Chapter Text
“Why can’t you just stop ?” Okay, rude . Shen Qingqiu has to fight the urge to pout up at his shidi.
“Whatever do you mean, shidi?” he asks as sweetly and innocently as he can, knowing full well that it won’t work on the medic. He’s trying , that has to count for something! It’s hard to keep up with the peak, his lessons and taking care of himself!
“Don’t give me that, shixiong, you’re testing my patience.” Mu Qingfang snaps back at him, crossing his arms. Liu-shidi must have been by earlier … “You must remember to take your medicine. You wouldn’t want Yue-shixiong to see you like this would you?” The scholar has a feeling he knows how that point is supposed to affect him and finds himself disappointed that it missed the mark. ‘Yue Qingyuan would be sad to see you like this’ clearly doesn’t affect him quite right. There… isn’t that guilt? He’d feel mildly bad if his shixiong was upset but….
It bothers him infinitely more that he would be troubling them. He already takes enough of Mu Qingfang’s time… Liu Qingge comes to help him frequently… Yue Qingyuan takes what little free time from his schedule to check on his shidi…. He feels bad, horrible really, about wasting their time. Knowing that none of his problems will truly go away hurts him, but it’s not like he can tell them that. They’d all be… sad? Scared? Angry? Liu-shidi would be angry .
“Yes… You’re right.” he sighs. I’ll have to trouble Binghe more…. He looks up at his medic-brother, who is staring down at him with a complex expression that vanishes in an instant. “I apologize for troubling shidi…” Ah, that look is back .
“... it’s nothing.” isn’t what he expected to hear come out of Mu Qingfang’s mouth, but he supposes that it makes sense. They’ve had this conversation before. The Peak lords have inserted themselves into his health situation more and more since that meeting where he bled. Perhaps it scared them? “It’s not like we can change anything, right?” he watches his medic brother go over to the tea he has left brewing and pour two cups. In one of the cups, he dumps some powdered medicine and stirs it in.
At least it doesn’t change the taste of the tea , he reasons as they sit together in a strange silence and refresh themselves. This must be the peach honey tea I brought back for him last trip.
“Shidi said something about not changing this?” Shen Qingqiu asks once he’s sure the awkward atmosphere won’t fix itself.
“I have long thought all of this was a result of your fever. If it is, if the symptoms have been going on this long even with your level of cultivation, there isn’t a way for us to fix it.” his disciple-brother explains; “It is troubling, but not something we can’t handle.”
“If I stop being so forgetful…” Shen Qingqiu adds.
“The mountain is more likely to move itself.” his brother chuckles; “We’ll work something out.