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Lan Wangji knelt and did not hang his head. He was not ashamed, would not allow his uncle’s fury and his brother’s turmoil to convince him that he should feel guilt. He made choices throughout his life with a careful precision and this had been one of them. Lan Wangji had long learned the consequences of the righteousness he practiced and he welcomed this punishment with open arms if it meant he could keep Wei Ying alive for just a little longer. If he could give him a chance.
His brother was there, standing off to the side. He wasn’t supposed to let his emotions show but his face was horribly pale, lips white. Lan Qiren held an indecipherable in his eyes that Lan Wangji didn’t recognize as he stared down at him, lips twitching, barely keeping himself from shouting. The shouting had not worked.
“Do you accept your punishment?” his uncle asked into the silence, with righteous fury and a tremble like terror.
Lan Wangji had known what would wait for him in the Cloud Recesses the moment he dove for Wei Ying after the battle in the Nightless City, when he stole him away in a desperate attempt to save him. He had known the punishment would be worse than death when his sect finally found him, when Wei Wuxian was still half out of his mind and Lan Wangji couldn’t stop his thoughts from spinning in a panic that it was all over.
He had known the consequences when he had pulled his sword and attacked his own. Knew with every slice of the blade that it was a death sentence, that if he would die for Wei Ying then he would rest easily.
His brother’s desperate pleas to surrender had not stopped him. His uncle’s commands to stand down had fallen on deaf ears. Lan Wangji attacked until that cave smelled like blood and no one was left standing but the only two remaining members of his family. He demanded, not asked, to bring Wei Ying to safety. Promised that he would return to Gusu to accept what may come, that he would surrender his sword and do what had to be done.
Wei Wuxian was safe. For now, he was alive.
He replied, strong and sure, “Yes.”
He heard the whip before he felt it.
One.
It all began on one night, that first one on the rooftops of the Cloud Recesses. Wei Wuxian did not care for the rules of the world, not those tethered to man or to magic. One look, one smile, one laugh. Lan Wangji would have followed him to the ends of the earth from that very first night.
Two.
He had only played Wei Wuxian his song twice. The first had been in the Xuanwu cave, voice nearly hoarse with terror. He had thought Wei Wuxian would succumb to his fever in a dirty cave and there would be nothing he could do to stop him from drifting away. The second time he sang it, Wei Wuxian was already gone, eyes distant and skin pale and spiritual energy channeling into a heart seemingly empty with grief. Lan Wangji hummed the song with a broken desperation and when he finished, Wei Wuxian had not even opened his eyes when he growled, “ Get lost .”
Three.
The wounds finally crossed and Lan Wangji felt the pain acutely, punching through what little remained of his spiritual energy, the pieces he had not been able to give to Wei Ying. He gritted his teeth against crying out, resolved himself to take his punishment without a noise. He knew it was impossible. This was only the third lash. It would only get worse.
Four.
He wondered which of the four sects would lead the inevitable charge on Wei Wuxian. He wondered if it would be Jin Guangshan in his grief; Nie Mingjue in his fine-tuned rage, temper on a hair trigger; if it would be his brother, blind with a burning revenge for these wounds on his brother’s back, a disgrace that he will never transcend. He thought of Jiang Cheng and the loss in his eyes as he held his sister’s body, how his mouth had curled into a snarl when Wei Ying sent the world into chaos, and hoped it would not be him.
Five.
Lan Wangji’s favorite days when he was five years old were the ones spent with his brother, no matter what the activity. He trailed Lan Xichen around like an eager puppy, gripping onto the edges of his robes, more than content to stay in his brother’s shadow. Lan Xichen always humored him, smiling down at him and asking his opinion on important matters of the sect, laughing when Lan Wangji did not know the answer but would look so serious and pensive anyway. His brother had been his best friend, his only friend, before he had met Wei Ying.
Six.
Lan Wangji played the guqin for six hours straight to kill the Xuanwu of Slaughter, fingers sliced and joints stiff. Some had asked him how he had done it, how he had found the endurance and the spiritual energy necessary for a chord assassination. He didn’t tell people that the question wasn’t about the strength, because that was the simple part. He had watched Wei Wuxian get swallowed whole and the burning panic, the relentless belief in Wei Ying’s strength, the unwavering fear that he would be too late kept him playing. Lan Wangji would have played for another six hours if it meant he could feel that relief again, the kind he felt when he had looked down into the beast’s throat and found Wei Wuxian clinging to a sword. Stubborn. Shaken. Alive.
Seven.
He could feel the open air on his back. The wind under his skin. It was cold when his mother died and he had knelt in the snow for so long that he hadn’t been able to feel much of anything. This time, his knees were not soaked through in snow. He was not cold because of a chill.
Eight.
He was eight when he received his first answer to Inquiry on his guqin, wide-eyed and sitting with his brother in the shade of a tree outside of the Cloud Recesses’ walls. He still remembered the crushing disappointment in his bones when he realized the spirit was not his mother. It was unlikely that his mother had lingered, and yet he had hoped.
Nine.
They would confine him when this was over. They would lock him away the same as they had done to his mother, smothering the sins of the sect. They would call it seclusion as if it were not a punishment. As if it would be weeks, months until Lan Wangji would be able to properly walk again.
Ten.
Lan Xichen had been silent. At the tenth lash, a muffled anguished ripped through his lips. It echoed down to Lan Wangji’s bones. He wished he could open his mouth, tell his brother that it was worth it. He had been selfish and he did not regret a single moment.
Eleven.
Wei Ying once gave him a flower. After, he kept it between the pages of a book. It suddenly felt even more precious than it had before, like it was the last remnant of a time long passed.
Twelve.
He had told Wei Ying that he loved him. Had he heard? Had he known that he meant it?
Thirteen.
He could return to Wei Wuxian’s side. He could save him --
Fourteen.
He thought of Wei Wuxian’s smile when he left him behind on the Burial Mounds, their last true meeting. Wei Ying had turned away and his smile had dropped into grief between one moment and the next when he had thought Lan Wangji couldn’t see him. He’d been cradling A-Yuan in his arms, the child still clutching the toys that Lan Wangji bought for him. When Wei Wuxian had smiled at him, it had been soft. He had thanked him. Lan Wangji had wanted to scream that he had not done any of this for gratitude but Wei Ying had already turned around, already walking away.
Fifteen.
He met Wei Ying when he was fifteen.
Sixteen.
They were halfway. The strikes came faster. Lan Wangji wondered if they were pitying him, if they wanted to get this over with so he could begin to heal. It was, perhaps, a mercy.
Seventeen.
A-Yuan. What would happen to A-Yuan?
Eighteen.
He felt his nose bleeding. Blood blinded him. Qi deviation --
Nineteen.
Lan Wangji was not much for noise. He screamed and the sound ripped through the quiet of the mountain. Shook the very foundation of the world.
Twenty.
He ran out of pain to feel.
Twenty-one.
Oh.
Twenty-two.
Oh. He was going to die.
Twenty-three.
Lan Wangji would die.
Twenty-four.
Wei Wuxian was going to die.
Twenty-five.
It was over. He blinked away the blood in his eyes. Choked on the blood in his mouth.
Twenty-six.
“Uncle, please! ” Lan Xichen begged in a broken scream.
Twenty-seven.
“No,” Lan Qiren whispered back. His voice shook.
Twenty-eight.
Mercy.
Twenty-nine.
They would not show Wei Ying mercy.
Thirty.
He had not done enough.
Thirty-one.
He could not save him.
Thirty-two.
Wei Ying would not live to be thirty-two.
Thirty-three.
The pain stopped. The world went dark.
Lan Wangji wished they had killed him.