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Madam Lan's tablet is not kept in the family shrine.
It had been an object of much discussion among the elders; or so Xichen was told. He was only eight when she died, Wangji only six; it wasn't as if their opinions had mattered then.
More than half of Xichen's life has passed since. At nineteen, he has knelt before the family and the elders and received the rites of ascension that made him the youngest sect leader in Cloud Recesses' history. He knelt in ashes and tried not to look at the seats unfilled, the tablets that weren't yet carved.
He's paid his respects to every part of his family but one. The one whose tablet and ashes sit in a lonely house on the back hill, surrounded by gentians that somehow, like magic, still bloom.
They have not set foot in this house in over ten years. Even so, it has been maintained, kept in perfect order and free of dirt and dust. Rule #586 — all living spaces in the Cloud Recesses, occupied and unoccupied, must be kept clean and tidy. It tugs at Xichen’s soul, knowing others have been inside this house when he and his brother were not. Even now they should not be here, by rights.
But Lan Xichen is sect leader now. The entirety of the Cloud Recesses is his. He can go wherever he pleases.
Beside him, his little brother's fingers curl tightly against his own. " Xiongzhang, " Wangji murmurs. "We will go inside?"
“Yes. Yes, I’m sorry,” Xichen says, and shakes the frozen feeling from his limbs to step forward, his brother’s hand still in his.
He steps over the threshold of his mother’s house, Wangji by his side, just as they did when they were children.
It is painful. He did not realize how painful it would be, to see everything as it was when they were young, untouched by the fires that ravaged their home and time’s cruel fingers. Their mother’s paintings still hang on the wall, barely lightened by the sun, her calligraphy still laid out on the desk as if she would return to it.
Wangji’s hand tightens around Xichen’s, and Xichen is not sure if he is seeking comfort or giving it. To linger in memory would only bring more pain, more grief, so they do not. Xichen guides them to the shrine that holds their mother’s name alone, surrounded by faded couplets and incense that has long since burned out.
Side by side, Xichen and Wangji kneel. From a bag he holds on his arm, Xichen brings out a bowl of oranges and lychee fruit and places it reverently on their mother’s altar. Wangji places joss sticks in the holder directly in front of her tablet and lights them with a talisman, setting out a bowl of rice while Xichen begins preparing tea.
“Mother,” Xichen begins as the fire springs to life in a small brazier, heating the water for tea. “Your eldest and youngest sons offer sincere veneration to you and pray for your happiness and peace in the afterlife.”
He bows, once, low but not quite touching the floor. Wangji does the same. The water they are boiling begins to bubble, and Xichen pulls it from the fire and adds the jasmine tea to it. The incense burning fills the room with the scent of sandalwood.
“Lan Huan and Lan Zhan bring your spirit news,” Xichen says, the formality sticking on his tongue. He never spoke to his mother like this in life. He thinks of using their courtesy names instead, realizes his mother never even knew them by those titles. “Lan Huan— your eldest son has been made sect leader of GusuLan. He is here to offer his greatest thanks to his mother for the gifts of life and nurture she has given him and his brother. His youth and inexperience pray for your gu—” he chokes on tears he did not realize were coming, swallows, tries again — “pray for your guidance from the world beyond, and—”
Xichen presses a hand to his mouth to keep himself from crying out in front of his mother’s shrine. Wangji takes his other hand again, squeezing so tight it’s nearly painful. “Your sons pray for your guidance from the world beyond,” Wangji continues in Xichen’s stead, “and for your blessing on our steps forward as sect leader and lead disciple.”
They bow again. Xichen pretends not to see the place his tears stain the bamboo mat. The incense smoke curls into the air. Xichen pours the tea through a sieve into the waiting cups: one for their mother, one for him, one for Wangji.
He places the tea on the altar. Wangji takes paper money out from his sleeve, placing it gently into the empty brazier. Xichen does not miss the way his fingers curl stiffly inward to hide their shaking. He places a hand over his brother’s, just for a moment, before they raise their cups to salute the tablet and drink.
They return the cups to the mat ahead of them. Wangji folds his hands in his lap. Sparks from the paper money drift up with incense smoke. They sit in twin silences, tears drying in place on Xichen’s face and Wangji’s hands trembling atop his thighs. The fire crackles in place.
“It was never quiet like this before,” Xichen says suddenly, but Wangji nods as if he were thinking the same thing.
“Mother did not like quiet,” Wangji says quietly. His voice is measured, like he’d been thinking about this the whole time. “She teased me always for speaking so little.”
“Should we play? I didn’t bring Liebing… ” Xichen grips the hems of his robe, twisting it around his hands. “Do you have your qin?”
Wangji sits still for a long moment, watching the incense float toward the sky in a silent house they have not been in for a lifetime. His eyes are fixed on the ceiling, on a point in the rafters Xichen can’t differentiate.
Then he moves. He picks up Xichen’s arm and laces it around his own shoulders, leaning his head on his brother’s shoulder and arranging his legs so he isn’t tangled up in his own robes. Xichen is startled, but he moves on instinct, pulling his brother into his side and balancing him so he doesn’t fall.
He opens his mouth to ask what this is all about when Wangji starts. “Mother. Xiongzhang and I have many things to tell you since our last meeting,” he says, and it takes everything in Xichen not to start crying again.
That’s the way Xichen would open every meeting they had with their mother. Mother, Zhanzhan and I have so many things to tell you! he would say, bounding over the threshold with Wangji in tow, usually to the frustration of their uncle or whoever delivered them to the gentian house that month. He would sit with Wangji leaning in his lap, or his mother’s, and regale her with whatever exploits they had taken up in the interceding weeks— who they’d met, where they’d gone, what they’d done.
“I have seen the defeat of the great Xuanwu of Slaughter, with my… treasured friend, Wei Ying,” Wangji says, in the present, still fixed on the incense smoke. “ Xiongzhang has been called the most talented cultivator of our generation.”
“I haven’t!” Xichen shoulders him slightly. “I haven’t, Zhanzhan, that’s not true.”
“
Xiongzhang
has. I have heard it said.”
“By you! Just now!”
“And before, by others. Mother, xiongzhang has a hao already, even before he has been made sect leader, he is called ‘Zewu-jun’.”
“Mother, Zhanzhan has been known as the most remarkable swordsman, an unparalleled beauty, and has formed great friendships in and outside the clan, which frankly I know we both never thought possible,” Xichen says, and Wangji glares at him.
“Wangji was so kind to xiongzhang in his report but receives only cruelty,” Wangji says, and when Xichen laughs, he thinks he can hear their mother laughing with him.
“Zhanzhan is the youngest ever to be made the lead disciple of the Lan sect,” Xichen says. “Wen Xu burned our home, and we will go to war soon, and he will be there alongside me, and we will find justice for all that has been done. For kidnapping your son and my brother and hurting him, trapping him in a cave, for stranding him and leaving him for dead I will see justice. For burning our home and killing our family, I promise you, we will find justice.”
Wangji tucks his head into the curve of Xichen’s neck, and Xichen rests his head atop his brother’s. “Wangji and Xiongzhang always must look out for one another. As you have always said. As we have always done.”
From the doorway, there’s a strong burst of wind. It tousles Xichen’s hair, and Wangji’s and if their paper money had not already been crumbling it would have blown it from the brazier.
A few leaves are carried in along the breeze, sweeping across the quiet floors, and with them: a whole gentian flower, blue and flawless, that drifts across the wind and settles just in front of their mother’s tablet.
Xichen closes his eyes and clenches his jaw to keep tears from springing back up. Wangji turns his head into Xichen’s shoulder, but can’t hide the way his shoulders shake.
Slowly, Xichen disentangles himself from Wangji and lowers himself into a full bow, forehead touching the mats.
“Thank you.” Xichen says, still lowered. From the corner of his eye, he can see that Wangji has done the same. “Thank you for everything.”
When they straighten, they move in silence: gathering the things for tea, the brazier, Wangji casting minor protective spells so the food will not turn or attract flies before they can return and replace it.
When they guide the door to the gentian house closed, Wangji speaks again. “We will return every month now.”
“There’s about to be a war on, Wangji,” Xichen says bitterly. “I can’t make promises like that.”
“We will return every month now,” Wangji repeats. “ Xiongzhang is sect leader. We are permitted.”
Xichen smiles at him, soft, and threads his arm through his brother’s. “Yes, I suppose we are. We two can return as often as we please.”