Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Lan Wangji was on patrol that day.  Lately he’d been assigned to train some of the disciples, as a sort of test run; bring an increasingly high-ranked demon hunter, it was expected that he’d take on his share of responsibilities in educating the younger generation, and the Gusu Lan board of elders had certainly spoken warmly of his unparalleled skill that deserved to be passed on.  But he wasn’t good at teaching, or at least wasn’t comfortable with it, because he wasn’t good at people in general.  His speciality was field work, tracking and fighting and protecting, and he remained firmly entrenched in field operations, unlike his brother who had risen high enough in rank that he did more desk work than anything else nowadays.  Diplomacy, and smoothing things over, and keeping everything running, and getting absorbed in the little details and signatures and having coffee with important people.  Not Lan Wangji’s style.  Lan Wangji’s style had a hilt and a blade and could be carried in his hand.

So Lan Wangji was on patrol again, for the first time in a couple weeks, and even more blessedly he was alone—most demon hunters patrolled in teams, but he was a good enough hunter that most agreed he could manage on his own, and besides he had a tendency to outpace anyone he was assigned with, partly out of a simple difference of skill and partly (this was, perhaps, unduly petty) on purpose.  He did things his own way, and had no patience for idle chatter or the delaying process of consulting with others before a decision could be reached.  And it wasn’t as though there was a significant security risk most of the time; demon attacks, after all, were not common, and most of the day-to-day field work of demon hunting involved more along the lines of preemptive measures to ensure they remained that way, along with exorcisms, dealing with other cases of resentful energy, or putting a stop to hooligans who thought it was a good idea to dabble in the incredibly risky and highly illegal field of demon summoning.

Which… speaking of that last one.

Lan Wangji’s assigned territory for today’s patrol included the docks by one of the ports.  Boundaries and points of transition—including shores and ports, where land met sea and where trade and passengers changed hands—were like liminal spaces, places where demons could more easily travel between their world and this one, and so setting up and regularly maintaining the necessary wards and talismans and arrays to keep them at bay was a vital task.  Lan Wangji replaced the protections that had been worn down by pressure from the demon world—not necessarily any demons trying to force their way through, it could just have been from exposure to the strength of that place’s spiritual energy—noted the places where said pressure seemed especially strong, and was working out what types of protections might need to be added when he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise.

When it came to matters of spiritual energy, instinct was invaluable.  Lan Wangji got to his feet and followed the sensation of unease until it coalesced into a stirring of demonic energy, a slight excess of yin humming in the air.  Followed it further, until he came to an abandoned warehouse whose exterior was dotted with talismans that no Gusu Lan demon hunter had put there. 

Wards to keep people out.  An additional few to keep casual passersby from realizing the talismans or the wards were even there to begin with.

A civilian might have been stymied, but Bichen was a spiritual weapon, and the wards were low-level; Lan Wangji cleaved through them like butter and hurried into the warehouse.  The sight that met him was unmistakeably a demon summoning in progress—additional talismans throughout the room, a half-finished array on the floor, and the culprit in the middle of it with a paintbrush, head whipping around like a trapped animal.

“Summoning demons is a grave offense,” said Lan Wangji, and brandished Bichen.  “Come quietly, and this will be easier for you.”

The would-be summoner—a youth in his late teens or early twenties, by the looks of him—glanced dartingly from side to side, and then pulled a knife from his belt, rose to his feet, and charged.

The fight was lengthier than Lan Wangji would have expected.  In a fight between a sword and a knife, distance determined which weapon would be actually effective; Lan Wangji tried to use Bichen to keep his opponent sufficiently at bay, in ways that would have worked if the kid hadn’t seemed to evince a frightening absence of self-preservation instincts.  Enough to rush him a couple times and actually unexpectedly get under his defenses.  It was an awkward, messy fight with two mismatched weapons, made all the more difficult by the fact that his opponent seemed a lot more willing to inflict actual damage than Lan Wangji was, and Lan Wangji was bleeding from a deep wound and in a terrible mood by the time the kid apparently decided he’d had enough and made a break for it.

Lan Wangji gave chase, but lost him among the warehouses and shipping containers; the culprit had apparently used another talisman to distract and throw off pursuers, and so Lan Wangji gave up, putting pressure on his wounded forearm and by this point keeping up a running internal grumbling that would probably have taken the form of swear words if those had been in his vocabulary.  He was regretting having made it a fight by brandishing Bichen in the first place; he’d hoped it would have dissuaded confrontation, not encouraged it.  Few demon summoning attempts ever made it this far, but when they did it was a headache for the demon hunters; the regulations for punishing anyone who summoned a demon were convoluted and old-fashioned, bound to ancient traditions, and uncertain on how much of a role the summoner’s commands played in determining the weight of the crime.  Hence Lan Wangji’s current mood.

The array was as he’d left it.  Lan Wangji made his way unsteadily towards it, blood dripping down his wrist.  He needed to check the nature of the array before he could decide whether to devote serious energy to pursuit; kids that age would sometimes try to summon a low-level demon as a minor prank, in which case the bruises sustained in the interception would probably be deterrent enough, but sometimes they went for the big shots instead in a fit of overconfidence.  If the array was for a high-level demon, he was going to have to call in backup to canvas their surroundings for where the culprit had gone, have him detained and brought in for a good talking-to and a suitable punishment to impress upon him the gravity of his attempt.  He hoped he wouldn’t have to do that, but the size of the thing didn’t look promising…

It was very big.  Red paint that didn’t do a very good job of looking like blood sprawled in a spiderweb circle on the warehouse floor, the characters spiky with ritual stylization and distorted with perspective; Lan Wangji paced the perimeter, holding his bleeding forearm and reading what he could make out.  He wasn’t familiar with the technicalities of demon summoning arrays, but from the characters alone, there seemed to be a calling forth, a binding, a section still blank from where he’d interrupted, and in the center, the name…

The Yiling Patriarch?

Lan Wangji stopped at the edge of the circle, bloodied hand gripping Bichen’s hilt with trepidation.  The Yiling Patriarch wasn’t one of the most active demons, but he was one of the more powerful, and more mysterious; records showed him lying dormant for decades before wreaking havoc overnight and then going back to sleep for another long interval.  The name wasn’t one that was common on the lips of most demon hunters, but Lan Wangji recognized it from his studies; those power levels were not to be trifled with.  For some desperate-looking youngster in an abandoned warehouse to, contrarily, attempt to trifle with them…  Well, it scanned with the lack of self-preservation he’d noticed during the fight.  But why…

Absorbed in puzzling it out, Lan Wangji suddenly and abruptly remembered the first rule of intercepting demon summonings:  Never bleed near a prepared array.

He only remembered this, of course, because the array had already lit up, curtains of red light scything through the air in a blaze of crackling power, his hair rising and dancing with the charge of it.  In shock and horror, Lan Wangji stared at the drops of his own blood lying on the painted line in front of him, and thought, FUCK.

It was a thought he didn’t permit himself often, but it was probably appropriate in this case.

In any case it was too late to stop now.  The temperature in the entire warehouse was plunging, a mausoleum chill settling over the air as the red light spiraled into a vortex at the center of the array, a twisting pointed whirlwind that built and built until a column of light blasted into the air, probably piercing through ceiling of the warehouse.  There was a protracted screech like metal on metal, like a hundred tortured souls screaming in unison; Lan Wangji’s ears were ringing.

He’d never actually… seen a high-level demon summoning before.

The light died down.  The warehouse felt all the darker for it.  In the center of the array was a humanoid silhouette, poised and kneeling on the ground; two red eyes glowed at him.

Not a problem, thought Lan Wangji, forcing his composure back into place.  Not a problem.  The thing would see he was a demon hunter, it would attack him, and then he could kill it and go after the—

“Who has dared summon the Yiling Patriarch, the Puppeteer of Corpses, Terror of the Nightless City and the Graveyard King?”  The voice floated to him across the distance, languid and lazy in its certainty of power.  “Who calls on me this time?”

Lan Wangji swallowed.  Damn it, he was going to need to talk to the thing.  “It…  It was an accident.”

The red eyes blinked.  “An accident?”

Lan Wangji nodded jerkily.  This was supremely awkward.  Awkwardness was not an emotion he liked to feel, and it especially was not one that was welcome when dealing with high-level demons.  Time to end this.  “Now come over here so I can kill you.”

Another blink.  The figure rose to its feet, and made its unhurried way over; Lan Wangji gripped Bichen until it hurt, but couldn’t bring himself to unsheath it yet.  Wait.  Wait for the thing to attack, then he’d end it in a single strike.

The demon stopped in front of him, a hand on its hip.  It took the form of an inordinately beautiful man—Lan Wangji made a mental note to check the records for succubus lineage—in flowing traditional robes of black and red; it looked almost human, but for the two thick black horns that grew from its head, curling down to a coiled point beside its ears, and the red, slit-pupiled eyes giving him a calculated once-over.  In the shadows they glowed a little.  A flute hung from its belt, thrumming with demonic aura, and Lan Wangji decided to go for that first, if there was an opening; if he failed and the demon survived the encounter, he’d at least have destroyed its most legendary weapon.

“An accident,” repeated the demon, amused, and its eyes swept the room, taking in the situation; the Gusu Lan insignia on Lan Wangji’s breast pocket, the blood on the array between them.  “A demon hunter summoned a demon by mistake?”

Lan Wangji nodded again, stiffly.  He really really wished the thing would just attack him and be done with it.

The demon blinked at him again, then laughed; it wasn’t the maniacal cackle Lan Wangji had come to expect of these beings, but a bright, genuine laugh, like an ordinary human finding something hilarious.  Lan Wangji’s grip on Bichen was turning his knuckles white.  “Sorry,” wheezed the demon, “it’s just—it’s so funny!  Your face!” 

“What,” said Lan Wangji, with deadly cold, “about my face.”

“Look at you!”  The demon flapped a hand in his direction, still nearly doubled over laughter.  “You look like a deer in the headlights, it’s amazing, you really weren’t expecting something like this, were you?”  Another wheeze.  “How does this even happen?”

“I was careless,” said Lan Wangji, still cold as ice, and unsheathed Bichen a threatening inch.  Attack me, attack me already, damn it!  “It will not happen again.”

“Mm, I bet it won’t.  You look like someone just keyed your favorite car.”  The demon sat down, leaning on its palms and tilting its head to look at him.  “Which I bet you have several of.  You demon hunters are all rich, right?”

“We are a well-funded organization,” said Lan Wangji stiffly, and was tired of the charade.  “Hurry up and attack me so I can kill you.”

He killed demons that were rampaging, he killed demons that were a threat—he killed to protect others or himself.  Enemy or no, he would not kill in cold blood, which was why he really needed this deadly, high-powered demon with a massive body count to make it not be in cold blood anymore.

The demon scoffed.  “Why would I attack my summoner?”

What?

Oh—oh, this was bad, very bad.  “I am not your summoner.”

The demon’s gaze flicked down to the blood on the array, then back up at Lan Wangji’s face.  Clear amusement.  “Ohh yes you are.”

“The array was drawn by someone else.  All I did was provide the blood.”  He was starting to panic a little.  “By accident.”

“You don’t need to be the one to draw the array.  Otherwise the kings of the past wouldn’t have been able to get away with just hiring people to do it instead of learning themselves.”  The demon stretched.  “The blood is the personal tie.  It’s what puts a name on the binding.  I don’t care who drew this array, you bled on it, it’s yours.  And so am I.”

Lan Wangji couldn’t take it.  He took a step back, unsheathed Bichen, and pointed it menacingly.  “Leave.”

“Sure, if you want.  Dismiss me.”

Lan Wangji stared.  The demon was leaning on its palms, legs stretched out in front of it; entirely too casual for the situation they were in.  There was a horrible beat.

The demon pounced on it gleefully.  “You don’t know how.”

“Shut up.”

“You don’t know how to dismiss me!  You summoned me by accident and you don’t know how to get rid of me!”  Another peal of bright laughter.  “Oh, this is rich!  This is priceless!”

“Shut up,” hissed Lan Wangji.  Of course he didn’t know how to dismiss a demon!  The only reason one would need to was if one had summoned one in the first place, and no demon hunter would ever do that.  There had never been any need to learn!

Until… now.

“You’re stuck with me, you know that, right?”  The demon bounced its heels on the ground.  “I can’t just leave, I need to be dismissed.  And you need to be the one to dismiss me.  And you”—its eyes curved up in amusement—“don’t know how!  This is shaping up to be the highlight of my century, you know that?”

Whereas this was quickly shaping up to be the low point of Lan Wangji’s year.  He tried very hard not to sound desperate when he said, “Do you know how?”

The demon considered the array it was sitting on for an infuriating length of time, and then looked brightly back up at him. “Nope.”

Lan Wangji pointed Bichen harder; the tip was approaching the demon’s nose. “Are you sure?”

“Hey, hey, no need to threaten me!” The demon put its hands up defensively, inching away from the sword. “I really don’t know, all right? It’s not a one-size-fits-all thing, you have to deduce it from the circumstances of the preexisting array and it’s not like I’m the one doing it all to know how it works. Plus they deliberately don't let you see it being constructed, that's like showing a prisoner where the keys are—”

Lan Wangji had heard enough. He sheathed Bichen in a decisive movement and said, “What am I supposed to do at this point.”  That sounded too much like a cry for help.  Unacceptable.  “What do demon summoners typically do with their demons?”

“I mean, at this point, you’re supposed to give me orders,” said the demon.  “That’s the entire reason people summon us, to have a high-powered servant to do their bidding.”  Red eyes gave Lan Wangji a once-over.  “Although you don’t look like you’re going to do that.”

The appropriate thing to say was probably, Can I order you to kill yourself?  But he couldn’t say it.  The words felt far too cold, too unfeeling in his mouth.  This demon may have been dangerous, capable of killing innocents and certainly no stranger to doing so, but Lan Wangji still couldn’t bring himself to strike the first blow, much less in such an inhumane way.

He cursed himself.  When this was all dealt with, he was going to go back to the archives, look up the Yiling Patriarch’s exact body count, and then probably hit his head against the wall at his own inability to act, to preempt the death of others in the future—but he had standards, and those standards wouldn’t let him strike until there was an immediate threat.

Which there had always been.  A demon in the human world that wasn’t posing a danger to humans was vanishingly rare, and Lan Wangji knew it was probably only the summoning enchantment keeping this one from devouring him and fucking off to do whatever it pleased, probably resulting in more deaths.  His hand clenched on Bichen.  Let it try.

“What…” he said stiffly, “…do people… order you… to do?”

“Well, violence, of course!” said the demon promptly.  “That’s half my reputation.  Although given the other half, a lot of them ask me to bring their loved ones back from the dead.  As if I can revive people’s souls, and not just their bodies.”  It rolled its eyes.  “I do what they ask, of course.  Can’t refuse an order from a summoner.  But they get the message pretty quick when they get a shambling corpse in their house instead of the tearful reunion they’d been hoping for.”

Disgusting.  “I don’t want any of that.”

“Okay, okay.”  The demon held up a hand.  “No orders.  Got it.  So, what, you want me to just not do anything until you figure out how to dismiss me?  Pssh.  Boring.  If I’m going to be hanging out in the human world, I at least want to stretch my legs a little.”

“Can I order you to go back to where you came from?”

“Nope.”  The demon cracked the word like a glowstick.  “I already told you.  The summoning enchantment binds me here, it’s not something I can break myself.  Only you can break it.”  A very inelegant snort.  Lan Wangji hurried to speak before more rubbing in of his situation could ensue.

“I have an order for you.”

“Oh, progress!”

“As long as you’re here, you are not to harm a single human.”

Red eyes blinked at him.  “Is that it?  Okay.”

Suspiciously easy.  Lan Wangji was going to have to try to think of loopholes to cover later, but for now, that should do it.  “And”—he gritted his teeth—“you are to stay close to me at all times.”  As much as the idea of being around a demon for extended periods of time made his skin crawl, he was not going to let this being out of his sight.  The Yiling Patriarch was not going to have the opportunity to go on a killing spree without Lan Wangji there to stop it. 

“Oh man, you are not happy about that!” said the demon gleefully.  “Done.”  It clambered to its feet, movements graceful with an otherworldly flourish; dusted off its robes.  “What now?”

Lan Wangji considered the situation.  “Move,” he said at last.  “I need to photograph the array.”  Gathering evidence for a future report, and also to facilitate the research he was about to have to do.

“And not my sexy face?”  the demon pouted, but it did move aside.  Lan Wangji pulled out his phone and took a number of pictures of the array, walking around it to capture it from different angles, zooming in on the blank unfinished spot.  He didn’t know what was supposed to go there.  He really hoped it wasn’t something vital, something whose absence would leave the Yiling Patriarch free to rampage through the town or devour him or anything similar.

He took pictures of the wards scattered around the room and plastered around the entrance, the paint can on the ground, the red shoe prints tracked around the perimeter of the array.  Satisfied at last, he pocketed his phone.

“Let’s go.”

“Sure.”  The demon bounced back from exploring the perimeter of the warehouse.  “Where to?”

“Library,” said Lan Wangji.  “I don’t want you making any noise while we’re there.”

The demon’s eyes gleamed, head tilting to the side.  “Is that an order?”

Lan Wangji swallowed.  Commanding the demon not to hurt innocents was one thing, but silencing it for his own personal convenience felt… wrong.  It was part of why demon summoning was prohibited among demon hunters; killing the enemy to protect others was one thing, but subjugating and controlling them was entirely another.

…Right.  Demon summoning was prohibited, and yet here he was.  This was going to be a pain to explain.

The demon was still waiting for an answer, eyes trained on his face as though this question was a test.

“No,” he allowed.  “Not an order.  But if you cause a disruption I will be angry.”

“Ooh, you’re going to give me that intimidating aura, aren’t you,” said the demon, skipping after him as Lan Wangji headed for the exit.  “That cold glare you’ve got going on.  I bet all your subordinates fall right in line with one well-aimed look, right?”

Lan Wangji ignored the babbling.

“Hey, what’s your name?”  Marked inability to take a hint, noted Lan Wangji.  “If we’re going to be hanging out together until you find the dismissal spell, we shouldn’t be strangers, right?”

“No.”

“Come onnnn.  Don’t be such a sourpuss.”

“No.”

“You can tell me, we’re practically friends already.”

“We are not,” gritted out Lan Wangji, and was faced with the grim realization that the demon was going to keep pestering until he gave.  He deliberated.  Giving one’s name to a demon was extremely dangerous, but that was precisely why demon hunters had kept the practice of courtesy names alive—if he didn’t give away his birth name, he should be fine.  “My name is Lan Wangji.”

The demon made a pleased noise.  Probably it thought it had managed to successfully wrangle a weakness out of him.  “See, we’re getting somewhere!  What a nice name.  So refined.  That same Lan that’s one of the oldest demon-hunting families in the world, right?  I’m Wei Wuxian.”

He didn’t need to know that.

“Because, you know, if you’re just going to call me the Yiling Patriarch all the time, that would be so terribly stuffy.”

Lan Wangji stopped talking and turned around.  They were just outside the warehouse exit.  “Can you change shape?”

The demon cocked its head.  “Within limits.”

“Good.  Please make yourself less conspicuous.”  Even for civilians who couldn’t sense demonic aura, the horns and eyes were a dead giveaway, and the hanfu would probably turn a few heads on the street.

“Your wish is my command,” said Wei Wuxian, and shimmered into an indistinct haze for a moment before rematerializing as a young man, identical in face to the previous form but without the demonic features, and looking for all the world like the heartthrob lead singer of a goth visual kei boyband.  The curtain of hair was shorter and instead tied up into a ponytail that looked like it had been slept in three times; Lan Wangji noticed nail polish.  “Does this work?”

“Your fashion sense is hardly inconspicuous.”

An indignant snort.  “I’m not compromising my style.  Sorry not everyone wants to dress boring like you.”

Lan Wangji’s uniform was a perfectly respectable button-down with the organization’s emblem on the breast pocket, slacks, and of course the forehead ribbon.  Unlike Wei Wuxian, there were no fishnets anywhere on his figure, and he was just fine with that.  “Come.”

He went.  The demon followed.

***

Gusu Lan HQ had its own library, an archive full of tomes of various age on the subject of demons, from ancient compendiums to recent graduate theses.  Lan Wangji loaded up on books and found a secluded recess away from the main space for optimal privacy; unfortunately, the distance also meant Wei Wuxian had wiggle room to be annoying without going against Lan Wangji’s injunction not to disturb the other patrons.

“So, forgetting worldly connections,” the demon said, poking Lan Wangji’s shoulder, and seeming determined to make conversation based on the one bit of information Lan Wangji had provided—that was to say, his name.  “You sure do act the part, huh?  I bet you don’t drink alcohol and have sworn off porn, too.”

This was, in fact, true.  “Be quiet.”  Wei Wuxian immediately went suspiciously still.  “Not an order,” Lan Wangji had to clarify.  “I just—want you to be quiet.”

Ugh, this was ridiculous.  He shouldn’t have to defang his anger towards a demon, and a damned annoying one at that, to skirt around the conventions of a magical contract he wanted no part of.  If he couldn’t find the dismissal spell within the next three hours he was going to scream.

“So are you always this cold with everyone, or is it just because I’m a demon, or—”

“Shut up.  …Not an order.”

“Hey,” said Wei Wuxian, in a tone that made Lan Wangji turn to look at him; he was leaning his cheek on his hand, eyes on Lan Wangji’s face.  “Why do you keep clarifying you’re not giving me orders?”

“Summoning demons is already a grave offense.  I don’t want to exacerbate my situation.”

“Hmm.”  Wei Wuxian tilted his head, leaning in a little closer.  “Is that really it?  I mean, the damage is already done…  I doubt making me shut up a little would add significant weight to this ‘grave offense’.”

The close distance between them was an unfortunate reminder that the Yiling Patriarch was unfairly attractive—even more so without the demonic features.  If he were a model in an ad on the side of the road, Lan Wangji might well have slowed his steps to appreciate.  He swallowed. 

“I don’t like denying any living being their autonomy,” he said quietly.  “Even the enemy.  That’s all.”

“So you’ll happily kill demons,” said Wei Wuxian.  “But giving us orders is off limits.”

“Disposing of a threat is necessary for the safety of others.  Abuse of power isn’t.”

“Not every demon is a threat.”

“A demon in the human world is.”

“Mmm,” said Wei Wuxian, apparently giving up on the conversation, and started trying to balance a pen on his nose.

Victory, thought Lan Wangji, childishly, and then realized he was being childish and shook it off.  He wasn’t here to win back-and-forths with demons.  Reaching for his pencil, he reimmersed himself in the pile of books, searching for anything that could give him any details on the particulars of demon summoning.

Demon hunting was an ancient practice, and those committed to it had built up a wealth of knowledge over the centuries on how demons operated—bartered from temporary allies, wrung out of prisoners, extrapolated from logical conclusions of previous knowledge.  The pile of books before Lan Wangji was ample evidence of that.  Information on demon summoning was thin on the ground, however—there had doubtless been many treatises written on the topic during the lifetime of the practice, but since it had been outlawed for good some 200 years ago, knowledge of the specifics was kept away from prying eyes; and dig as Lan Wangji might into the tomes, they only told him things he already knew.

Summoned demons were physically unable to harm their summoners; their limbs would fail them, weapons drop from their grip and schemes evaporate from their mind should they try.  Summoned demons comprised only a minority of demons in the human world at any given moment, especially since the permanent ban forced such dealings under the table; most visiting demons had crossed over of their own free will, usually for purposes of killing and pillaging to build up their physical power and their reputation back home.  Summoned demons were distinguishable from freely intruding demons by a black, shackle-like mark around the neck, wrist, or ankle in their base form.

Lan Wangji cast a glance at Wei Wuxian, who was doodling on a piece of scrap paper the library provided for notetaking purposes.  This human guise wasn’t his base form, but he was wearing a black leather collar as part of his ridiculous getup…  Lan Wangji returned to his research.

Demons who were frequently summoned tended to be adept at wiggling out of loopholes, finding micronuances of wording, and setting trains of events in motion in order to defy orders and slip under the injunction not to harm their summoner.  They were, the book warned, crafty and not to be underestimated.

Lan Wangji took another look at Wei Wuxian.  He was coloring in some kind of sketch, humming lightly.

Had Wei Wuxian been frequently summoned?  Lan Wangji set aside his currently fruitless quest for the dismissal spell and turned his attention to learning more about the being who was currently bound to the human world and, for the sake of public safety, his side.  The Yiling Patriarch had first risen to prominence some five hundred years ago, in a massacre that claimed three thousand people and singlehandedly put him on the map as one of the most fearsome demons alive.  Since then he had reappeared in the human world about a dozen other times, each one marked by bloodshed and slaughter.  He was most easily identified by his ability to raise the dead, to turn them into his personal armies—he could stand high and dry pulling the strings with dark music while a wave of corpses unleashed death and destruction on his behalf.  He was intensely powerful, and should only be taken on by the highest-ranking demon hunters.

Lan Wangji couldn’t help a third glance.  Wei Wuxian had given up on whatever drawing he was working on, and was now doodling stylized penises in the margins of his paper.

Ridiculous.  Lan Wangji was pretty sure this is all an act to lower his guard; it would fit in with the notion that frequently summoned demons were crafty liars, only… he couldn’t really find any information about how often Wei Wuxian had been summoned.  True to his infrequent appearances in the human world, there wasn’t much information on him outside of his body count and a warning to stay away; although really, those should have been enough.  All Lan Wangji needed to know was that he had a horribly dangerous demon on his hands, that he really should kill when he got the chance.

…After Wei Wuxian had been dismissed.  Three thousand casualties or not, Lan Wangji couldn’t shake the instinctive revulsion at the thought of killing something magically bound not to fight back.  Once they’d parted, if they met again on equal terms… then, then Lan Wangji would strike.

“Hey.”  A tapping on his shoulder.  “Hey, Wangji-xiong.”

“No.”

“Wangji-gege.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You’re so boring!  Here, look, I drew you!”

Lan Wangji looked.  Wei Wuxian slid him the notecard he’d been doodling on, and Lan Wangji beheld what was actually a pretty good likeness of his face frowning down in concentration at his book.  There were cartoon penises in the margin.  He blinked.

“Oh, wait,” said Wei Wuxian, snatching the notecard back, and scribbled—the drawing was passed back, now with a little speech bubble coming out of Lan Wangji’s mouth.  The text in it read, I have never laughed a day in my life and I cut down jokes with my blade. 

Lan Wangji gritted his teeth.  “Are you five.”

“Five hundred sixty three, actually,” said Wei Wuxian, leaning back in his chair.  “But that doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun!  You should try it sometime!”

“My idea of fun isn’t annoying demon hunters whose power I am under,” hissed Lan Wangji, a deadly reminder, but Wei Wuxian just laughed.

“Oh, but you won’t exercise that power.  You’ve made that clear enough already.”  His eyes, warm and brown in this form, crinkled in amusement.  “Wait, wait, what is your idea of fun then?”

Lan Wangji… didn’t have an answer for that.  Most days he did his job, hunted demons, and went to bed.  “I play the guqin sometimes,” he said stiffly, and Wei Wuxian dissolved into laughter.

“That’s it?  My god!  My god, Wangji-gege!”

Secluded corner though they may have been in, they were still in a library, and Wei Wuxian’s laughter was entirely too loud.  “You're like a parody of demon hunters,” wheezed Wei Wuxian, “all stiff and righteous and—”

Lan Wangji couldn't take it anymore, his ears were burning and they were in a library—he reached out and clamped a hand over Wei Wuxian's mouth.

He’d never done anything so direct before.  He’d never met anyone obnoxious enough.

Wei Wuxian blinked at him once over his hand, and then something hot and moist darted against Lan Wangji's palm; Lan Wangji snatched his hand back with an undignified noise and wiped it furiously on his pants.  Wei Wuxian broke into laughter again, only—thankfully—not as loud this time.  “You asked for it,” he giggled.  “You really asked for it.”

“You—”

“Wangji-qianbei, is everything all right?”

One of the lower-ranking demon hunters had been attracted by the noise.  Perfect.

“We’re fine,” said Lan Wangji icily.

The disciple’s gaze traveled to Wei Wuxian.  “Wangji-qianbei, who is this person?  Might it be fitting to ask him to remove himself?”

Wei Wuxian’s eyes lit up gleefully, and Lan Wangji was seized with the terrible fear that he was about to blurt out I’m the demon he summoned! just to watch the hot water it would land him in.  “He is helping me on a case,” he cut in, before Wei Wuxian could say anything disastrous.  “I need him with me.”  Unfortunately, he didn’t say, but it probably showed in his posture.

“I… see,” said the other hunter, eyes traveling over Wei Wuxian's extravagant appearance.  “My apologies for disturbing Wangji-qianbei.”

“No need,” said Lan Wangji, quite sure that Wei Wuxian was making faces over his shoulder by now.  “You were concerned about the disturbance.  That is only natural.”  He really wished this person would leave.  Being seen with Wei Wuxian—not just as part of the background of the library, but directly looked at and acknowledged—made him feel horribly vulnerable, like the live wire of the situation was being exposed to the touch.  “I am in need of no further assistance, thank you.”

The other hunter bowed and left.  Lan Wangji gave Wei Wuxian a stare as cold as he could muster, which when he was really feeling it could reach Arctic levels.

He was feeling it now.

“I would really, really appreciate,” he gritted out, resenting that he couldn’t just phrase it as a command, “if you would be quiet.”

“Oooohhh,” said Wei Wuxian, and shivered.  “I knew you were a master of intimidation!  I felt that in my bones just now, I tell you!”

To his credit, he at least said it quietly.

Lan Wangji returned to his research, resolutely.  Wei Wuxian wasn’t talking anymore, but he was still fidgeting, spinning pens between his fingers so fast they blurred or folding bits of paper over and over with no rhyme or reason.  Lan Wangji did his best to ignore him and focus on the material.

Unfortunately, the material wasn’t much help.  Lan Wangji was getting the feeling he’d been optimistic to think the Gusu Lan HQ would have materials on something so illicit, but—surely, the means of best combatting something lay in a thorough knowledge of it?  Not to the Gusu Lan board of elders, apparently, although Lan Wangji could see the reasoning.  He would be worried about that information being put to the wrong use as well.  The Lanling Jin sect, less strict about uprightness and regulations, might have something on the topic… but they were not in Lanling Jin HQ, and Lan Wangji was not about to undertake the lengthy and risky business of heading all the way over there with a demon in tow.

Nothing to do but to keep reading then.  Through piles of books, ancient and recent and in between, slim volumes that he checked all the way through and thick tomes that he hunted in the index for, then went back and read any relevant chapter when that wasn’t enough.

His eyes were starting to ache.  He’d done research before, of course, but rarely had anything been this hard to find, and never had there been such urgent emotion behind it.  Searching for a piece of information on which lives depended wasn’t new to him—he’d been in the demon hunting business since he was young enough to hold a sword, raised into it, and things got intense sometimes—but foreign to the situation was the shame mixed in.  It gnawed at his gut, dark and slimy and more rotten than the clear and simple tension he was used to.

He’d summoned a demon.  He’d failed to kill it.  He’d failed to report it, and would not report it until after he had dismissed it, because if he did he would almost certainly be ordered to kill it.  And… he didn’t want to do that.

It wasn’t breaking the rules, he told himself.  It was just… following the spirit of them, rather than the letter.  Gusu Lan demon hunters were instructed to do no unnecessary harm, to be unflinching but never sadistic in their pursuit of demons, weren’t they? Wasn't he abiding by that, in doing this?

It was only when an odd gurgling sound was heard that he realized the sensation gnawing at his stomach wasn’t just shame.

“You should eat,” said Wei Wuxian, tapping the pen against the desk.

Lan Wangji risked a glance out the window.  The sun had already set, the sky a dim peach-gray color.  He’d been reading far past his usual mealtime, distracted from his body by the importance of his research.  Now that he thought to look for it, he recognized the signs of a hunger long-neglected.

He returned to his book.

Wei Wuxian frowned and pouted in the corner of his eye.  “You should should really go eat.”

“Why are you insisting I do?”

“Because it’s not healthy for you to be like this,” grumbled Wei Wuxian, and at this Lan Wangji looked up to make eye contact.

“What does a demon care about my health?”

“Secondhand stress!” said Wei Wuxian indignantly.  “I hope you find the dismissal spell soon, because I’m getting an ulcer just watching you!  You don’t smile, you don’t have hobbies, you don’t look up from your books for hours, you won’t even eat when you’re hungry—what kind of weirdo doesn’t eat when they’re hungry—fuck, are you even human?”

Oh, that was rich, coming from a demon.  Lan Wangji hadn’t been particularly determined to skip dinner before, but now he was certainly going to do so out of spite.

Spite.  A petty, childish, unbecoming emotion.  Not one that was typical to him.  Wei Wuxian really brought out the worst in him—made him react in wild, unpredictable ways.  He was dangerous in more ways than one.  Lan Wangji really needed to dismiss him.

His stomach grumbled again.

Several minutes later, it did so again.  His hands were starting to shake.

Wei Wuxian blinked at him like a cat.

“Fine,” said Lan Wangji, because he did not snap, giving in and getting up.  “Fine.”

“Yay!”  Wei Wuxian immediately hopped up onto his feet as though he’d been waiting for it.  “Buy me food.”

Oh, was that why he’d been pushing Lan Wangji to go eat?  Lan Wangji faced him, eyes narrowed.  “Ulterior motives,” he accused.

“Hey, I wasn’t lying,” protested Wei Wuxian, following him as Lan Wangji headed for the door.  “It really is creepy how robotic you are.  But if I can get dinner out of it then that’s a plus.”

“You will not.”

“Aww, come on!  I’m your guest!”

“You are not my guest,” hissed Lan Wangji.

“Hostage, then.  Prisoner.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Oh?” said Wei Wuxian, voice silky, in a way that made Lan Wangji turn around and look at him.  They were in the stairwell, Wei Wuxian one step above him and looking down, eyes in shadow under the fluorescent lights.  “What do you call this situation, then?  Do I look free to go where I wish?”

Lan Wangji… didn’t know how to answer.

“I didn’t mean to,” he said, finally.  A clumsy and small-sounding phrase.  Defensive.

He shouldn’t have to defend himself against a demon, and yet in this moment, he did.

Wei Wuxian burst out laughing, slapping Lan Wangji on the shoulder so that he nearly pitched forward down the stairs.  “I know, I know!  Look, you’re all right.  You’re all right because you didn’t mean to.  Now are we getting food or not?”

Lan Wangji didn’t need a demon’s approval.  He kept walking down the stairs.

“Not we.”

“Come on, aren’t you rich?

“What does a demon want with human food?” countered Lan Wangji.  Everyone knew that demons, while in the human world, got their nutrition from humans—whether from absorbing spiritual energy and emotions, or the much more direct and fuel-providing medium of human flesh. 

“It tastes good,” said Wei Wuxian cheerfully.  “Just because it doesn’t give me the energy I need doesn’t mean I can’t have a good time eating it.”

Lan Wangji scoffed internally and kept heading out of the library, towards the restaurant.  He didn’t want to bring a dangerous demon into an enclosed and crowded space such as the train, so he walked the two miles on foot while Wei Wuxian tagged along, zigzagging from one corner of the sidewalk to the next to comment on storefronts, passing cars, the weather, why Lan Wangji was so boring, a stray cat he just saw look look Wangji-gege why aren’t you looking it has a fish in its mouth aww it’s gone.

The demon never shut up.

At the restaurant Lan Wangji ordered soup dumplings for himself, and then, because the demon wouldn’t stop pestering him with his own order, noodles with pork belly (“with extra chili oil!  Wangji-gege, make sure to tell them to add chili oil—”) and black sesame tang yuan for Wei Wuxian.  After a brief deliberation on Lan Wangji’s part, they sat outside, because a confrontation between them indoors would both cause more property damage and potentially result in hemmed-in civilians unable to access the exit.  Wei Wuxian played with a hairband around his wrist while they waited for their food, stretching and twisting and snapping and looping it, as though part of him needed to be in constant motion at all times.  The evening breeze ruffled his hair.

Lan Wangji said, “How long until you’ll need to feed?”

Wei Wuxian’s eyes met his; dark brown in this form, but something of their true red seemed to burn through.  “Not human food, you mean.”

“Mm.”

Wei Wuxian stretched.  “I’ve been siphoning off a bit of spiritual energy from everyone I pass by.  We’re in a city, so it’s easy, there’s so much of it just floating in the air, you know.  But if I’m here another couple days I’ll probably need to really get my teeth into someone.”  Lan Wangji flinched.  Wei Wuxian held up a hand hastily.  “Figure of speech, figure of speech!  I only consume spiritual energy, I’m not into the whole actually eating people thing.  I just mean I’ll eventually need to hold someone down and take, mmm, probably enough they’d pass out for a bit.”

Lan Wangji digested this information.  Another couple days…  He’d most likely have found the dismissal spell before then, so it shouldn’t be a problem.  The declaration of I’m not into the whole actually eating people thing was new.  Very strange, considering the Yiling Patriarch’s reputation, but reassuring, until Lan Wangji remembered there was nothing stopping the demon from lying through his teeth.

Which, actually, he probably was.  There were two ways for demons to become stronger—either through eating a lot of humans in the human world, or through defeating and absorbing the power of a lot of demons in the demon world.  Given Wei Wuxian’s body count, and how powerful he was, the road he took gain to all that power seemed obvious.

Lan Wangji narrowed his eyes.  “You don’t eat humans?”

“Nope.”  Wei Wuxian stuck his straw into his water and sipped noisily.

“Are you lying?”

“Why would I lie?”

“Why don’t you eat humans, then?”

The straw popped out of Wei Wuxian’s mouth as he made steady eye contact.  “Tried it once,” he said.  “Wasn’t a fan.”  His tone was casual, perhaps too deliberately so, but his gaze pinned Lan Wangji in place.

The silence stretched between them until a waiter arrived with their food; Wei Wuxian tucked in eagerly, and Lan Wangji belatedly realized that when he’d asked when Wei Wuxian would need to feed—had been contemplating the probability of said food source being human flesh—he’d been focused on the need to get the demon out of here before then.  Several hours ago, he’d have been relieved that once Wei Wuxian started showing signs of increased appetite, it would qualify him as enough of a threat that Lan Wangji could dispose of him with a clear conscience.

He was softening, it seemed.  Maintaining this kind of constant guard was tiring, and keeping up feelings of hostility even more so.  Despite what some of the junior hunters might have thought from the way his face usually looked, he wasn’t actually a cold-hearted or mean person, and it was wearing on him to be around someone who his job (and three thousand dead in one night) required him to think cold-hearted and mean thoughts about.  It was natural he’d end up slipping a little, but he had to keep the safety of the wider population in mind.  Wei Wuxian was an obstacle to said safety.  Who knew how many lives he might destroy in the future?

“Hey,” said Wei Wuxian, mouth full.

“No talking while eating,” said Lan Wangji, reflexively.

“Okay, okay, sorry.”  Wei Wuxian gave a mighty swallow.  There was chili-augmented broth on his chin.  “Aren’t you gonna eat?”

“No talking during the meal,” Lan Wangji clarified.

“You’re so boring,” complained Wei Wuxian, stabbing at his pork.  “I was going to ask you why you keep staring at me like that, but now I have to complain about how boring you are.  Do you ever—fuck, do you ever smile?  Laugh a little?  Say more than five words at a time?”

“Why would I smile around a demon?”

“Well, I mean, look at me.”  Wei Wuxian propped his cheek on one hand and gave Lan Wangji a bright and winning smile.  He really was distressingly beautiful.  “I’m a demon, and I’m smiling around a demon hunter.  It’s not that hard, see—”

And at that he actually reached over the table in an apparent attempt to manipulate Lan Wangji’s face.  Lan Wangji batted him away, grabbed at his wrists, but Wei Wuxian still managed to at least smush his fingers into Lan Wangji’s cheeks before the altercation was resolved.

They were in public.  Lan Wangji’s dignity barely made it out intact.

“You are the most infuriating individual I have ever met,” he felt the need to inform Wei Wuxian when they were both back in their seats.

Wei Wuxian snickered.  “And you’re just a joy to be around.”  He slurped at his noodles; loud, obnoxious and sending little droplets of broth splashing onto Lan Wangji’s shirt.  “I mean, you’re actually kind of interesting, from a situational standpoint,” he said cheerfully, indistinct through the food in his mouth.  “I’ve never been summoned by someone who didn’t want to summon me, and I gotta say this is quite the entertaining experience.  But, man—”  Hasty chewing, swallow.  “Your personality!”

Lan Wangji didn’t dignify that with a reply.  He started in on his soup dumplings, which were cooling.  Wei Wuxian seemed to have gotten onto the topic of how unusual this was for him, chasing it with the abandon of a cat running after a feather toy.

“Like, just going out to eat?  Like this?  Fantastic!  I’ve never done that with a summoner, except when they want me to bodyguard them or act as a servant, which is so humiliating, one does not summon the Yiling Patriarch just to have him wipe the sauce off your mouth, thank you very much, but I’ve never just gone out for food like this.  Normally.  I mean I do sometimes, I do come to the human world occasionally for normal reasons that don’t involve bloodshed and corpses and shit, but never with another human.  This is really a first for me and you could make it that much more interesting by providing your own share of scintillating repartee, but—”  Dramatic sigh.  “Alas and alack!  I’m stuck with a jade statue for a conversation partner.”

The chatter had become constant enough that Lan Wangji would have been able to just tune it out and focus on his food, but annoyingly, some of what Wei Wuxian said was of interest.  So he sometimes came to the human world only to keep a low profile the entire time, did he?  Demons had been known to do that, but given that a major goal of said visits seemed to be not to attract the attention of demon hunters, no one really knew how much; and since said visits didn’t result in any deaths, it wasn’t a priority to deal with.  But if someone this powerful was just sneaking around…

“I mean, at least you’re fun to tease,” Wei Wuxian allowed.  “Like the way your ears go all pink when you’re angry, it’s so cute, my condolences on being one of those people who is naturally entertaining to piss off, I’m sure it must be like going through life with a ‘kick me’ sign on your back.  But you could try to send it back at me at least a little!  My brother may have a stick up his ass almost as big as yours but at least he knows how to banter, but I never see him anymore because we have our own lives and the only person I’m really consistently around these days is Wen Ning who looks like a kicked puppy if you tease him which is no fun.  So, like, at least you’re here, and now I can be annoying to someone I know can handle it—”

Wei Wuxian broke off to take another huge slurp of his noodles, and Lan Wangji forced his way into the stream of babble with the one thing that had stuck out to him.  “You have a brother?”

Of course demons could have families—this wasn’t news to him, or any other demon hunter.  Demons took after humans in many ways, after all, and family was one of them, but it only gave them backup, or motivation—another headache for demon hunters to deal with.  One of the deadliest attacks in the past decade had been by a demon seeking revenge for the death of its entire family—the streets had flooded with illusory black water that suffocated the life and soul out of any who dared step into it, and when the flood receded, the demon hunter responsible for the deaths had been found dead in an alleyway.  His head was subsequently found in another alleyway, three blocks over.

So yes, demons could have families.  That only made them more dangerous.

But it was a new and strange thing to hear one of them discuss it so casually, in the context of annoying banter no less, and the good-natured eyeroll Wei Wuxian gave before replying was even stranger in its familiarity.  This could have been any normal human sibling relationship.  “Yes, I do, and he’s a pain in the ass,” Wei Wuxian told him.  “You ever hear of the Wielder of Three Poisons?”  Lan Wangji shook his head.  “Yeah, didn’t think so.  He’s got enough of a reputation over at home he doesn’t need to come over here and cause trouble to make a name for himself.”

“Unlike you.”

“Mmm,” said Wei Wuxian, and took a long sip of his water, not breaking eye contact with Lan Wangji.  When the straw fell out of his mouth, he said, “Hey, are you going to finish that?  You’re eating very slowly.”

“Food should be savored and eaten in gratitude.”  Not inhaled like you’re doing.

“Okay,” said Wei Wuxian, and leaned over the table, expertly snagging a dumpling from Lan Wangji’s plate.  Lan Wangji made a grab with his chopsticks; the dumpling tore.  Fat drops of broth splashed onto the table between them.  Lan Wangji gritted his teeth in annoyance as Wei Wuxian retrieved the dumpling and slipped it into his mouth.

“Why,” he said, “are you like this.”

“Because you’re the first summoner I’ve had who won’t do anything to me no matter how annoying I am,” said Wei Wuxian with his mouth full, and swallowed.  “Congratulations on being the first human to ever get the full Wei Wuxian experience.”

Lan Wangji frowned.  “Do anything to you?”

Wei Wuxian sent him a look.  “Don’t you know how demon summoning works?”

“I am a demon hunter,” said Lan Wangji, very stiffly.  “We are not involved in—”

“Right, right, of course not.  But, you know, not being able to fight against your summoner, that basically means they can do anything to you.”  More slurping of noodles.  “There are even some summoning contracts that don’t even bother putting in the spiritual compulsion to obey; not being able to escape punishment is already a pretty good incentive in and of itself.  Most people will do anything to avoid having their spiritual energy pulled out bit by bit through their eyeballs.”

There was a prickle of horror going down Lan Wangji’s spine.

“So, you know, I tend to run my mouth no matter what, haha, but it’s nice to be able to do that without getting scorched by soul-rending flames the next moment.  Thanks for that, by the way.”  Wei Wuxian lifted the bowl to his mouth and downed the remaining broth, his head tipped back, throat bared; the black collar on his neck bobbing up and down as he swallowed.  Shackle, thought Lan Wangji, and it was so much more sinister a thought now than when he’d read about it in the library.

“I would never,” he said, as though he needed to reaffirm it.

“Mmm.  I know you wouldn’t.  Mister Principled.”  Wei Wuxian set down the bowl with a decisive click.  “You won’t even kill me even though you clearly want to.  Thanks for that as well, by the way, I appreciate not being dead.  You want some of my tang yuan?”

“No thank you.”

“Your loss,” said Wei Wuxian, and scooped the first orb out of the sugar water, eating it with a loud slurp.  Lan Wangji looked away.

By the time they headed back to the Gusu Lan HQ it was getting dark.  Lan Wangji resettled himself in front of his books with an increased sense of despair and futility, but pushed that aside; he had to keep looking.  That was all that mattered.  He trawled through volumes of all ages and thicknesses, hunted down page numbers in indices for a single sentence, as the hour grew later and later and the library emptied around him.

No luck.  Nothing was coming up.  Finally he gave up and turned to the Internet on one of the library computers; he’d been hoping to avoid that, being more comfortable with books, but clearly the books weren’t enough anymore.

…No helpful results were forthcoming.  Demon summoning was, after all, illegal, and so any information about it that might be conducive to conducting one was regularly scrubbed from the Internet. 

Lan Wangji ran his hands down his face, a rare outward expression of exhaustion.  He couldn’t help it; he’d been at it for hours without a break, and any relevant advice stubbornly refused to be forthcoming.  He knew there had to be information about demon summoning somewhere out there, or else people wouldn’t be able to conduct them, but not apparently anywhere that would be accessible by a reputable establishment.  What was he supposed to do, hire someone to hack into those sites that managed to shield themselves from the information purges?  Go poking around the seedy underbelly of the city?  He didn’t even know how to access the seedy underbelly of the city.

A massive yawn broke through his contemplation, catching him off guard so he wasn’t able to stifle it.

Wei Wuxian noticed, of course.  “You should rest,” he called over from where he was sprawled along the top of one of the couches.  The library being by this point empty except for them, he’d taken to roaming, hanging upside down from armchairs, flipping through books and putting them back in the wrong places.  “You’ve been researching nonstop.”

Lan Wangji glared at him.  What did a demon care about his wellbeing?

“It’ll all still be there tomorrow morning if you turn in for the night,” said Wei Wuxian, as though the problem was the possibility of the information suddenly disappearing and not the prospect of having to spend any longer in this increasingly shaky situation.  The longer Wei Wuxian remained in the human world, the more judgment would fall on Lan Wangji for ineffectively handling the situation.  “Or even if you just take a nap.  Come on, I’m getting secondhand worn out just by watching you, do it for my sake if nothing else.”

Wei Wuxian wanted him asleep and vulnerable, huh?  Fat chance.  Lan Wangji returned to the database he had open, and dimly contemplated how to word his search in a way that might turn up results.  The screen blurred in front of his eyes for a moment; he staunchly ignored it.

Two hours later—and by this point, far past his usual bedtime—he had to admit defeat.  He wasn’t a slave to his own sleep schedule, and was able to pull all-nighters when necessary, but that was provided those all-nighters were actually accomplishing something.  Spending this much time and energy on a fruitless search with nothing to show for it was wearing him down much faster; a couple times he’d blinked his eyes open to realize he’d fallen asleep for a moment.  He should really probably rest…

…except, how the hell was he going to do that with a demon in tow?

Rubbing his eyes, Lan Wangji contemplated his options.  At this point, although it rankled to admit it, he should probably turn in for the night completely—not just nap.  He wouldn’t be able to tackle this complicated situation properly if he wasn’t well-rested, and would be more liable to make potentially fatal mistakes.  But where would he sleep?  If he passed out on the couch, someone might come in the next morning and ask what he’d been working on that had kept him so focused he couldn’t even go back home, and he’d have to make something up—not to mention cover up the presence of Wei Wuxian, who would still be there.  Lan Wangji was not fond of lying, both for reasons of conscience and obedience because deception tended to lead into a vicious cycle, especially for something as sensitive as this.  He wasn’t even a good enough liar to come up with a story that would hold up.  Plus, either Wei Wuxian would have free run of Gusu Lan HQ—an unconscionable thought—or he’d have to order him to remain close by… right by Lan Wangji’s sleeping unguarded body, all night…

No.  It wasn’t happening.

But then… would he need to sleep at his house, and take Wei Wuxian back with him there?

To his growing unease, it seemed increasingly like the better option.  Lan Wangji’s place didn’t contain any important secrets to the organization, and he’d be able to shut the demon out of his room while still keeping him within close enough range not to get up to any funny business anywhere else.  He could even set up additional talismans to ensure the demon wouldn’t be able to leave the apartment even if he managed to slip through any orders not to.  Spending the night on a library couch wasn’t appealing; he’d rather do so in his own bed, and that way he wouldn’t need to make excuses for why Wei Wuxian was there…

Resignation heavy in his heart, Lan Wangji closed all his tabs and stood up.  “Come on,” he said to Wei Wuxian.  “We’re leaving.”

Wei Wuxian perked up.  “Where?”

“My apartment.”  The words ground like sandpaper out of his mouth.

“Such hospitality!”  A charming laugh.  “I never would have known you were such a gracious host!”

“This is for the public safety,” gritted out Lan Wangji.  “You are no guest of mine.”

Wei Wuxian said nothing, but fell into step behind him.  They made their way out of Gusu Lan HQ, through the darkened streets, into the subway station.  The lights set at odd intervals in the subway tunnel flickered over Wei Wuxian’s beautiful face as he stared out the window at the wall blurring past them, chin in hand, apparently lost in thought; the fluorescent light made him look ghostly, eerie, even in what should have been a disguise hiding his true nature.

Lan Wangji swallowed and kept his hands clenched on his knees.

When they arrived at the apartment Lan Wangji wasted no time in resetting the protective seals by the door, adding a few strokes to change their primary purpose from keeping out to keeping in.  He headed immediately to the windows to do the same thing there.

“Wow, you really are rich,” said Wei Wuxian, looking around.  Lan Wangji ignored him.  The thought came to him that his apartment was going to be redolent of demonic aura when all this was done, and he was going to have to take an hour or so to purify it at some point.  Annoying.  He set his shoes by the door, rested Bichen on its hooks on the wall, and headed into the bathroom.

Wei Wuxian followed him.

“What!” he said, in response to Lan Wangji’s glare.  “You said to stay close to you at all times!  It was an order!”

“The other side of the door,” said Lan Wangji, with steel in his voice, “is still close.”

Wei Wuxian shrugged and left.  Lan Wangji got ready for bed, hurried and tense; he couldn’t bring himself to shower, didn’t want to spend any amount of time wet and naked and vulnerable with an enemy in the house, so he soaped himself down with a washcloth under his clothes in front of the sink.  He was sticky with the residue of water against the fabric afterward and barely felt clean, and it made for a bad mood when he emerged.  It was Wei Wuxian’s fault, he decided.  The thought was a petty one, but he was in an uncharacteristic mood to be petty.  Prolonged exposure, it seemed, was bad for him.

Wei Wuxian had apparently wandered over to the table with the guqin on it while Lan Wangji was in the bathroom, and was now plucking aimlessly at the strings.  “Don’t touch that,” said Lan Wangji reflexively.

Wei Wuxian didn’t stop, which meant he’d probably taken “this guy doesn’t want to give me orders” to mean “any imperative statement he gives is not actually meant as an order and therefore can be disregarded within the terms of the contract”.  Which assuaged Lan Wangji’s morals, but presaged an increase in his headache.  “You said you play,” said Wei Wuxian.  “You didn’t say it was also a spiritual weapon?”

Lan Wangji was not in the habit of telling enemies about the details of his fighting style.

“What’s it called?”

“Wangji.”  Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened in incredulous amusement.  “Different characters.”

“Still,” Wei Wuxian snorted, and then put a hand on the flute at his belt.  “This is Chenqing.  Chenqing, say hi.”  He drew the flute out and tapped it against the wood of the guqin.  “See, they’re friends now!” 

“Ridiculous,” said Lan Wangji helplessly.

“Hey, maybe we can duet sometime!” said Wei Wuxian, gratingly chipper, and brandished the flute as though in demonstration.  Lan Wangji recoiled, just a little, from the Yiling Patriarch’s instrument of death.  Just a little.  “Have you ever done a duet with anyone?  There aren’t really any music players at Luanzang, so I haven’t in a while…  But I bet you’d sound really good, you look like you’re not allowed to be bad at anything, haha.”

“I’m going to bed,” said Lan Wangji, and headed for his room.  Wei Wuxian barged ahead of him, as though in curiosity, and flung open the door.

“Ha!  Wangji-gege, do you have any personal effects?  You room looks like a furniture ad in a magazine!”  Black eyes turned to fix on Lan Wangji, with all the intensity of red.  “You’re so boring it makes you interesting.  I mean, how does a person live like this?”

It struck Lan Wangji that this was essentially a more direct and flippant phrasing of Lan Xichen’s gently pointed inquiries into such things as his hobbies and workload.  For some reason, this made him feel disoriented, as though the natural order of things was being tilted.  He didn’t need lecturing on his life choices from a demon. 

He didn’t need to answer, either.  Wei Wuxian was looking around the room, poking at a shelf containing one of the few personal touches to the room; a small row of framed photos, mostly of himself and his brother.  Panic shot through Lan Wangji.  He did not need a demon rummaging through his personal life.

“Don’t touch those,” he hissed, sweeping over, and snatched the frame Wei Wuxian had picked up out of his hands; a picture of Lan Wangji and Lan Xichen at the beach many years ago, when they were still children.  Chubby-faced Lan Wangji frowning in concentration at a sandcastle, while Lan Xichen helped shape the other side.  Not something a demon had any right to look at. 

“Okay, okay, sorry.”  Wei Wuxian let go, putting his hand up as though to show it was empty.  “That was you?  Figures you aren’t smiling even in your baby photos.  You have a brother?”

“I do.”  Lan Wangji was not discussing his family, except perhaps to make veiled threats.  “He’s a very capable demon hunter.”

“Of course he is.  Lans, huh.”  Wei Wuxian sat down on the bed, bracing himself on his palms.  “Is he as boring as you?”

Lan Wangji busied himself with turning all the pictures to face the wall, so that Wei Wuxian couldn’t get a glimpse of them.

“Probably not,” Wei Wuxian answered himself, and gave a satisfied nod at his own conclusion.  “I think you’re accomplishing a superhuman feat it’d be difficult to replicate.  Hey, you should meet my brother!  You’d definitely hate each other even if you were both the same species, but you’re both stick-in-the-mud younger siblings, so it’d be like looking in a mirror.”

Lan Wangji turned back to face him.  Wei Wuxian was also in his sock feet; he wondered if the demon had left his shoes by the door as well, or simply dematerialized them as part of his shapeshifting.  The thought of his own dress shoes sitting side by side in the entryway with the boots Wei Wuxian wore in his human guise put an odd feeling in his throat, more than simply the discomfort of having a demon in his house.

It was the fact of having someone over, he decided.  Anyone at all.  Aside from his brother, no one ever came to visit unless it was a coworker with an urgent demon-related matter to report, and that was entirely different from having someone in here with no purpose, fiddling with his guqin, looking at his family photos, and commenting on his decor.  Lounging on the bed.  The new and alien experience of having a beautiful man getting comfortable in his bedroom.  Lan Wangji was worlds removed from the concept of taking anyone home in that sense, but if he did, would it look like this?

The mental image presented itself to him without its permission, and—ah, that was entirely the wrong sensation in response to the idea of himself entangled with a demon.  His theory of succubus lineage seemed more and more solid; there was no way he’d find such a thought pleasurable on his own.  Wei Wuxian’s aura had to be affecting him.  It was a disagreeable notion, and it was what moved him to speak more harshly than he might have.  “Get up.”

“Okay,” said Wei Wuxian, and hopped up off the bed, moving to the windowsill and seating himself there instead.  Lan Wangji stared.  Wei Wuxian stared back.

“I am about to go to bed,” said Lan Wangji.

Wei Wuxian blinked at him.  “Sure, you do that.”

“That means you leave.”

“Okay,” said Wei Wuxian, and left the room.  A moment later Lan Wangji heard the sounds of aimless plunking coming from his guqin again.

He deliberated on the matter of changing into pajamas, before deciding he still wasn’t willing to endure the vulnerability of changing with a demon on the other side of the door.  So, he was sleeping in his clothes.  Annoying.  One more thing that was Wei Wuxian’s fault.

He turned out the light and folded himself into bed, and made an almighty effort to relax.  After a while the door opened.

“Oh, you didn’t change?” said Wei Wuxian.  “I thought you were going to, that’s why I had to leave—”  And then, to Lan Wangji’s great alarm, he began to climb into bed next to him.

“What,” said Lan Wangji, in the kind of voice that could freeze the bones off the average Lan disciple, “are you doing.”

“Sleeping,” said Wei Wuxian, as though it was the most obvious thing.

“You can sleep on the couch.”

Wei Wuxian pouted.  “It’s not as comfortable.  Besides, you said to stay close by you at all times.”

Lan Wangji was more and more beginning to regret that stupid order.  “The couch counts.”

“Fine,” said Wei Wuxian petulantly, and left the room, and Lan Wangji made his second attempt at sleeping.

It was no use.  There was a goddamn demon in his home and the demon was annoying as all hell and inconveniently attractive and unsettlingly human and couldn’t kill him but could maybe find a way to if he was really clever about loopholes and he did seem to be clever but he also seemed like he wouldn’t do something like that?  But that could well all be an act?  Too much had happened today.  And it didn't escape him longer that the longer he kept Wei Wuxian by his side, even if he was tirelessly looking for the dismissal spell, the more difficult it would be to explain to the board.  His mind was in gridlock, and his muscles followed suit, unable to relax.

“Hey,” said Wei Wuxian, poking his head in through the door a few minutes later.

“What,” snapped Lan Wangji.

“Your spiritual energy is so full of stress I can feel it from the living room.  It’s stressing me out too and I can’t fall asleep.  Want me to play a calming song?

A what?  “With your flute?”  With the demonic flute he used to control undead armies?

“I don’t know any guqin pieces, so yeah.”

A lullaby from a demon?

Unfortunately, Lan Wangji was increasingly unsure he’d be able to fall asleep without it.

Did he want to fall asleep, with a demon in his home…?

A moment later he dismissed the doubt.  Wei Wuxian was magically bound not to hurt him, either directly or through any schemes; anything that did harm him would be through the careful manipulation of events in ways that couldn’t definitively be said to be his fault.  It was, the books said, a highly subtle and delicate art, and more importantly slow-moving enough that he wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything significant in the few hours Lan Wangji was asleep.

Besides, toting a demon around while sleep-deprived sounded like a bad idea.

“Play it,” sighed Lan Wangji in resignation.  Just to be sure, he added, “You are not to play anything that might have adverse affects on me or anyone else.”

“Like I could,” snorted Wei Wuxian—very reassuring—and settled himself on the windowsill again, raising the flute to his lips.  From his silhouette and the rustling of long clothes Lan Wangji could tell he was in his true form again.

The melody, when it came, was a gentle one, wistful and nostalgic, winding its way around notes that spoke of drifting clouds, wind in the trees.  A touch of melancholy, as though mourning the way days and years slipped by, the transience of things.  Lan Wangji matched his breathing to it, felt the spiritual energy of it steal around him, light and silvery; felt the tension drain out of his body by degrees.  A deep and abiding calm settled oceanlike within him.

This… was demonic music?

Wei Wuxian was a very good musician.

In this state it didn’t take long for him to fall asleep.