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Chapter Text

Wen Chao insisted on chaining the Thief and the Jiang soldiers, even for the short walk back to the throne room of the Cloud Recesses. He did this because it amused him. Lan Wangji let him.

Once the logistics of putting a man with one hand in irons were settled, with him chained by the neck to his brother, he threw a lazy grin at Lan Wangji. “Bet you’re curious how we found you all the way out here,” he said. “You’re lucky we did!”

“Not really,” said Lan Wangji. Wen Chao likely had Lan Wangji’s rooms watched. He hadn’t thought he needed to be careful tonight. Clearly, it was a mistake. He never used to make mistakes before Wei Wuxian tumbled back into his life.

He still didn’t turn to look at the Thief, who he could hear bickering with the Jiang sect’s minister of war. They seemed to be discussing their belief that after they died, their sister was going to kill them in retribution.

“Shijie’s too nice for that,” Wei Wuxian insisted.

“Of course she is,” replied his brother. “But we’ll wish we could die again when she cries.”

Wei Wuxian did not seem to have any clever remark to parry that with.

“We should send a message to Sect Leader Jiang,” said Lan Wangji.

“And say what?” scoffed Wen Chao. “Send her back their heads, see how she likes that.” He laughed. “Or their limbs, if you had so much fun the first time. I’m sure you could make the next hand last. Try sending one finger at a time.” He spoke loudly, ensuring the prisoners would hear.

Lan Wangji did look back then. “Where is your sister?” he asked, addressing himself to the minister of war.

Jiang Cheng glared at him mutinously. Wei Wuxian answered for him. There was a bruise already forming around his neck where the irons had dug in. He was smiling, as if in response to Wen Chao’s poor excuse for a joke. “Just outside of Caiyi town.”

“Wei Wuxian,” snapped his brother.

“If your men approach, they’ll be full of arrows before they get within a mile,” he added, helpfully.

Lan Wangji turned away from him, saying nothing.

When they reached the walls of the Cloud Recesses, Wen Qing stood by the gate, anxiety pulling her taut like a bow.

“There you are!” called Wen Chao, showing his teeth. “It’s been impossible to find you, cousin.”

Wen Qing surveyed Wen Chao, the Wen soldiers, and his prisoners with a cool look. Then she bowed to Lan Wangji.

“Send a message to Sect Leader Jiang,” he told her. “A trustworthy one. She is outside of Caiyi with her soldiers; they will attack if a force of any size approaches.” Wen Qing understood that this meant to go herself.

“What is the message?”

“We have her brothers in custody,” said Lan Wangji. “I would like to arrange for their ransom.” He glanced behind himself. “One of them,” he amended. “She can decide which she would like to remain here.”

Wen Qing nodded. “I told my brother to stick close to you,” she said, and gave Lan Wangji a long hard look he could not interpret. “He’ll attend to you shortly.” Then she was gone.

Wen Chao snorted. “I never realized before that Lans liked to play with their food,” he said. “You’re just giving her an opportunity to attack you. I wouldn’t.”

“She has already attacked me,” said Lan Wangji, nodding to the prisoners. “I have confidence she will act wisely.”

Wen Chao rolled his eyes ostentatiously.

“I should make myself presentable,” Lan Wangji told him, before he could start talking again. “Have them brought to the throne room.”

He left without another word, as though he had full confidence in what Wen Chao and his soldiers would do if given free reign of the Cloud Recesses.

Even riding her sword, it would take some time for Wen Qing’s message to be delivered. Lan Wangji lingered in his rooms. He found, much to his surprise, that the rabbit had returned all on its own. Perhaps it had fled back to familiar ground once startled. Did that say more about the safety of Lan Wangji’s rooms, or about the danger of the world outside? Or just about the appeal of the familiar, no matter how bleak?

He put on a finer set of robes than the ones he had gone out in. He thumbed through the contents of his jewelry box, in the end choosing nothing. Most of it had belonged to his mother. It was always hard for him to imagine wearing any of it.

Then he sat in front of the mirror and arranged his hair slowly, with deliberation. When he was done, he looked at himself for a very long time.

-

Lan Wangji nearly expected to find Wen Chao sitting on his throne. In truth, he wished for it; no one could fault him then for killing the man where he sat. It would make everything very simple. But the throne was empty. Wen Qing’s brother stood behind it, uneasy on his feet. The Jiang soldiers were lined up in neat rows, though somewhat rearranged. The Thief was now separated from his brother, and someone had taken the time to gag him. It was not hard to imagine what kind of trouble the Thief of Yiling could get into if he was allowed to speak freely. Lan Wangji wondered what he had said.

“Well?” demanded Wen Chao, after Lan Wangji sat down. He was pacing. Lan Wangji could not imagine what he was so impatient for. He had very neatly won.

The Thief’s eyes followed him as he walked, like a cat.

Lan Wangji stood. He strode forward and knelt before Wei Wuxian, who didn’t attempt to speak through the gag. Instead, he met Lan Wangji’s eyes. Then his gaze skittered away, much more like a rabbit now.

Very carefully, Lan Wangji untied the cloth between his lips, leaning in close to do it, his hands brushing the back of Wei Wuxian’s neck beneath his hair. His fingers grazed Wei Wuxian’s throat as he pulled back. He felt it when his breath just barely hitched.

This task done, he returned to his throne, and sat. The room waited for him to speak the same breathless way a hungry audience waited for a song. Wei Wuxian watched him and him alone now, with very dark eyes.

“I’ve sent a message to your sister,” he said. “I told her she can have one of you.” He nodded between Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng. “Do you think she will find those terms acceptable?”

“Oh, probably,” said Wei Wuxian. “She always said having two brothers to wrangle was a lot of work.”

Jiang Cheng began to speak, and was knocked in the head by one of the Wens for his trouble. Wei Wuxian glanced in his direction, lips tight. “Sorry, I know, I know,” he said. “She would never say it, of course, shijie is way too perfect for that, but it’s true.”

“Lan Wangji, don’t you ever get bored?” demanded Wen Chao. “When my father sent me here, I was expecting more excitement! I should have known better. All it ever is with you Lans is talking. Where’s the man who cuts off the hands of anyone who dares cross him?”

Lan Wangji, turned towards Wen Chao, did not see Wei Wuxian flinch. “Are you interested in crossing me?” he asked. “You’ve helped me very generously tonight.”

Wen Chao rolled his eyes. He tipped his head to the side, eyeing his lieutenant. Wen Zhuliu was wiser than his master; Lan Wangji knew he would encourage caution. Wen Chao was not a naturally cautious man. When he sensed weakness, he wanted to pounce. He had learned to listen to Wen Zhuliu, though, if only out of self preservation.

Then Wei Wuxian opened his mouth.

“Lan Zhan, do you really just let this guy go on and on?” he asked. “You know, the Cloud Recesses isn’t the only place I’ve had the run of. I’ve been to Nevernight, and let me tell you, even there he’s got a bad reputation.”

“As if you would make it ten feet into our home without being turned to ash,” drawled Wen Chao, radiating false boredom.

“That’s the problem with the Wens,” said Wei Wuxian, speaking still to Lan Wangji as though there was no one else in the room. When their eyes met, that was how it felt. “They build their palace half on top of a volcano, and then they dust off their hands and think, oh well, that’s enough security.” He leaned forward, nearly tipping over in his chains, a manic edge to his grin. He stage-whispered, “It’s not.”

“Shut up,” said Jiang Cheng. One of the Wens kicked him in the ribs; no one did any such thing to Wei Wuxian. It paid, it seemed, to have a reputation.

“I’m surprised you didn’t cut out his tongue,” said Wen Chao.

“Well, there’s always this time,” said Wei Wuxian. “You know, Wen Chao, getting into Nevernight was easy. It’s always easy if you know the right person to ask. None of that with the Cloud Recesses. People here are loyal, it was a lot of work. But Nevernight is like a sieve. Jiaojiao was very happy to help me out, for a price.”

Wen Chao drew his sword then, twirling it lazily. Every Lan in the room stood up straighter. They looked to Lan Wangji, but when he didn’t move, they didn’t either. Wen Ning’s grip on his own sword tightened.

“You’re not very smart, are you,” said Wen Chao. “I’m supposed to believe you’d go to Jiaojiao? That she wouldn’t laugh in your face? She almost helped you lose your hand the first time, didn’t she? I heard all about it. With the way you act, I’m surprised you kept it as long as you did.”

Lan Wangji’s eyes, finally, were drawn away from Wei Wuxian. Wen Chao snorted at his expression. “Oh, are you jealous? Don’t blame my Jiaojiao. She just helped advise Madame Yu on how to properly discipline her subordinates.”

Wei Wuxian was silent. When Lan Wangji glanced back at him, he wasn’t looking at either of them, or at his brother, who had gone pale. He had, it seemed, no clever remark for Wen Chao.

Lan Wangji hadn’t known he was afraid of dogs. He hadn’t known about this, either. He tried to live so steadily, so precisely, and it was still as though he held his blade as loosely as Wen Chao did, careless of who would be cut.

Lan Wangji stood then, his hand trembling at Bichen’s hilt. In a rush, every cultivator in the room not in chains put their hands on their own swords, drawing their blades a few inches from their sheaths.

Wen Chao raised an eyebrow, still twirling his blade casually. “Is there a problem?” he asked.

“Lan Zhan,” said Wei Wuxian, his voice low. Lan Wangji ignored him. He thought of Wei Wuxian pale and sweating and shaking, too terrified to think, asking if Lan Wangji was lonely. He drew his blade, and Wen Chao barked out a laugh and raised his own.

Wen Ning stepped between them, facing his cousin, his chin raised.

“Walk away, a-Ning,” said Wen Chao, in a mockery of sweetness. “Run and hide behind your sister like when we were kids.”

“Put your sword down,” said Wen Ning. His mouth was set. Lan Wangji was used to thinking of him as Wen Qing’s wallflower brother, vanishingly shy; he was not used to this. “This is the Cloud Recesses. You—you’ll start another war.”

There was a tense moment when Wen Chao might have stepped back, and laughed the entire incident off. He had done such things before. Maybe he would have if anyone but Wen Ning stood before him; but he thought Wen Ning was weak, and couldn’t bear to back down from him. So he sneered, and raised his sword, and Wen Ning met it, his arm shaking, and throughout the room fighting broke out. In the end it really was easy. For a bright moment Lan Wangji had no idea why he had never started a fight with Wen Chao before.

A few of the Jiang soldiers launched themselves at their captors. Lan Wangji grabbed Wen Ning’s arm, yanking him back, away from Wen Chao. “Get them out,” he said, nodding to the Jiangs.

Wen Ning obeyed on instinct, only realizing that he had left Lan Wangji alone after he was already doing as he’d been asked. He looked up to see Lan Wangji busy crossing swords with Wen Chao. It was obvious he’d wanted to get Wen Ning away from him. Wen Ning’s heart gave an unfamiliar lurch. He returned to his task, and hoped his sister would forgive him.

“Thank you,” said the Thief of Yiling, when Wen Ning took the irons from around his neck. He didn’t move. He was as cold and still as a statue. When Wen Ning reached out to him, worried, his expression flickered for a moment until he found a grin. “You should stand back now.”

Wen Ning, startled, did as he was told.

“Stop,” said Lan Wangji then, his voice ringing out through the room. Wen Chao smirked. Even after striking the chains from the Jiang soldiers, the Lans were still hopelessly outnumbered.

Lan Wangji met the Thief’s eyes. He didn’t nod. He didn’t need to. There was a ribbon threaded through his hair, bright red in contrast to his usual style of clothing. It was the first thing Wei Wuxian had noticed, when Lan Wangji walked into the room; it was the same ribbon he had left in place of the Yin Iron.

Wei Wuxian reflected that what Jiang Cheng was always telling him was true after all: he wasn’t as good a thief as he thought. He’d found and retrieved all four pieces of the Yin Iron, with the help of his sister and Nie Huaisang, but he hadn’t been able to piece it back together. They long suspected another piece must exist, but no matter how many history books Huaisang and Wei Wuxian combed through during their late nights in the library, they had never been able to find it.

That last piece was resting now halfway down the back of Wei Wuxian’s robes, dropped there like a fish in a schoolboy’s prank when Lan Wangji took the cloth from between his lips. Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, thought Wei Wuxian, and he closed his eyes so that he would stop staring at him, feeling seen through to his core.

A whistle rang harshly through the still air. The dead were scattered all along the floor; gutted Lan and Wen disciples, a few of Jiang Cheng’s men who had been freed only to die. They rose as the Thief did, his eyes flashing, his teeth very bright in the sudden darkness.

“Sorry, Wen Chao,” he said, in a voice that echoed more than it should. He did not sound sorry. He hardly sounded human. “But at least this isn’t boring, right?”

The Wens turned on him and fought, of course. The Thief only laughed. He had no sword, but he balanced the piece of Yin Iron on the tip of one finger, spinning in lazy arcs. His hair rose around him, and his eyes glowed, the color of blood. When he wasn’t laughing he whistled, a high piercing note, and when he whistled, the dead obeyed.

It wasn’t a complicated command. Wei Wuxian asked only one thing of them, and they had all been soldiers in life. They were very good at killing.

Lan Wangji understood then, watching him work from such a short distance, why they called him a demon.

Jiang Cheng called to his brother, shouting for him to be careful, but Wei Wuxian wasn’t listening. His dead men wouldn’t attack anyone in Jiang or Lan colors. They honed in on anyone wearing Wen red.

Wei Wuxian had intended to keep Wen Chao alive, send him sniveling back to his father, and maybe buy some years of peace for everyone else while the Wens fought with themselves. That’s probably what Lan Zhan wanted when he gave Wei Wuxian that last piece of the Yin Iron. For Wei Wuxian to buy him some time. But he could only think, now, of Wen Chao’s sword at Lan Zhan’s throat.

He snarled when a dead Lan cultivator ran Wen Chao through. He was lucky to die so easily as that, choking on his own blood and nothing else.

“Wei Wuxian!” shouted Jiang Cheng. “Stop it!”

There were more men to kill, so Wei Wuxian asked the corpses nicely to kill them. Every dead Wen rose again, sword still in hand. Anyone in red, that was easy. The most frightening thing, when he was a creature capable of being frightened, when he threw up in corners with only Nie Huaisang to see him, when he tried to count the dead and found his memory too fuzzy to do so, was always how easy it was.

“Wei Ying,” said Lan Wangji, knocking away Wen Chao’s sword. Wen Chao’s corpse lunged for him, and Lan Wangji lashed out, slicing him across the chest. It pushed him back, but didn’t stop him; he was already dead, after all. “Wei Ying.”

Wei Wuxian gasped, and jerked back, all at once terrified. He stopped whistling. He stumbled, legs suddenly unsteady, and tumbled to the ground. Jiang Cheng, who had been pulling uselessly at his arm as he shouted in his brother’s ear, fell too.

Lan Wangji, wearing a red ribbon in his hair, pulled the Yin Iron from Wen Chao’s sleeve, and then kicked away his body without looking to see where it landed. He strode forward. Even pristine Lan robes, it seemed, could be bloodied.

He dropped to his knees beside Wei Wuxian. He looked for a moment completely familiar: unconscious on the cold ground, gravely injured at the hands of Lan Wangji’s men.

Lan Wangji had visited the Thief in his cell in the middle of the night, just once, right before he was sent back to Yunmeng. He had looked dead then too.

Lan Wangji gathered him up in his arms. Resentful energy clung to his robes like smoke, slow to dissipate.

“Get out,” he said to Jiang Wanyin, and the remaining Jiang and Lan disciples. All of Wen Chao’s men lay dead on the ground.

“Fuck you.” Jiang Wanyin bared his teeth. “If you’ve killed him—”

“I’m fine,” said Wei Wuxian, without opening his eyes. He turned his face into Lan Wangji’s shoulder. The piece of Yin Iron was still in his hand, his fist closed tightly around it. It trembled as though he was holding it too hard, or like the Yin Iron itself was shaking, trying to break free from his grip. “Shijie is on her way, right?”

“Yes,” said Lan Wangji.

“You should meet her before she starts shooting arrows at us,” Wei Wuxian advised his brother.

“Fine,” snapped Jiang Cheng, fuming with the both of them. He stormed out to lurk outside the gates. Once there, he waited with his men. None of them mentioned it when he ran a furious arm across his eyes, or when he sat down hard to put his face between his knees.

In the throne room, Wei Wuxian lurched out of Lan Wangji’s gentle hold and stood, unsteady on his feet, exhausted and shaky and scared. How could he not be scared? There was only one thing that scared him anymore, as Lan Wangji looked up at him with an expression like thunder, like a flood. He had long felt this way around Lan Zhan, but it was worse now. It was an urge to cut open his own chest and bare his bloody heart to him, before Lan Zhan had the chance to do it for him, or to do it for real.

“I got rid of the Wens for you,” he said. His voice was rough, as though he had been screaming. “Is that a good enough wedding gift, Lan Zhan? How are you going to top that?”

Lan Wangji stood. He took Wei Wuxian’s shoulders to steady him. “I didn’t think you were going to kill all of them.”

“No,” said Wei Wuxian. He closed his eyes. “Me either.” He did not apologize. “My ribbon looks nice on you.”

“It will kill you,” said Lan Wangji. He reached for the other piece of Yin Iron, and Wei Wuxian danced back, out of his grip. Lan Wangji’s face hardened.

“So what?” asked the Thief of Yiling, about his own life.

“I could take it from you,” said Lan Wangji. “You would let me take it from you.”

“I’ll give it to you,” said Wei Wuxian. “This one, and the other three pieces me and shijie managed to find. I’ll fix it up for you. You’ll have what Lan Yi had. Another wedding gift. But you’ll have to let me use it. You know you will. Wen Ruohan is going to want it, now. Jin Guangshan is going to want it. Wherever Jin Guangyao is, he’ll definitely want it. You’ll be safe, if you have me.” He smiled. “I’ve been told I’m a very good attack dog.”

“Do you care so little for your family that you wouldn’t protect them instead?” demanded Lan Wangji. He knew it wasn’t true.

“They would never stand for it,” said Wei Wuxian. “Shijie would kill me. Jiang Cheng would never shut up about it. And what else can I do for them?” He shrugged expansively. The hook he wore in place of his right hand gleamed. “I was always going to marry to secure an alliance. Why shouldn’t I do it for love too?”

Lan Wangji had seen too much already of how far Wei Wuxian would go for those he loved. He closed his eyes.

“It’s okay, Lan Zhan,” said Wei Wuxian, his voice very quiet now. He stepped closer, nearly into Lan Wangji’s arms. He put his left hand to Lan Wangji’s cheek. “The other sects can’t let shijie have the Yin Iron, you know that. They’ll say she’s letting me run wild. We were never going to be able to keep it, even if we found it all. But if I have it, and you have me, then that’s fine. Everyone knows you can keep me in line. You’re the only one who can stop me, see? It’s for the best. It all worked out.”

Lan Wangji did see. The Thief of Yiling screamed at night, loud enough to be heard from neighboring rooms, loud enough that Wen Qing’s informants knew about it. His brother’s voice couldn’t reach him, when the Yin Iron had him in its grasp; but Lan Wangji’s could, because it was the voice that lived in his nightmares. The other sects would believe that Wei Ying was terrified of him because it was true.

“You could destroy it,” he said. “If you really have it all. You should. No one should have it. Not anyone.” Especially, he thought, not me.

“Maybe someday,” said Wei Wuxian, without conviction. “Wen Ruohan has a few more sons I’ll need to kill first, I think.”

Even when he was hardly conscious of himself, his eyes red with the Yin Iron’s power, Wei Wuxian had never looked as terrible as he had in the dungeons of Cloud Recesses, waiting for Lan Wangji to cut him apart. Lan Wangji thought about this. He thought about Wei Wuxian, who when deprived of his right hand found a new way to destroy himself for his sect and for his family.

“What happened to your throat?” Lan Wangji asked, touching Wei Wuxian there. His skin was covered in a ring of dark, livid bruises. Wei Wuxian inhaled shakily at the feeling of Lan Wangji’s calloused fingers.

“Oh, Jiang Cheng tried to strangle me,” said Wei Wuxian easily. “They wouldn’t let him. It was nice of him. He thought you were going to torture me before you killed me.” He laughed at the expression on Lan Wangji’s face, a beautiful sound, broken as it was. “I thought maybe you were going to torture me, too. You can’t fault him for that.”

Lan Wangji could fault the minister of war for anything he liked. It wasn’t fair. Of course it wasn’t fair. Despite his best intentions, Lan Wangji did not feel particularly fair about Wei Wuxian.

Had he really so easily let himself believe that his anger was justice? That what he felt was even wholly anger?

Wei Wuxian, the Thief of Yiling, the Demon of Yunmeng, who would throw away his life in every way that mattered so that his family could be safe. His body and his soul and his heart, handed like they were nothing to the man who hurt him so terribly. Not even just his family: he would do it so that Lan Wangji, too, could be safe.

Lan Wangji did not even remember what it felt like to be safe, and all along Wei Wuxian had known that too.

He realized it with the same sudden rush of destruction as a failed dam, and was nearly swept away. He was no better than his father, who loved a murderer, or his brother, who loved a traitor. It was worse, perhaps, to love a thief, after what Lan Wangji had done to him. But the Lans, if they knew anything, knew that love was like a river in a storm: it went where it willed, and could not be denied.

“Fine,” he said, and pulled the Thief close, startling him enough that he squawked. He kissed him soundly on the mouth, the both of them tasting blood. “Tell your sister when she gets here.” He could feel Wei Wuxian’s pulse pounding under his hands as he spoke. “I’ll marry you.”

Wei Wuxian grinned so brightly that it nearly chased away the last of the shadows clinging to him. He swayed forward in Lan Wangji’s grip, stealing just one more kiss.

-

First they had to argue with Jiang Cheng about it, because Jiang Yanli and her retinue had not yet arrived. Wei Wuxian seemed to Lan Wangji to be exactly in his element, yelling at his brother happily.

“I can’t believe you,” said Jiang Cheng. “This was your idea all along? Marriage?”

“Better than more corpses,” said Wei Wuxian, not as cheerfully as he intended.

“Did a-jie know?” There was no hiding the bitterness in his voice. Jiang Cheng could never hide things like that. “What, you didn’t feel like mentioning to me how insane your plan was?”

“You knew I was coming here! You came with me!”

“I knew this time,” Jiang Cheng spat. “This time, when you planned to come back engaged, as if Hanguang-jun wouldn’t kill you where you stood. Not any of the times you snuck into the Cloud Recesses, not any of the times you really expected to come back in a coffin—”

Wei Wuxian threw a glance at Lan Wangji, as if to say, isn’t he ridiculous? But Lan Wangji was glaring at Jiang Cheng.

“You sound like you were the one put in danger,” he said icily. “Or the one who was injured. Not Wei Ying.”

“It’s Wei Ying now?” Jiang Cheng whipped his head around, staring at Wei Wuxian, as though expecting him to have a problem with this. Wei Wuxian merely blinked at him, and shrugged. Jiang Cheng snarled inarticulately, and turned away again. “Are you serious? You’re getting high and mighty with me? You? You cut off his hand and sent him back to us to die, and I’m the one who isn’t treating him right?”

Lan Wangji did not say anything in response. He hardly appeared to hear.

“Alright, alright,” said Wei Wuxian placatingly, stepping between them. He rested his hand on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder, having put himself in the right position to do so.

Lan Wangji, watching Wei Wuxian argue with his brother, felt as though he had wandered into the middle of a dance he did not know the steps to.

All three of them were gratified when Jiang Yanli finally arrived. It was only her and a handful of soldiers. No attendants, as they had come on their swords. Lan Wangji had heard that Jiang Yanli preferred to avoid riding her sword whenever she could. Then again, he had threatened her brothers. He had done worse than that. He was surprised she did not draw on him immediately, after she stepped down onto the grass. She smiled politely instead.

It was nearly dawn. Lan Wangji wondered if any of them had slept.

“I received your message,” Jiang Yanli said formally to Lan Wangji. She did not bow. “You want me to leave one of your brothers in your care?”

It was not quite relief that rushed through him then. But Jiang Yanli had understood him. That was good, because it meant Wen Qing was likely alive. “Yes.”

“Shijie, I’m getting married!” Wei Wuxian ran to her, and slung his arm around her shoulder. It struck Lan Wangji what an absurd picture they made: two sect leaders at war, with Wei Wuxian, brother and fiance, grinning between them. He was swaying still on his feet, and his robes were covered in dried blood. Jiang Yanli did not seem unsettled by these things. She had surely seen him covered in worse.

She had seen him feverish and dying. It had started a war.

Jiang Yanli looked between them. “In exchange for a truce?”

“And an alliance,” Wei Wuxian said. “You’ll need it. I may have pissed off the Wens.”

“You did not leave many of them alive to complain,” said Lan Wangji.

“Word of it will get back to Nevernight, though. Wen Ruohan doesn’t appreciate his sons being killed, even the really annoying ones.”

“Oh, a-Xian,” said Jiang Yanli, becoming suddenly before Lan Wangji’s eyes a sister, her demeanor softening even as she scolded her brother, “you didn’t.”

“He was very annoying,” said Lan Wangji. He did not know what compelled him to speak. Jiang Yanli turned back to him, and stepped closer. Wei Wuxian hovered behind her, a nervous energy in him, as though he was afraid of what she might do.

Lan Wangji was not afraid of Jiang Yanli. He couldn’t imagine her hurting someone her brother loved.

“I see,” she said, glancing between him and Wei Wuxian. “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?” She was speaking to her brother.

“A-jie, please talk some sense into him.” Jiang Cheng had sat down again on a boulder, his head back in his hands.

“You know that’s never worked on me,” said Wei Wuxian.

“You’re going to leave us alone at Lotus Pier?”

“I’m going to leave you in peace.”

“To become a Lan—”

“A-Cheng,” said Jiang Yanli. She sat down beside him, putting a hand on his back.

“You knew, right? And the fucking—that was the Yin Iron, wasn’t it. How the fuck did the Lans have two pieces?”

“Lan Yi left one behind long ago,” said Lan Wangji. “As I’m sure Sect Leader Jiang is aware. And Wen Qing brought the other with her when she defected. She feared what Wen Ruohan would do with it.”

“And now we have all of them,” said Jiang Yanli. She looked up at Wei Wuxian. “Right?”

Wei Wuxian held up his piece, spinning it lightly on his finger. Lan Wangji held up the metal he had taken from Wen Chao’s body. It ached to hold it, like keeping ice in your palm, so cold it burned. Already it encroached on the edges of his mind, whispers in the dark. And he was healthy and whole. How had it felt, when Wei Wuxian was dragged back to Lotus Pier, the Yin Iron hidden against his heart?

“I’m the minister of war, and you don’t tell me these things?”

“Well, if it hadn’t worked, it would have been really embarrassing,” said Wei Wuxian.

Jiang Cheng stared down at his shoes, thinking. “So you have to go, so you can keep it,” he said finally. “Otherwise Jin Guangshan will start something.”

Wei Wuxian shrugged. “Better us have it than Wen Ruohan.”

“You mean better him have it than Wen Ruohan.”

“You do realize Lan Zhan helped us in there, right?”

“We’ve been trying to kill each other for months! Him liking us better than Wen fucking Chao is not exactly an accomplishment.” Jiang Cheng shook his head. “All this so you can be a Lan and get better at raising corpses? That’s what you want your legacy to be, Wei Wuxian?”

Wei Wuxian dropped down beside his brother and sister, sitting on the ground since they were taking up all the space on the rock. “I’m the only one who can do it,” he said. “And it’s the only thing I can do. So I have to. That’s it, Jiang Cheng, I promise.”

“That’s not it at all,” said Jiang Cheng bitterly. He glared up at Lan Wangji, and then stood. “Clean up,” he said. “I’m not about to have peace talks in a room that’s still covered in blood.” He stalked away.

“You know,” said Jiang Yanli, “I thought you two might fight less during a war.”

“Ah, shijie, we’ll never fight less,” said Wei Wuxian. “I might move away and get married and become horribly boring and grown up, but I promise, me and Jiang Cheng will always fight.”

For reasons Lan Wangji did not think he would ever understand, this made Jiang Yanli smile.

-

The Cloud Recesses was, of course, thrown into chaos, which was not a state it knew how to be in. None of the disciples were sad to see the Wens go. But it was an unpleasant task, digging graves, made worse by the growing unease, a question passed along nearly silently, in furtive glances and whispered conversations: what would happen now?

Lan Wangji wasn’t the kind of man to calm those sorts of fears. He shared them. Wei Wuxian could have done it, but he had barely made it back inside the walls before he lost his footing, and was out cold before he could have hit the ground. Lan Wangji caught him before he could. Jiang Yanli, watching them, sighed and began discussing the matter of sleeping arrangements with a few of the servants herself.

Lan Wangji, meanwhile, watched Wei Wuxian’s still face, touched his cheek very lightly, and had time to wonder if he was making a mistake.

Wen Qing arrived then, dusty from the road. The Jiangs had taken her sword and escorted her to the Cloud Recesses under guard. She found her brother first, and he submitted himself to being fussed over.

“Sorry for the trouble,” said Jiang Yanli, approaching them both to hand Wen Qing back her sword. Wen Qing only shrugged. Reasonable precautions did not offend her. She paused in the middle of wiping a spot of blood from Wen Ning’s cheek and looked to Lan Wangji, who had lifted the Thief of Yiling into his arms, and was carrying him away.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Oh,” said Jiang Yanli, “they got engaged.”

“Engaged?” Wen Ning blinked at her. Then, realizing exactly who he was talking to, he ducked his head.

Wen Qing rubbed at her eyes. She took a moment to absorb this. “Well, that’s going to be a nightmare.” Jiang Yanli began to laugh, quiet and bright, not a sound that was heard often in the Cloud Recesses.

“I’m sure a-Xian won’t be any trouble,” she said. Her brows drew together. “Do you think it’s such a terrible idea? You’ve lived here for a long time, both of you.”

Thinking of Lan Wangji’s painstaking composition over the past several months, Wen Qing said, “Even if it’s a bad idea, there’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Yes,” agreed Jiang Yanli. “I often feel that way with a-Xian, too.”

Wen Ning said nothing, but thinking of that same composition, he thought that it might not even be a bad idea after all.

-

Wen Qing, worn through to the bone, still went to find Lan Wangji after her brother had succeeded in convincing her that he wouldn’t immediately collapse in her absence.

“Really,” he had insisted. “Lan Wangji even got me out of the fight before Wei Wuxian, um. Finished it.”

“I see,” said Wen Qing. “He’s Lan Wangji now, is he?”

Wen Ning colored, and shook his head quickly, and it struck Wen Qing all at once that for better or for worse, things would be very different now. She hugged him fiercely then, and did not let go for a long time.

She checked the infirmary first, since that would have been a sensible place for Lan Wangji to bring Wei Wuxian. Of course, they weren’t there. She was waylaid for a little while to help treat the wounded, so suddenly in her element that she could barely pull herself away. But eventually she did, and with a sigh dragged herself to Lan Wangji’s bedchamber. It was where the music was coming from, after all.

All of her caution burned out of her, Wen Qing entered without knocking. Lan Wangji was in his customary place at his qin. Wei Wuxian lay sprawled out on his bed, dead asleep, the rabbit settled on his pillow and nosing curiously at his hair.

“He looks terrible,” Wen Qing observed.

Lan Wangji endeavored to play Cleansing more pointedly. Even exhausted as she was, it made Wen Qing smile. She went to Wei Wuxian’s bedside and plucked the rabbit from the pillow, settling it down in Lan Wangji’s lap. His hands stilled. The rabbit and the man looked up at her with equally startled expressions.

“Do you want me to look him over?” she asked. “I think you’ve played enough by now.”

Lan Wangji nodded for her to go ahead.

“A-Ning said he was using the piece of Yin Iron.” Wen Qing felt for Wei Wuxian’s pulse. “You were right.”

“I was.”

Wen Qing pressed her lips together. “Why aren’t you angry with me?” she demanded. She had insisted the Thief of Yiling was no threat, even once they knew what he had stolen. She thought that one piece of the Yin Iron was nothing—after all, three other pieces must be hidden away, and none of their masters had dared to use them. In the worst case, she thought her own bargaining chip, taken from Wen Ruohan, would be enough to keep them safe. That, too, had been a mistake.

Lan Wangji set the rabbit aside and came to stand beside her.

“He’s fine,” she said, letting go of Wei Wuxian’s wrist. “He just needs to sleep it off, and to stop being so reckless.”

“He won’t.”

“I see. So are you angry with him?”

“No,” said Lan Wangji, looking down at the Thief. He wanted to brush some of the hair from his eyes. He curled his hand into a fist instead. There was only one person in this room he was angry with.

“Are you actually going to marry him?”

“He thinks it will keep him safe. Or that I will.”

“Fair assumption,” said Wen Qing. “You’ve kept a-Ning and I safe so far.”

He had; he’d done it by being the kind of person who cut off Wei Wuxian’s hand. Who set him on the path that led to him lying in bed, dead to the world, his skin the color of a corpse. Or perhaps Wei Wuxian would always have ended up here, and it was only Lan Wangji selfishness that allowed him to think his own actions had anything to do with it. He shook his head.

“Okay, fine. So don’t do it.” Wen Qing sighed when she saw the look on Lan Wangji’s face. “Or do. But don’t lie to yourself about the reason. And when your fiance wakes up, send for me. If he’s going to keep channeling resentful energy like this, I need to talk to him.”

She left him then. Lan Wangji lingered, watching the Thief, being selfish for just a little while longer.

-

Things didn’t get any easier in the following days. The Jiang sect’s actual diplomats arrived, and talks began in earnest. Wei Wuxian, after he had recovered, was as unhelpful as he knew how to be. He woke up in a neat guest bedroom that Jiang Yanli had arranged for him, with no idea why he had been dreaming of lying in a meadow with rabbits climbing all over him.

The Lan disciples were scared of him, and he did nothing to dissuade them, whistling at odd hours and grinning at them with smoke pouring from his eyes, there and then gone in an instant. He once startled poor Wen Ning so badly that he nearly fell from a balcony; this, at least, he apologized for profusely.

He was annoyed that his sister and Lan Wangji had found something to agree on in forbidding him to forge the pieces of the Yin Iron back into one just yet. Most of it was back at Lotus Pier, under guard, and Yanli didn’t want any of them to leave until an official end to the war was settled. Who knew what Lan Wangji was thinking; at the mention of the Yin Iron he had returned to an impenetrable sheet of ice.

If Wei Wuxian trusted his own memory even just a little less, he might think he had imagined it that Lan Wangji had agreed to marry him, or kissed him fiercely, or even carried him away from the throne room, a hazy memory that really could have been a dream.

“I have a reputation,” Wei Wuxian claimed, when his sister scolded him for scaring the disciples. “What’s the point of all this if I’m not the terrifying monster everyone thinks I am?”

“You’re some kind of monster, that’s for sure,” snapped his brother, and Jiang Yanli, exhausted from days of negotiations, for once didn’t have the energy to deal with both of them at once. They only stopped sniping at each other when they realized she had fallen asleep at the table between them.

The Lan advisors were scrupulous, and didn’t wish to give an inch. Their sect, they maintained, was the wronged party; they were accepting the fearsome Wei Wuxian as a new member. They expected concessions, and Jiang Yanli might once have been happy to offer them, but Sect Leader Lan had cut off her little brother’s hand. Negotiations were tense.

And Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian, when they were seen together, hardly spoke a word. Jiang Yanli, who had seen Lan Wangji cradling her brother’s body, was surprised. Jiang Cheng wasn’t. Whatever temporary madness had come over the both of them had clearly run its course, he told her, as they watched them during one of the interminable diplomatic dinners. They were seated next to each other, and every time Wei Wuxian dared to say anything, he was silenced with a glare. Of course, this only encouraged him to say more and more outlandish things.

Jiang Cheng appeared in Wei Wuxian’s room one night, dressed for travelling. “Let’s just go,” he said. “Obviously you’re not actually interested in marrying him, and I can’t blame you. We can always say Huaisang kidnapped you again.”

“Like they’d believe me this time either,” said Wei Wuxian, still trying to calm his racing heart and steady his breathing without his brother noticing. Jiang Cheng used to barge into his chambers at all hours before Wei Wuxian lost his hand; it had never been a problem before. Slowly, his brain caught up with his mouth. “What? No, I’m not leaving.”

“You hate it here,” said Jiang Cheng. “You keep complaining about the food.”

“Because the food’s terrible.”

“Wei Wuxian, what do you want?” Jiang Cheng sat down heavily on his bed. “You say you want to get married, and then you take every chance you can get to annoy Lan Wangji.”

“Hey! I can be way more annoying than this,” said Wei Wuxian, offended.

“You don’t have to marry him. Don’t look at me like that, you don’t. You know that, right?”

“Yes, Jiang Cheng,” he said, serious now. “I know. You don’t have to worry.”

“Then stop making me,” grumbled Jiang Cheng. “If he was going to cut off your other hand, he’d have done it already, but that doesn’t mean you have to provoke him.”

“Exactly!” said Wei Wuxian, grinning brightly to his brother’s dismay. “I think that’s exactly it. Only, I don’t think he’s realized it yet.”

Jiang Cheng shook his head. It had always frustrated him how little he understood Wei Wuxian, but then again, how could it be his fault? Wei Wuxian was unfathomable. “I don’t see why you couldn’t have just married Huaisang. Is Sect Leader Nie not a scary enough relative for you to lord over the rest of us?”

“Huaisang has better prospects in mind than a demonic cultivator,” said Wei Wuxian, wondering, also, why Nie Huaisang couldn’t have better taste in men. “And charming as he is…”

“Ugh.” Jiang Cheng wrapped him up in a hug so sudden that he had no chance to flinch away from it. “Seriously,” he said. “I’ll come kidnap you anytime. Just send word.” He drew back. “And if you love him so much, stop antagonizing him.”

“Because that’s your job?

Only shaking him about the shoulders a little bit, Jiang Cheng said, “Obviously.”

-

The next night, Lan Wangji found Wei Wuxian drinking on the roof outside his bedchamber. He’d heard a clattering above, and climbed up with his sword, half-expecting a Wen assassin arrived much earlier than they expected. Instead, his fiance lay sprawled on the roof tiles, cradling the same bottle Lan Wangji had seen in his hand a decade ago.

He and Wei Wuxian had spent plenty of time together in a series of slow meetings or dinners. They had not been alone together for weeks. They had been partners in avoiding it.

“Jiang Cheng offered to kidnap me,” said Wei Wuxian. He poured some of the wine into his mouth. His aim was terrible. He had, Lan Wangji reflected, been right handed. “Should I have let him?”

“It does not seem to be his area of expertise.”

Wei Wuxian cackled. “Oh, don’t tell him that, he’ll kill you.” He said this as if Jiang Cheng did not already surely wish Lan Wangji dead.

“Come sit,” said Wei Wuxian. “Or don’t. We’re to be married, aren’t we?”

Lan Wangji eyed him for a long moment, and then sat. “Yes.”

“Regretting it already?” asked Wei Wuxian carelessly. The same kind of careless with which he had once named his sword; the kind that wasn’t really careless at all. “We don’t have to. I can figure something else out.”

He moved to sit up. Lan Wangji grabbed him by the wrist, tugging him back down.

He had so many things to say, and could not find his way towards saying them. A river did not have to worry what it would leave in its wake; he did.

“Was it true?” he asked.

“You’ll have to be more specific. Was it something I said? Probably not.” Wei Wuxian grinned at him, still play-acting as himself. Lan Wangji did not know when he had learned to tell the difference. He did know that he hated it.

“Not you. Wen Chao. About your hand, and—Wang Lingjiao.”

The smile vanished. “Wen Chao would say anything if he thought it would hurt,” he said. “Jiaojiao is just the same.” The way he said her name was closer to a snarl. Lan Wangji wondered how long she had to to live.

“He would. But what he said was true.”

“Does it matter?” Wei Wuxian leaned closer as he said it, a frenetic energy in his limbs. Did it matter if Lan Wangji had taken one of his nightmares and made it real without even meaning to?

Maybe not to him. His hand was gone regardless. But it mattered to Lan Wangji.

There was no true answer that Wei Wuxian would accept. So instead Lan Wangji said, “Do you know the story of my mother and father?”

“Sure,” said Wei Wuxian. It was a well known enough story, all the more so for being the sort of thing one didn’t speak of in polite company.

“My brother and I both worked very hard not to become our father. Neither of us have been very good at it.” He looked away. “I hurt you.”

“So, so, so,” agreed Wei Wuxian. “And you’re wretched over it, aren’t you, Hanguang-jun? Maybe I’m just certain you won’t dare do it again.”

“But you aren’t,” said Lan Wangji. Wei Wuxian, watching him, nearly wished that Lan Zhan knew how to lie, even as he loved him for the fact that he couldn’t.

He hummed, tapping his nose with the dull side of the hook. “Let me tell you a story, okay, Lan Zhan?” He settled down with his hand behind his head, his other arm resting on his stomach, and began to speak.

Lan Yi was a daughter of the Lan sect, and always knew she would inherit. She thought of her family first in all things, and was, all around, as perfect an heir as anyone could hope for. I should talk about how beautiful she was now, shouldn’t I? That’s how these usually go. I don’t think she was, though, not to everyone. Too serious. But she was to Baoshan Sanren.

“I know this story,” said Lan Wangji.

“Did I ask if you knew it? It’s rude to interrupt, you know, is that not one of the rules?”

It was. Lan Wangji inclined his head, gesturing for him to continue.

I’ll tell you the stories my mother told me about Baoshan Sanren sometime. She knew her, you know. How many people can say that? But this was before she ascended her mountain, before she was a god, before she had any of her many disciples—she was just a girl. She and Lan Yi met as children, and were inseparable from then onward. They knew the moment they crossed swords in training that they were fated for each other.

“I see their tale had a great affect on you.”

“Lan Zhan,” whined Wei Wuxian, noticing with a start that Lan Wangji was nearly smiling. “I’ll never finish telling it this way!”

They traveled together, sharing everything, partners in all the ways they could devise. Those stories are the ones my mother liked best, all the adventures they got up to—Baoshan Sanren and the water-demon, Lan Yi and the heart’s curse. Some even say that Baoshan Sanren died, once, and Lan Yi stole her spirit back before she could be born anew, unwilling to be parted from her lover. I like that one too. But this story comes after that.

To bring Baoshan Sanren back from the dead, Lan Yi required immense power, more than any cultivator before or since has possessed. So made herself a new power source. Don’t look like that, Lan Zhan. Are you really so disapproving? Aren’t you her descendant?

“That’s disputed,” said Lan Wangji. “There were once several branches of the Lan family. Many of the records were lost.”

“Oh, come on. It’s only disputed because the Lans were embarrassed.”

So, so, so. She forged the Yin Iron, to bring back the one she loved most. Noble, right? Who could fault her? But she kept it, after. Petitioners came from all over, asking for her help. Little things, big things. A farmer asked for help collecting his harvest fast enough before the rains came; a cultivator asked for the return of his stolen golden core; a widow asked for her husband back.

Lan Yi granted every request she could, right up until that widow asked for her husband back. That, she would not do. And the widow was furious. Wouldn’t you be? If the great Lan Yi could bring her lover back, why shouldn’t she ask the same? She stole a sword from a nearby cultivator, and attacked, expecting of course that Lan Yi would strike her down. And so it was. Very unbecoming. Blood all over the palace floor, and Lan Yi at the center of it.

He paused. Both Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian thought of the blood that had recently been spilled across the floor of the throne room of the Cloud Recesses.

You see what I mean? Unbecoming. Baoshan Sanren begged her, then, to give up the Yin Iron. Clearly it was no good. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. She had to fix what she had done. So she searched and searched for the widow’s spirit, to bring her back to the land of the living. But she found only darkness. The woman was gone, and only resentful energy left in her place. Lan Yi thought to use it, perhaps to find the woman’s husband, to at least fulfill her last request, but it overcame her. The Yin Iron became unstable. She couldn’t control it anymore. She couldn’t stop herself from hurting that widow, from hurting anyone else. She returned to her home to seek Baoshan Sanren’s aid.

But Baoshan Sanren was gone. Secluded up on her mountain. They never spoke again. Then, Lan Yi broke the Yin Iron and hid the pieces. But it was too late. Some say the resentful energy consumed her; others think she wandered the world forever, looking for her lover, that she wanders still. Or supposedly she haunts one of the caves near Cloud Recesses. It doesn’t really matter though, does it? They never saw each other again.

Wei Wuxian went quiet. He looked up at the sky, not at Lan Wangji.

“So learn from Lan Yi. Bury the pieces of the Yin Iron and be done with it.”

“Baoshan Sanren wanted to stop her. She wanted it all along. But she didn’t, out of love. A soft kind of love. Too soft.”

“Better that she had put her in a cage?”

Wei Wuxian threw out his arms, frustrated. “Better that she have stolen the Yin Iron, or accidentally dropped it in a river and forgotten about it, or something. Lan Yi had no one to stop her, and so in the end she had nothing.”

“Better,” said Lan Wangji, “that she let Baoshan Sanren die when it was her time. It does no one any good to go against the nature of the world.”

“Maybe,” said Wei Wuxian. “Is that what you would have done?”

Lan Wangji thought of Wei Wuxian, half dead in his prison and later half dead in his arms. He bore it with a smile when the people he loved hurt him, and decided that they must have been right to do so. If Lan Wangji built him a house and told him that for his own safety, he could never leave, he would probably bear that with a smile too.

“I would cut down anyone in my path who took something so important from me,” he said. “I would overturn the world itself. Perhaps I am not so trustworthy either. Did you think of that?”

Wei Wuxian stared at him. “Lan Zhan.”

“Do you think Baoshan Sanren was afraid of Lan Yi?”

“No. Never.”

“You can’t know that. Perhaps she was right to leave before she could be trapped.”

This time, Wei Wuxian was the first to look away.

That night he dreamed, again, of Xiao Xingchen. It was a blurry dream, not moonlight clear like the first one. Muddied enough that in the morning, he thought perhaps it was just that: a dream. Jiang Cheng would tell him he was just being overdramatic, and wishing himself more important than he was. Probably he would be right.

Xiao Xingchen asked the same question, after all: “Do you regret it?”

It was hard to imagine, Wei Wuxian reflected in the morning, that Baoshan Sanren was the sort who liked to repeat herself.

-

“I tried to give you advice, once,” said Jiang Yanli. It was just her and Lan Wangji, drinking tea and talking circles around fishing rights, which was the sort of thing they should have both been using their secretaries to argue over. It was a nice respite from more complicated topics.

Lan Wangji silently took a sip of his tea. Jiang Yanli proceeded as if he had answered. “You didn’t appreciate it, did you?”

He had not. Lan Wangji, seventeen and terrified, had been aching from the loss of his brother in a way that the loss of his parents had not hurt him. That was a numb sort of pain, a freezing; this was like fire burning through his heart, uncontrollable and never-ending.

Jiang Yanli had taken him aside the first time she visited the Cloud Recesses after he became sect leader, and very kindly offered him the advice that had so helped her when she was in his place. She told him to trust those closest to him, to rely on them as he needed, to never try to shoulder too much of the burden alone.

He’d walked from the room without reply. Impolitely, but perfectly within his rights, he’d asked the Jiang delegation to leave the next day. He recognized Jiang Yanli’s nature well enough to know it had not been a joke, the way the same advice might have been a joke coming from one of the Wens. She really thought he had anyone close to him, anyone to rely on, anyone to shoulder any part of the burden that was his, and his alone.

They had not spoken much since, and now he was to marry her brother. Perhaps. At this point the tide of speculation had turned, and many of the Lan disciples were sure it was some sort of ruse, that the great Hanguang-jun had never intended to marry the Demon of Yunmeng after all.

“No,” he said. “I did not.”

Jiang Yanli frowned down at her tea. “I never apologized. I was naive.”

“You could do so now.”

She inclined her head, exuding sympathy. “I can’t.” Their eyes met. Lan Wangji understood perfectly well why Jiang Yanli could not apologize to him.

He looked back down at the table. He could feel, like distant music, the way he might find this funny. Jiang Yanli was sorry for misunderstanding his situation; she would never say so, now that he had hurt her brother. It was sweet. An example of exactly the kind of care Jiang Yanli had that he did not.

A few weeks ago, standing sword to sword with Wei Wuxian, his mouth might have twitched. But it was as distant now as the sun on a moonless night, as the water trapped under the frozen surface of a lake. How could it be funny that Jiang Yanli would not apologize to him? Even Lan Wangji hadn’t been certain Wei Wuxian would live when he left the Cloud Recesses that last time. And now Wei Wuxian wanted to put his life back in Lan Wangji’s hands.

“Will you throw us out if I offer you more advice now?” asked Jiang Yanli.

“I am not seventeen anymore,” said Lan Wangji.

Jiang Yanli inclined her head, politely, and in such a way that suggested somehow that her question remained.

“Please.” Lan Wangji nodded to her. He wondered whether her advice would be to break off the engagement. To give it up as one of her brother’s whims, take a simpler truce, and let her keep him safe at home. It would be a reasonable request. More sensible. Lan Wangji was used to being ruthlessly sensible. Perhaps if Jiang Yanli told him it was best, he would be able to convince himself to be ruthless in this too. At least then he would stop living like this, on a blade’s edge, unsure which way he would fall.

“Things are different now,” said Jiang Yanli. “You have what you didn’t before. It would be a waste to ignore that, don’t you think?”

Were things truly different? Lan Wangji’s brother was still in seclusion at the top of the mountain. Lan Wangji would have to write to him, and tell him of everything that had happened. Nothing would change the past.

He thought again of Wei Wuxian in moonlight, chin tipped up to Lan Wangji’s blade. Wen Qing at Wei Wuxian’s bedside, taking him under her care without thought. Wen Ning, stepping between his cousin’s sword and Lan Wangji’s heart.

Jiang Yanli didn’t say anything more on the subject. She asked about another dull piece of bureaucracy, changing topics smoothly. Lan Wangji realized, in growing resignation, that he liked her after all.

-

Lan Wangji was out of bed with his sword drawn before he fully realized he was awake. Wei Wuxian danced back from the blade at his throat, his grin barely visible in the darkness. It was not yet dawn, and the moon tonight was hardly a sliver. Not even the gods could watch them. Negotiations for the terms of their marriage had been ongoing for over a month.

Still, the silver in Wei Wuxian’s hand glinted. Lan Wangji’s jewelry box lay open on the table set before his mirror, its contents spilled across the polished surface.

“Last time, you know, it wasn’t really you that caught me,” said the Thief of Yiling, his voice teasing, and then he turned and ran.

Lan Wangji chased him without thought. Wei Wuxian flew silently through the hallways of the palace, and then bounded into the courtyard, spinning on his heel to face Lan Wangji, grinning. He blew him a kiss, and jumped onto the roof. Lan Wangji followed. Wei Wuxian’s feet were silent across the tiles, out of habit, but his laughter would have given him away even if Lan Wangji lost sight of him in the dark. He didn’t.

Wei Wuxian looked back over his shoulder, his mouth open to speak. His words left him as he lost his balance, nearly tripping right off the side of the roof and onto the rocks below.

Lan Wangji saw him teeter. He lurched forward, grabbing him by the wrist and hauling him back. He could feel Wei Wuxian’s quick startled breaths against his chest where he was pressed up against him.

“Okay,” said Wei Wuxian. He laughed, shaking under Lan Wangji’s palm flat against his chest. “Okay. That time you caught me.”

Lan Wangji loosened his grip enough that Wei Wuxian could turn to face him, though not enough that he could drop his arm.

“Here, Lan Zhan.” He still had the earrings clutched tightly in his hand. He made them dance between his fingers, as though he was performing a coin trick. “For you.”

Lan Wangji let go of his wrist to take them. The earrings were elegant in their simplicity, fine silver chains with a single ruby at the end.

“I’ve never seen you wear them. I thought maybe you needed a reminder.”

“They belonged to my mother,” said Lan Wangji, and took Wei Wuxian by the wrist again before he could fall off the roof with the way he stiffened all over. He sat, dragging Wei Wuxian implacably down with him.

Lan Wangji ran his thumb across the silver, warm from Wei Wuxian’s hand. He could picture a woman wearing them, although he had no idea if it was his mother he was seeing. It could have been one of her attendants, who Lan Wangji saw more often than he saw her. It could be no one at all.

“I don’t know why I never wore them.” They were beautiful. He liked beautiful things. No one else was going to wear them.

He dropped Wei Wuxian’s wrist, and took his chin in his hand instead.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and Lan Wangji had to work not to tighten his grip. “I didn’t realize, I thought they were yours—”

“They are.” Lan Wangji tilted Wei Wuxian’s face to the side, leaning in close so that his breath ghosted past Lan Wangji’s cheek. He hooked the earring through his earlobe. Wei Wuxian, silent now, turned for the other one without direction.

“Well, Hanguang-jun,” said Wei Wuxian easily, as easy as the smile on his face, and as easy as though he were not shaking in Lan Wangji’s grip, silver glinting in his ears, “what are you going to do with me now?”

“Is there a reason you felt the need to steal from me again?”

“Why does a thief steal anything?”

“You always have a reason.”

Wei Wuxian made a face. “Don’t go around telling people that,” he said. At Lan Wangji’s look, he laughed, and then he threw his arms out expansively, showcasing himself, unhurt on the roof after robbing the Second Jade of the Lan. In the darkness, the move did not even draw attention to his missing hand. The metal of the hook might have shone in the meager light, but he wasn’t wearing it. He was dressed for sleep, save for the silver in his ears.

Lan Wangji touched him on the cheek and felt the way he trembled, perhaps with the cold. He caught Wei Wuxian’s eyes. He said, “I see. Do you feel safe?”

Wei Wuxian swallowed. He nodded, and then shook his head. Lan Wangji tugged very lightly on one of the earrings.

“You should really take them back,” said Wei Wuxian. “I didn’t mean—”

“You shouldn’t do something to prove a point if you are not willing to accept the consequences.”

Wei Wuxian touched his earlobe, his fingers brushing Lan Wangji’s. “Consequences?”

“Your punishment,” said Lan Wangji, “is to accept something for yourself.”

“They were your mother’s.” Wei Wuxian’s voice was a little high. “I didn’t know that! Lan Zhan! I absolutely can’t take them.”

Serenely, Lan Wangji said, “I’ll speak to your sister tomorrow. The Jiang sect can dictate the terms of the tariffs your sister was worried over. My only condition for the marriage is that you accept the earrings as a wedding gift.”

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian gaped at him. He was not used to being outmaneuvered. He liked it so much he could hardly sit still, even as his stomach squirmed at the thought of keeping Lan Wangji’s mother’s earrings, especially after stealing them in the middle of the night.

“Regretting it already?” asked his fiance.

Wei Wuxian laughed so long and so hard that he had to flop down against the roof tiles. Then he sat back up, put his face between his knees, and laughed some more. His head snapped up all at once, his eyes wide. He met Lan Wangji’s curious gaze.

“Lan Zhan,” he said, aghast. “Lan Zhan, I’m marrying into the Lan sect. Am I going to have to learn the rules?”

Amused, Lan Wangji agreed that he would. Wei Wuxian slumped back against the roof, defeated at every turn. His fiance bent down to kiss him. Wei Wuxian was startled, not by the kiss: Lan Wangji was smiling.

The smile faded. Lan Wangji was sitting on Wei Wuxian’s right side. Very carefully, he took Wei Wuxian’s bare wrist in his hands.

“It still hurts,” said Lan Wangji, not a question, running his thumb along the callused skin there.

Wei Wuxian raised his hand and ran his fingers along Lan Wangji’s jaw. It was still shocking, after all this time, how beautiful he was. It really was too bad he wouldn’t wear the earrings. Wei Wuxian would have to steal more for him.

“It always hurt to love you.” Wei Wuxian shrugged. It always would. “How could we trust it, if it was easy?” He pressed his thumb to the furrow in Lan Wangji’s brow, smoothing it out for him, fingers brushing against the ribbon.

“Do you trust it?”

“I don’t know,” said Wei Wuxian. He was quiet for a moment. “You know about Xiao Xingchen, don’t you? He visits me sometimes, delivering messages for his master. Don’t laugh. We’re engaged, you can’t laugh at me. He came to me last night. Or maybe I was just dreaming. Usually I’m sure, but...”

Lan Wangji did not look like he wanted to laugh. “Did he tell you how to catch me?” he asked, thinking of the chase, and the earrings.

“He asked if I regretted it.”

“Which part?”

“That’s the annoying thing about the gods, isn’t it? He didn’t say. And anyway, I already—it doesn’t matter.”

“What do you think he wanted to know, then?”

“If I would give you up,” said Wei Wuxian, tipping his head back to watch what he could of the moon. He wished he could have this conversation in full darkness. “To have my hand back.”

Lan Wangji’s eyes asked the question for him. Wei Wuxian did not hesitate to answer. “If you could be like this,” he said, reaching up and running his fingers along Lan Wangji’s cheek, “Then maybe. But no. I really wouldn’t leave you here all locked away. Not for anything.”

He smiled when he felt Lan Wangji stiffen. “You disagree?”

“I think you would do well to be less like Xiao Xingchen.”

“You know the story?”

“Not told by you.”

“Alright, Lan Zhan,” said Wei Wuxian, and spoke this time in a whisper.

Xiao Xingchen was a righteous man, gleaming in white. He was beloved by Song Lan, and they were together always. If fate had just left them alone—but of course it didn’t. They were happy, and in love, and hunted down evil together. One of the evils they hunted was the criminal Xue Yang, and he, like fate, didn’t leave them alone.

Xue Yang hated them both, but I think we both know that hate is a funny thing. It doesn’t always behave the way it’s supposed to. He hated Xiao Xingchen so much that he loved him. He thought of him all the time. He let him get close to catching him, just so he could see his face. He didn’t know it was love. He didn’t know that was something he could do. But it was, and it made him terribly jealous to see Xiao Xingchen and Song Lan working in tandem to stop him. That, he understood.

So he broke them. He blinded Song Lan, and killed his family, and told him the reason why. Song Lan in his grief said things he didn’t intend. And he and Xiao Xingchen had never fought. They didn’t know how to do it well.

“I don’t expect that will be a problem for us,” said Lan Wangji, nearly smiling. Wei Wuxian ignored him.

So they fought. Xiao Xingchen left. He went to his master, the great Baoshan Sanren secluded on her mountain, and begged her for a favor. She gave it to him. Only the gods can say why. He blinded himself, and gave Song Lan his eyes, and left him all alone on the mountain.

He travelled. He wasn’t unhappy, necessarily. He wasn’t much of anything. He was lonely. He met a girl, and adopted her; met a gravely injured man, and adopted him. He grew soon enough to love him. The man, of course, was Xue Yang, and they lived in their own sort of happiness for years. Xue Yang tricked Xiao Xingchen, and made him hurt people; he delighted in that almost as much as he delighted in Xiao Xingchen’s love.

And then Song Lan found them. Xue Yang played one more trick, and Xiao Xingchen killed his beloved, the man he gave his eyes to. If only he’d been able to see, he never would have struck. He would have left Xue Yang to rot, all those years ago.

Come on, Lan Zhan. Do you really want to hear the rest?

“I will always want to hear you,” said Lan Wangji, his cheek still resting in Wei Wuxian’s palm.

Fine. He killed himself in grief. Xue Yang couldn’t understand it. He couldn’t understand anything. And no one knows how the story ends after that.

“Wei Ying.”

I know, I know. Doesn’t the storyteller choose his own ending?

I think that’s the end. I think he died because of his own stupid choices, and it doesn’t matter what happened after that, how the fuck he ended up back on the mountain, plucked away from death and mortal concerns to deliver messages for his old master. I think Baoshan Sanren should have told him no when he came to her for help, I think she should have fucking learned something from Lan Yi, and if she wouldn’t, he should have stayed to see Song Lan recovered. There are a million ways it could have ended differently, if he’d just stopped being so—so—

The Thief struggled for words. Lan Wangji, taking pity on him, kissed him gently on the mouth.

“Should I climb Baoshan Sanren’s mountain, and appeal to her to give you my right hand?” he asked. “It would be more fair than Xiao Xingchen’s request.”

“I thought you didn’t like to say useless things.”

“I would do it,” said Lan Wangji, gravely. “It’s not that I don’t understand the sentiment, Wei Ying. But you did not trade your hand for my happiness. I cut it off in anger. I will regret it for the rest of my days. That’s all.”

They were quiet again then. Wei Wuxian was thinking of his sister, and how she could never fix the things she wanted. “That’s not a good answer.”

“No,” Lan Wangji agreed. “But it is true. Sometimes that is all there is.” He watched the shadows in Wei Wuxian’s eyes. “We should sleep.”

“Won’t it be a scandal if I’m found in your bedchamber before the wedding?” asked Wei Wuxian, pretending at lightness. He sat up then, pulling Lan Wangji along.

Lan Wangji had faith in Wei Wuxian’s ability not to be found anywhere he didn’t wish to be. He did not say this. Instead, finding himself unwilling to leave the stillness of the moonlight just yet, he pulled the ribbon from his forehead. Clasping Wei Wuxian’s hand in his, he looped it around their bare wrists. Wei Wuxian’s smile was bright in the darkness, too wavering to be fake now. A candle flame that refused to be snuffed out.

“That doesn’t count,” he said, and then he laughed, shaking his head. “Who knew that Hanguang-jun would flout the rules?”

Lan Wangji pulled them both to their feet, their hands still clasped. He began to retrace the path they had taken.

“See?” said Wei Wuxian, looking out across the ocean of darkness visible from the top of the roof. His steps never wavered. “It really is okay. You’ll catch me if I fall. Won’t you, Lan Zhan?”

Lan Wangji looked at him. Wei Ying would let all of himself be cut to pieces before he hurt anyone that he loved; and he loved so very widely, like a tide crashing up along the sand. He thought a hand was a fair enough trade for his heart. Lan Wangji loved him so much it hurt to breathe, and he would never make up for what he had done. There was no mountain to climb or god to appeal to for help in fixing his own mistakes. He would have to make do on his own, with whatever help he could find.

“Only if you do the same,” Lan Wangji said, and squeezed Wei Ying’s hand. Already he’d managed to get him to accept a pair of earrings. He had the rest of his life to discover what else he could do.