdsong had stopped when this strange being had suddenly crashed into their peaceful little clearing. He sucks in a breath to call again--and then he hears it.

There is a small child crying somewhere nearby. 

Quiet and hoarse but unmistakable.

He isn't slow, gentle, or cautious or anything that a terrified child might need right now; something else has a hold of him, now. He blindly crashes through the brush towards the sound, half skidding down a slope until--until! There! 

A blur of white amongst tree roots halfway down, a curled shape and-- “A-Fu!”--a little face, smudged and red cheeked and tear stained raises and his little eyes light with recognition and he scrabbles, fumbling and crawling out as Xichen tears back up the slope--slips, rights himself--and reaches and the boy throws himself off the lip of the hollow and into his arms, colliding hard with his chest like his heart coming home. 

He staggers, momentum and sudden weakness buckling his knees. A gnarled tree catches his side and he slides them down into the huddle of its roots, curled around him. Against his chest, wrapped in his arms, A-Fu is damp and chilly. He is covered in muck and sticks and burrs but he’s alive--alive--safe and hiccuping and piteously hoarse, tangling his hands through Xichen’s hair as he clutches him back, gasping.

He can breathe. He can finally breathe again.

Some unnameable agony, like some wild beast, is thrashing, welling up, bursting from his chest. It shakes him, tearing at his throat, his heart, his lungs, burning. It’s not relief. It's not fear. It’s…

Heedless of stitches cracking and bursting, he yanks his thicker outer robes open and over the child, tucking him deep into the pocket of warmth. He can feel him shivering, his tiny heart speeding.

He had forgotten that his head is so warm, that his hands are so tiny, just how real his weight is in his arms. When he buries his nose in the baby fluff of his hair, under the dirt and musty forest chill is that wild-sweet child smell he remembers from carrying him for days beneath his chin--and long ago from when Wangji was young. 

He tries to pull back to check him for injuries, for bruising, but he latches onto his neck and sobs. Mere minutes before, Xichen had never wanted to hear another scream again--but now he wishes A-Fu’s cries were as loud as the first day he held him, deafening and demanding, sure and strong in their conviction. These sobs are private, weak, exhausted little things. Not calling for attention. No longer certain of a trusted adult’s return.

“P’ease,” he croaks and that pain, that pressure bears down on Xichen and it feels like drowning; it feels like dying.

“I know. I know. I’m sorry. I’m here,” he whispers back, thick and choked (that thing inside him that aches, that wails, that loves is strangling him), and he draws up his knees, he wraps his robes tighter and rocks and rocks them both as it breaks--all of it, calving and crashing and surging and molten and ugly and broken--and he wants to beg ‘scream, little love, scream your heart out; someone is coming, someone will always come,’ but he doesn't have enough breath as it tears from his locked throat in silent sobs, because with unworthy hands and heart, he holds this blameless little life that has wandered through the halls of his heart leaving muddy fingerprints, and does the cruelest, most selfish thing he can ever recall doing. 

He realizes that he cannot let him go again. 

[rayan12sworld]

💠🧡golden

By:queen_gee

Summary:

Wei Ying sees him through the flowers and silk and his heart whispers, oh. There you are.

It is there in one moment and then gone in the next, just a fleeting hint of recognition, relief that spreads through his chest with intensity that makes his knees wobble. There is a beautiful man at his sister’s wedding and he is looking at Wei Ying as if he has been struck speechless and something about the curve of that man’s bowed lips, the molten gold of his eyes, the way his throat bobs and his jaw slackens—it feels like coming home.

----------

A beautiful stranger asks Wei Ying to dance.

Chapter:1/1

Words :3,826

Status:completed

I can't they are so sweet,my heart can't take it🤧🤧

The man stares at him like he has only ever lived in the dark and now he has seen the sun, and he will stare at it until he’s long gone blind.

~~

a gorgeous man is staring at him like he is the most treasured thing in the universe, when he just met this man but he is fairly sure he has known him since the beginning of time.

~~

Wei Ying has never been in love before but he thinks this might be how it starts. The promise of a dance, two hammering hearts, shy smiles. Red and gold and eternity at their fingertips.

~~

He looks up at Lan Zhan and his smile whispers, there you are. And Lan Zhan whispers back, I am here.

[araceliiiix]

MDZS HEADCANON #2

In modern AU, everyday after work, Lan Wangji brings home flowers for Wei Wuxian.

(can also be Canon AU)

🧧🪭💮 x 🦢☁️💎

[a-blue-nony]

MingXian Modern AU definitely have a cat, if not three, reason 1) Wei Wuxian is a cat magnet and reason 2) over the years whenever Nie Mingjue met Wei Wuxian, there would always be a feline around him, sometimes bigger feline species too (maybe Nie Mingjue adopts a tiger baby? To get Wei Wuxian to come over more and it would be so adorable if the stray kittens WWX is raising also adopt the tiger babe lmao)

[silverflame2724]

I have class in seven hours. Instead of sleeping, I wrote this. Enjoy!

_________________

“Lan Zhaaaaaan!!! Look at me, look at me!!”

Lan Wangji steadfastly ignores Wei Wuxian who gives a big pout.

“Look at meeeeee!!!!”

Lan Wangji give a long, suffering sigh and turns to look at Wei Wuxian who grins and babbles about the adventures he went on throughout the day, despite his full day of classes. Lan Wangji waited for a moment and then said, “Continue your work.”

“But Lan Zhaaaan, my hands are about to fall off!! Can’t you show me some mercy, gege?”

Lan Wangji sighed. He was so ridiculous.

Lan Wangji liked him all the same.

[Huh.]

Lan Wangji twitched but went back to his work. He completely forgot about that voice in his head.

[Hey, Lan Wangji.]

What.

[Oh, don’t look so annoyed. I never asked to be in this situation!]

Lan Wangji schooled his face back to impassiveness as he remembered the night hunt he went on recently. It had been a relatively simple hunt, until the yaogui had escaped from its bindings and landed an attack on one of the senior disciples who had joined him that day. The attack was not fatal, but due to the nature of the yaogui’s power, had separated the disciple’s soul from his body. A soul that accidentally crashed into Lan Wangji and has been since possessing him. They didn’t try to get them separated but the concluded it would take time to separate them.

[Anyway, so. You like the kid, huh?]

Lan Wangji stayed silent despite the soul’s - Lan Lifang’s - pestering. He was distracted but for a few moments. It was enough time, however, for Wei Wuxian to pull a prank on Lan Wangji and illusory butterflies flooded his vision.

“Wei Wuxian!” Lan Wangji seethed.

Wei Wuxian laughed uproariously. “I finally got you to snap! Hahahahaha!!!”

[Wait a moment.] Lan Lifang said. [Wait a moment.]

But Lan Wangji could not hear him. He was too busy pushing Wei Wuxian out of the library.

In hindsight, he probably should have paid attention.

………..

A couple days later, Wei Wuxian was up to his antics yet again and Lan Wangji had about enough when Lan Lifang suddenly overtook his body.

[What do you think you’re doing??] Lan Wangji hissed.

Oh, be quiet, cousin. I’m getting you a lover.

[What???]

“Wei Wuxian, why do you tease me so?” He asked with Lan Wangji’s voice.

“Huh, because it’s so interesting to see your reactions of course!”

“You’ve gotten enough reactions from me. Why continue?”

“I, uhh, I don’t know? I just want you to keep showing me more sides to yourself!”

“Why?”

“Because I want to be your friend!”

Lan Lifang tilted his head to the side. “Then why does your behavior say something different?”

“H-Huh? What do you—”

“You’re always pushing my buttons. But I’ve never seen you do that with others. Is it because I’m quieter? Or….” Lan Lifang stared intensely at Wei Wuxian. “Because you like me that way?”

And to both Lan Wangji and Lan Lifang’s surprise, Wei Wuxian blushed a bright red.

“W-What are you talking about! Of course I like you!”

“I meant the way lovers like one another.” Lan Lifang sent a quick apology to Lan Wangji. “The way I like you.” Then he returned control to Lan Wangji.

You coward!!!!! Lan Wangji cursed in his mind.

[Good luck, cousin.]

.

.

.

In the end, it all worked out wonderfully. Lan Wangji managed to stammer his way through a proper confession (with guidance and encouragement from Lan Lifang) and was shocked to see his feelings were returned.

How did you know?

[Hmm?]

How did you know he’d return my feelings?

[It’s simple. Wei Wuxian’s behavior is so similar to when boys pull the pigtails of a girl he likes. He always wanted your attention on him whether it be good or bad. And….] He trailed off.

And?

[I’ve seen him staring at your muscles.]

…Ah.

Out of curiosity, during a sparring session, where it was acceptable for Lan disciples to dress lightly, Lan Wangji openly flexed his muscles when Wei Wuxian came up to bother him. He watched as Wei Wuxian’s words stuttered to a halt as he stared, open-mouthed, at Lan Wangji’s biceps.

Huh. It seemed what his cousin said was true. Lan Wangji would thank him later for bagging him the love of his life.

After he throttled him of course.

[gourmetgamer23]

New Fic!

🌸Proud of These Scars🐰

Chapter 1: Breathe ・Trans Lan Wangji/Non-binary Wei Wuxian ・Rated E 🔞| 11k+ words ・Alternate Universe - modern ・Top Surgery

🔗below

[kachawo]

Once upon a time there was Wei Ying.

A being who was born craving love. But at the same time, he was cursed to be the most undesirable person in the whole world.

But as a being who starved for affection, he tried, tried so hard.

See, there are people that do love him. But the person those people see isn't exactly him.

For every person he meets, they see a wholly different form of him. He changes into most desirable person in their eyes.

If Wei Ying asks them-- how do I look like to you? Without fail, every single one of them will answer differently.

You have dark skin. A mole under your eye. Your eyes are green. You're pale and have red hair.

And Wei Ying takes it in, he accepts it as it is. Because he cannot be picky when it comes to the people who love him, he just can't.

But sometimes at moonless nights he cries silently, agonizes the fact that no one will truly love him as he is.

He's stuck being seen as someone he will never truly be.

It's an aching wound that he locks up deep in his heart, one that he shouts into the abyss and foolishly expects something to echo back.

To be as pathetic as a love-starved man who no one loves.

But then, Lan Wangji comes into his life.

This man-- Wei Ying has fallen hopelessly in love with him. It doesn't better the damage that breaks his heart open.

Lan Zhan is sweet, so unbearably loving and caring. Someone that Wei Ying can say 'This is him. This is the man I want to spend my life with.'

He's the warmth that Wei Ying has craved for all his life.

That's why he's afraid.

He knows what will come when he asks the question. He knows how he'll feel when the truth is said.

And he doesn't want to know.

Even though he's asked it before, even if he has accepted it many times. This time around, it feels like he'd crumble and fall like a ceramic pot.

So he doesn't ask.

Months become years, the ugly worry grows in him like a parasite devouring him from the insides, and he can't stand to suppress any longer.

He asks Lan Wangji-- How do I look like to you?

"Beautiful." Is the first thing that comes out his mouth. It warms his heart thoroughly.

"No I mean, literally. What do I look like to you?" That's when Lan Zhan's brow lifts a bit.

"To me?" He asks, but no answer comes forward.

Lan Wangji cups his cheeks with his hands, thumb smoothing over his features.

"You have bright silver eyes."

Wei Ying inhales.

"Black hair." To which the man smothers his face in.

"Olive tanned skin, with freckles adorning your face." He presses a kiss to his nose.

"A mole under your lip." He kisses the mole.

Finally, he looks at Wei Ying with softness in his eyes. One that melts the man into utter oblivion.

"And a beautiful smile, that lights up my life."

Oh. Oh. He's crying. He's crying so much---

The sobs escape his lips and suddenly he's bawling hard.

This man is ridiculous. Wei Ying loves him so much-

When you're cursed there's always a way to cure it.

Even when you're vexed to be the most unloved at your truest form-- there are always expections.

A certain bug in the game that the creators can never fix. That's something he finds hinself laughing at.

But oh,

It feels so freeing.

To love, and be loved.

Oh, this man will be the life of him.

[maria-taiwin]

Thinking about a angsty (just a bit) Wangxian modern!au scenario: Wei Wuxian just got a bad fever, and unfortunately he has no one at home with him to assist him (madame yu in this modern!au kicked him out of the jiang house, he lives in a small ramshackle apartment by himself). He already used to take care of himself, he got through much worse than a fever in his childhood, but still he misses so much being pampered by his shijie and the feeling he would never be alone anymore through these hard times, especially because it hasn't been that long since he's been kicked out.

He tries to endure the fever like it's nothing serious, he really does for hours but then it's like a nightmare and he just realized that the fridge is empty and he's getting weaker. He doesn't want to be a burden, never did, he hates that feeling but he's really tired and, fuck it, in a moment of impulse he decides to call Wen Qing: she is a friend AND a future doctor, which it's always useful. Yeah he'll have to bear her scolding about his unhealthy lifestyle but he really needs help in this moment so he is willing to endure.

The fever however is so bad that it causes him to hallucinate. He mistakes the number and he calls Lan Wangji by error. Believing the person beyond the phone is Wen Qing, he starts to whine about a bad illness that will kill him SOON if she doesn't go to his apartament, he urgently needs food and protein and how can a conscientious person just abandon him to his destiny, this is really bad, please have mercy, just think to the neighbors, etc etc. He exaggerates a bit but because he knows Wen Qing, she'll snort a bit but she will give up by her generous heart. When he blabbered though he didn’t realized that the person beyond the phone NEVER talked back. He's justified because the fever is really bad and didn’t pay attention and talked too much like usual. He ends the call.

After 10 minutes, not more, the bell rings. With difficulty he drags himself to open the door. He doesn't put on a show like at the phone, he just scratches his head in fake laughter, trying to play down the fever but still thanking the dear Wen Qing for the help. He doesn't realize that wen qing still doesn't speak at all, but his head is boiling so maybe it's for the best, he really couldn't stand to be scolded right now.

He just sits on the bed while "wen qing" prepares the dinner. He feels so relaxed, having someone taking care of him, feeding him, offering him a drink of water to take medicines, preparing him a delicious ginger tea (he's never been a fan of tea but this is really good) and handing him a blanket. A blanket with rabbits? It's really a warm feeling.

While he's overjoyed he also looks at "wen qing", who has her back to him and he is suddenly confused. Wen Qing's hair isn't that long (lan zhan is wearing a long braid), she's not that tall, her legs aren't that long, and she never wears blue and white... and what is this scent? Maybe the fever is giving him hallucinations? Suddenly she approaches, kneels in front of him, wei wuxian feels a hand approaching, not enough to touch his body but still its weight felt over the blanket and indirectly he feels its warmth. And then he hears a "wei ying".

Wei Wuxian freezes. What? Only one person calls him like that. Since his parents died, only one person has ever called him like that. But it's impossible right? Why would Lan Wangji, the icy and unapproachable jade of the school, being at home looking after him? As much as Wei Wuxian tried to be his friend, he was always ignored! Whenever he invited Lan wangji to do something or just called him, he only got a block of marble in response. He doesn't hold a grudge against him for that, indeed he considers Lan Wangji a very cool person, but still this is really impossible. And it would be too nice, having that cold and beautiful jade at his service, being all good for him. It's just a hallucination, of course.

He mumbles "ha ha why are you suddenly calling me wei ying ha ha ​​that's strange".

Just silence. He hears a sigh, and then suddenly he no longer feels that comfortable hand on the blanket.

He doesn't have time to complain because he suddenly feels a cool (not too cold, just the right temperature) cloth over his forehead. "Thanks" and puts his hand on top of "wen qing"'s.

He hears an arrest in her breath, that hand trembles a bit, but that uncertainty lasts only a few seconds. Then everything is comfortable. The bed, the extra blanket, his stomach deliciously full. Wei Wuxian is sleeping already but he thinks he's feeling a tight hand on his own. He imagines it's another person with him, not Wen Qing.

Of course after the recovery, he will just think that Wen Qing acted very strange, it was not like her at all. But he will thank her properly of course, because he never felt that safe from a very long time. And he will have to give her back the rabbit blanket, sadly.. because it is really cute and he got fond of it!

And of course he won't remember Lan Wangji at all. He'll think it was just an hallucination or a naive dream. And of course Lan wangji never dares to confess and he'll act like this never happened at school.

[wangxianficrecs]

Thirty, Flirty, and Telepathic

Thirty, Flirty, and Telepathic

by Scrippio

T, 24k, Wangxian, Chengqing, Xuanli

Summary: In which Wei Ying gains mind-reading abilities on his thirtieth birthday and Lan Zhan has a secret. Or: A Cherry Magic AU

Mojo's comments: Very cute cherry magic au featuring wwx turning 30 and getting hit with the curse and then, a few days later, jc does the same thing. (Now they can have telepathic conversations! And freak out about what's happening to them!)

modern setting, modern with magic, cherry magic au, fluff, telepathy, chengqing, xuanli, happy ending, humor, pov wei wuxian, pov jiang cheng, curse breakers, touch telepathy, getting to know each other, getting together

~*~

(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[bloody-bee-tea]

Gift for me

1) I am not back into Mingcheng, I'm very sorry to disappoint on that. This fic has been ready to go for a year now, and I am kind of happy to finally get it off my desktop XD

2) Happy New Year, may it be filled with love and softness and laughter and happiness for us all

Part 1 (Happy Birthday) Part 2 (Selfish Gift)

It’s the third birthday Nie Mingjue spends with Jiang Cheng right by his side and by now he stopped expecting anything. Jiang Cheng blew him out of the water when he actually cared more about his birthday than about any New Year’s celebration and then a year later he did it again when he asked Nie Mingjue to move in together.

This year—well this year, it’s Nie Mingjue who has a surprise for Jiang Cheng.

He had wanted to give it to him in bed, when they were both still sleep-warm and relaxed but of course Jiang Cheng doesn’t stick to any kind of plan at all and isn’t in bed when Nie Mingjue wakes up.

“A-Cheng,” Nie Mingjue groans out, his hands grasping at already cold sheets and his mood already turning for the worse.

“I’m right here, my heart,” Jiang Cheng says with a smile as he sticks his head into the bedroom but he’s not where he’s supposed to be, which is warm and lazy in Nie Mingjue’s arms.

“What are you doing?” Nie Mingjue demands to know, mustering his best glare even though he knows it’s not much, this soon after waking up.

“We’re getting guests in about half an hour,” Jiang Cheng informs him and Nie Mingjue lets his head drop back with a groan.

“What? No. Why? What happened to spending my birthday in bed together?” he demands to know because this wasn’t the plan.

“But we woke up together all year,” Jiang Cheng gives back and at that Nie Mingjue throws him an outraged look.

“You think waking up together every other day gets you out of waking up together on my birthday?” Nie Mingjue is honestly lost for words how Jiang Cheng could arrive at such a horrendously wrong conclusion but he softens a bit when Jiang Cheng laughs at him.

It is still one of Nie Mingjue’s most cherished sounds.

“Not really,” he admits as he comes closer to sit on Nie Mingjue’s side of the bed. “But you know that Huaisang and Xuanyu are leaving for their holiday early tomorrow morning so we decided to have your birthday celebration a little bit earlier.”

“I preferred it when we celebrated my birthday a week late,” Nie Mingjue grumbles even as he pulls Jiang Cheng in for a kiss.

“Liar,” Jiang Cheng whispers back and kisses Nie Mingjue again. “Happy birthday, my soul.”

“Good morning, my heart,” he gives back, still a bit unhappy with how this day is going but he guesses he has to make the best of it now. “Will we have dinner alone, then?” he asks because so far Jiang Cheng at least made sure to always spend one meal a day with Nie Mingjue alone.

“Yes. I will kick everyone out after cake, don’t worry. We’ll do dinner and a movie on the couch, with all the cuddles you could want.”

It feels a little bit like a consolation prize with how cold the bed was when Nie Mingjue woke up but he will take whatever he can get.

“Fine,” he finally heaves out because what else can he really say and Jiang Cheng laughs at him.

“Don’t even pretend to be a grump, I know you too well,” he teases him and flicks his forehead for good measure too.

“You’ll still have to make it up to me,” Nie Mingjue decides as he gets out of bed and Jiang Cheng raises an eyebrow at him in question.

“And how would I do that?” he wants to know and Nie Mingjue gives him a devilish grin as he leans down to give him a much more heated kiss.

“You’ll simply have to wake up in my arms for at least a month straight,” he then tells him and leaves Jiang Cheng right there on the bedside as he walks off to the bathroom to get himself ready for their guests.

And to wrap up his gift in a different way, now that his original plan has been ruined.

Nie Mingjue laughs out loud when he hears Jiang Cheng splutter behind him and he has to admit that this birthday is still good, simply because Jiang Cheng is right there with him.

~*~*~

The day itself is busy. Nie Huaisang and Mo Xuanyu come over for brunch but leave early in the afternoon because they still have some packing to do. Nie Mingjue’s friends arrive shortly before Nie Huaisang and Mo Xuanyu leave but true to his word, Jiang Cheng throws them all out an hour after cake.

Nie Mingjue watches it with a smile but he lets him do it because it is what was promised and Nie Mingjue is now actually looking forward to a relaxing evening with Jiang Cheng.

He loves his family and friends but these celebrations are always a bit too much for him, especially if they are this stretched out.

“Tired?” Jiang Cheng predictably asks when he comes back from kicking the last lingering friend out and finds Nie Mingjue on the couch, his head tilted back and his eyes closed.

“Yes,” Nie Mingjue easily says because admitting to these things is always easy with Jiang Cheng.

“Too much?” Jiang Cheng asks next and stands behind the couch, so he can scratch lightly at Nie Mingjue’s scalp.

“Mh, no, just right,” Nie Mingjue admits. “An hour longer though—” he trails off, trusting Jiang Cheng to understand what he means and when Jiang Cheng laughs, he knows he did.

“And you would have started to murder people, I get it,” he chuckles out and then leans over to press a kiss to Nie Mingjue’s forehead. “But no murder on your birthday. Only relaxing stuff for us now.”

“Are you going to cook?” Nie Mingjue asks, and he reaches up to grab Jiang Cheng by the forearms.

Suddenly the idea that Jiang Cheng will cook in the kitchen and Nie Mingjue is left with nothing to do but watch him seems like the worst idea ever.

“Nope,” Jiang Cheng cheerfully tells him and simply flips over the back of the couch when it becomes apparent that Nie Mingjue is not going to let him go. “I thought we order in today.”

“Good thinking,” Nie Mingjue hums out, leaning over to steal a kiss and then wrangles Jiang Cheng around until he’s arranged to his liking, mainly in Nie Mingjue’s arms and with no way to run off again.

“Clingy much?” Jiang Cheng teases him but Nie Mingjue only hums because Jiang Cheng is fooling no one. He went boneless the moment Nie Mingjue pulled him into his arms and so Nie Mingjue simply presses a kiss to his head.

They doze off like that on the couch for a while, and Nie Mingjue has to admit that this is still good; it’s not waking up with Jiang Cheng in bed levels of good, but it comes close, simply because they get to share this soft moment together.

And even though it has been a year Nie Mingjue hasn’t quite forgotten what happened on his last birthday, so when Jiang Cheng’s stomach grumbles and basically wakes them up, Nie Mingjue laughs.

“You’re so rude,” Jiang Cheng grumbles, pawing at him to try and get away, but Nie Mingjue is not going to let him.

“And you’re so starved,” he teases right back, leaning in for a kiss when Jiang Cheng pouts at him.

“I’ll truly be starved by the time dinner comes around,” he complains and Nie Mingjue shrugs.

“Get some more cake then?” he tells him even though he has no intention of letting Jiang Cheng out of his arms any time soon.

“First let’s order something,” Jiang Cheng decides, fishing for his phone.

He makes quick work of their order and doesn’t even bother to ask what Nie Mingjue would like; they both have their favourites at several different delivery places and Nie Mingjue is content to simply be surprised by dinner tonight.

“Now let go of me, I’ll starve for real,” Jiang Cheng then says as he puts the phone away and he tries to struggle out of Nie Mingjue’s arms whose intentions haven’t changed.

“Nope, you’ll have to live off my love for you for a while,” Nie Mingjue tells him with a laugh that only gets deeper when Jiang Cheng flops around like a fish.

“You’re ridiculous,” Nie Mingjue says when Jiang Cheng finally exhausted himself and Jiang Cheng blinks up at him.

“You love me,” he says and Nie Mingjue will probably never stop marvelling at the fact that Jiang Cheng doesn’t doubt this at all.

It makes Nie Mingjue very proud to know that he loves Jiang Cheng well enough that none of Jiang Cheng’s insecurities can ruin this.

“That I do,” Nie Mingjue immediately says and drops a kiss to Jiang Cheng’s nose.

They get lost in trading kisses until it rings at their door and even the sweet promise of food is almost not enough to lure Jiang Cheng away from Nie Mingjue.

“Weren’t you starving?” he finally asks when Jiang Cheng makes no move to open the door and that finally prompts Jiang Cheng to get up.

“I was living off your love,” he throws over his shoulder even as he goes to retrieve their food and Nie Mingjue takes that little window of opportunity to dart into the bedroom to get his gift.

The gift giving part of the day is already over, but Nie Mingjue didn’t want to do this with everyone else around; this is just for him and Jiang Cheng, at least for today.

He makes a detour through the kitchen to bring supplies to the living-room and when he comes back Jiang Cheng is already unloading their food on the table.

“Do you know what you want to watch?” Jiang Cheng asks him as he works, not sparing a glance for Nie Mingjue.

“Yep,” Nie Mingjue says, even though a movie is very far from his mind right now and when Jiang Cheng expectantly turns around to him, he slips the gift onto Jiang Cheng’s plate.

He’s of course not fast enough to escape Jiang Cheng’s notice, so he immediately turns around to look at what Nie Mingjue just did.

“What the hell is this?” Jiang Cheng demands to know, crossing his arms in front of his chest and Nie Mingjue sits down on the couch, pretending that his heart isn’t about to beat out of his chest.

“What does it look like?” he innocently gives back and Jiang Cheng narrows his eyes at him.

“Like a goddamn present.”

“Then that’s probably what it is,” Nie Mingjue teasingly says and doesn’t shrink back under Jiang Cheng’s glare.

“It’s your birthday. Why the hell am I getting a gift?”

“It is, technically, a gift for me,” Nie Mingjue says and now the glare melts off Jiang Cheng’s face to turn into a confused frown.

“But I’m the one who’s supposed to open it?”

“Yes.”

“Mh,” Jiang Cheng hums out and gingerly picks the wrapped gift up.

He tries to shake it to see if it rattles and he seems surprised when it does.

“Am I going to break it?”

“I don’t know. Are you?” Nie Mingjue laughs out when Jiang Cheng continues to poke at it instead of opening it up but finally he rips the wrapping paper apart.

He is met with a cardboard box Nie Mingjue found lying around in their bedroom this morning and it clearly does nothing to solve his confusion.

“What the hell is this?” he breathes out again, working on getting the box open and Nie Mingjue leans forward in anticipation.

It seems as if Jiang Cheng’s impatience finally won out because he rips the box open the last bit and then he immediately freezes.

And Nie Mingjue slides off the couch, onto one knee.

“My heart,” he starts as he reaches into the box to get the little black box out and it seems as just that is enough to make Jiang Cheng cry.

“Yes,” he gets out, his voice all choked up and Nie Mingjue laughs.

“I didn’t even say anything yet, don’t be so impatient,” he chides him but he catches Jiang Cheng’s hand in his to press a kiss to his fingers.

“My heart,” he repeats. “Will you give me the greatest birthday gift of them all and marry me?” he then asks and flicks the box open to reveal a ring.

“Yes, yes, yes,” Jiang Cheng chants out, tearing his gaze away from the ring and cupping Nie Mingjue’s face in his hands. “I will marry you, my soul,” he whispers and when he leans in to kiss Nie Mingjue the tears spill over.

“Best birthday ever,” Nie Mingjue mumbles when they part and he takes that opportunity to slide the ring on Jiang Cheng’s finger.

“Best birthday ever,” Jiang Cheng agrees, marvelling at the ring now on his hand and Nie Mingjue isn’t sure if he’s ever seen him smiling so much.

But to be fair, he isn’t sure if he’s ever smiled so much in his life before either.

“I love you,” Jiang Cheng tells him, intertwining their fingers and Nie Mingjue feels as if he’s going to melt with all the love he has for this man.

“I love you,” he gives back even though that should be pretty much obvious by now and then he pulls Jiang Cheng in for a kiss.

Their food is—yet again—cold by the time they manage to part enough to remember it but Nie Mingjue thinks if this is the tradition they are going to set for his birthday then he’s not going to mind that much.

Not if being incandescently happy comes right along with that.

[jcs-writing-hell]

MDZS Fic Idea | Love mutes WWX

Even after years of living at Gusu Lan, WWX is still perfectly capable of ticking LQR off. It doesn't happen as frequently, but when it does most now breath a sigh of relief in secret. It shows LQR is fine and well...

But one day it's different. The weather had been particularly awful and one way or another LQR injured himself.. yet this time he doesn't just snap back. He's holed up in his room, doesn't heal right.

Everyone, including WWX becomes worried that LQR might've given up, or that he thinks he's done enough, can let go of life at last. Of course, that's not just going to happen on WWX's watch. No, him, LWJ, WN, LSZ and LJY either go to find a doctor for him or they find one that's already close by.

The doctor they find is a lady, close to LQR in age, wise, patient and kind. She seems like a good choice.. but still, somehow LQR doesn't seem to get better, at least judging by how often he has them call for her.

It takes a while before those around the pair realize that.. LQR is by then just fine, physically. Emotionally? He's crushing. Man, does he have a crush. And with that in mind, looking closer, she's crushing just as hard.

They are, in fact, so in love that no one can cope with staying around them.

Not only that, but they quickly hit it off and for the first time, no matter how hard he tries to annoy him, WWX seems muted in LQR's world. He's not even paying any sort of attention to WWX any longer.

Who knew that, in the end, it was really the entire bloodline of the Lan's that had this "Once in love he's a fool" trait?

[nakimochiku]

counting kisses

word count:1k

Pairing: songxuexiao

7:45AM

Xingchen listens to his favourite sex education podcast on a low volume while he fixes breakfast, feeling across the jar lids in the fridge until he finds the one for blueberry jam. The toaster is taking too long to pop up Xue Yang’s blueberry bagels. The coffee maker percolates. He listens to the shower, the rush of water on tile, the occasional splash. 

Zichen exits the washroom in a cloud of steam, bare feet padding across the floor. Xingchen tips his face up. Zichen brushed a kiss across his cheek. He smells of citrus and cedar, skin damp and warm. “Morning,” he murmurs, sliding a hand across Xingchen’s hip. 

“Morning.” Xingchen says happily back, and with a pleased sound, Zichen continues on to the bedroom to get dressed. 

1

8:10AM

A Qing’s lunch waits for her on the kitchen counter. “I can’t find my—“

“Did you check under the couch?” Xingchen asks, since he distinctly remembers finding her favourite scrunchie there.

“Why would it—“ footsteps towards the living room. The sofa creaks as she leans on it. “Oh. Thank you gege!”

She rushes up, grabs her travel mug from his hand, kisses his cheek. “Gonna be at soccer today. Bye gege love you!” And she hurtles out the door. 

2

11:27 AM

“Fuck!” Xue Yang darts out of the bedroom. He grabs at the bagel Xingchen left for him, soggy and cold, with a clatter, storms to the door to shove his boots on. Xingchen waits in the office door way. 

“I told you to get up three times,” he teases. 

“Fuck off,” Xue Yang grumbles, no heat. Finished with his shoes, he skips up a step, mindful not to go beyond the entry hall, and grabs at Xingchen’s hand to pull him closer. 

“What are you wearing?” Xingchen asks. On the step above him, Xue Yang can tuck comfortably under his chin. 

“Those jeans you like. And Zichen’s shirt.” Xue Yang slips his hands into Xingchen’s back pockets, and leans up so he can crush a searing kiss against his lips. His mouth is sticky with blueberry jam. 

“You’re gonna be late.” Xingchen reminds, a little breathless, tempted to chase the taste of sugar and blueberries into Xue Yang’s mouth. He licks his lips. 

“You’re a fucking tease.” Xue Yang mumbles. He pecks him on the lips again, and dashes out of the apartment. 

4

5:15PM

Zichen’s return home brings the scent of fried chicken, salt and grease and fat. “I brought dinner,” he calls. Xingchen meets him at the door, taking the bags so Zichen can head straight to the washroom for his evening shower. 

He sets the take out in the counter, and moves to the bathroom to lean against the door jam. The room is already steamy. Xingchen flicks on the vent. “How was your day?”

“Stressful.” Zichen calls over the shower spray, groaning gratefully under its heat. “There's only so many times I can explain the same thing before I feel like I'll explode.”

Xingchen places Zichen’s towel over the towel warmer (Xue Yang got it for Zichen for new years. He claims he was trying to bully Zichen for the amount of showers he took. They all know thats not true.) “didn't feel like cooking?”

“A Yang was complaining about junk food so…” he trails off awkwardly. The shower shuts off. Xingchen smiles. The shower curtain rattles as it's pulled back. The bathroom is small, with two fully grown men standing chest to chest. 

“Can I help you destress, maybe?” Xingchen smirks. 

Zichn makes a soft wanting noise, pressing him against the bathroom sink until Xingchen hops onto it. “Yeah,” he breathes, lips already brushing. They kiss, tongues tangling, sweetly exploring each others mouths. Zichen’s hair drips onto Xingchen’s face like tears. The mirror is cold against his back. He wants to let Zichen all the way inside him. They pause, take breaths, kisses pressed to a sharp chin or the corner of an eye, before they are kissing again, hungry for each other. 

They don’t part until A Qing comes home.

15+

10:35PM

The printer is making the clunky wheezy distresssed noises it makes when it is sick of working. Xingchen whole heartedly understands. He almost doesn't hear the front door close gently, or the office door whisper open. 

“You’re late.” Xingchen murmurs, spinning in his chair and getting a lap full of Xue Yang for his troubles. He smell like coffee, chemically sweet and artificial, sweat and skin. Its digusting. Its also kind of nice. 

“Bitch fucking Jessica was up her own fucking ass about closing tonight,” he grumbles from his place against Xingchen’s shoulder. The printer whines moodily. A thump, Xue Yang knocking the side with his foot. The printer sputters and resumes. 

“Anything I can do to make you feel better, Yang’er,” Xingchen pouts out his lower lip. 

“Yeah,” Xue Yang shifts until he’s straddling Xingchen’s lap. His fingers curl in Xingchen’s hair, tilting his face up, the tip of his nose trailing along Xingchen’s throat, up to the hinge of his jaw, a drag of teeth and lips, hot skin and hot breath. “Can kiss it all better, right?” Xingchen can feel Xue Yang’s smirk. 

Instead of answering, he catches Xue Yang’s mouth with his own, trading kisses, broken only by the sharp nip of Xue Yang’s sharp canine, sinking into plump flesh, or scraping across his tongue, as thrilling as electricity. 

They keep kissing until Zichen pushes the office door open. “You gonna eat dinner or should I put it away?”

Xue Yang laughs like a crow. “Having dessert first.”

“You’re so damn cheesy.” Zichen huffs, while Xingchen giggles helplessly into the hollow of Xue Yang’s throat.

30+

11:59PM

Xingchen tallies up the day’s kisses while he listens to Zichen brushing his teeth. Xue Yang clings to his side, sweaty and breathing heavily. It gusts against Xingchen’s neck, ticklish. 

Its a pretty good count, by his estimation. The sink shuts off. The bathroom door swings half closed, leaving a crevice from the night light. The mattress dips as Zichen climbs in beside him. 

He leans down, minty and cool, to kiss him. “Good night,” he murmurs. 

“Night,” xue yang mumbles. He kisses Zichen first, then Xingchen, settling back into a coccoon of blankets. 

Xingchen adds two more kisses to his tally, and goes to sleep. 

[ninjakk]

A Piece Of Cake

A sweet, fluffy and slightly saucy modern au fic, with a slice of WangXian married life - in celebration of the Second Jade of Lan's birthday. Art by the amazing @daynight139 ❤️🎂🎉

Wei Ying decides to give Lan Zhan a birthday he'll never forget. A baking disaster helps forge a new sexy tradition for the happy couple to enjoy for years to come.