Work Text:
Jiang Cheng knows he cannot win this war. It’s impossible. His sect is a handful of weak cultivators and himself, and his allies are another dead sect, a handful of smaller sects, and Nie sect. And while Qinghe Nie is a strong sect, it isn’t enough to take down the heavens.
And his brother isn’t here.
It’s not that Wei Wuxian would be enough to tip the scales by himself —Jiang Cheng isn’t that foolish,— but at least he would shoulder some of the stress. It would be easier to fight losing battle after losing battle if someone else knew why he couldn’t stop.
Jiang Cheng sighs and goes over the map in front of him again. The sun emblem over Yunmeng burns his eyes. He shakes his head to dispel the memory of Madam Yu pushing the boat away.
There is no winning this war. Jiang Cheng will not stop fighting anyway.
Jiang Cheng holds his infant nephew, so fragile and soft, and knows he cannot do this. He’s a hollow man made of grief and rage, and that’s not a father. That’s barely a relative.
Jin Ling shifts in his sleep, and there’s something in the curve of his nose that reminds Jiang Cheng of his sister. Kind, gentle, loyal, fierce Jiang Yanli. She would know what to do. She’d practically raised him and Wei Wuxian.
He latches on to the rage that wells up in him at the thought of his former brother. Sorrow will kill him, and he won’t let Jin Ling lose anyone else. So he holds that rage close to his heart to keep him moving forward.
But that just proves that he can’t raise Jin Ling. Jiang Cheng knows exactly how terrible it is to grow up under a furious parent who can’t let the past go. He doesn’t want to repeat his mother’s mistakes.
Jin Ling wakes up and looks at him, making a wet infant noise. Jiang Cheng’s heart breaks open
He cannot raise this child well. He presses a kiss to Jin Ling’s head, and hums Yanli’s favorite tune.
Jiang Cheng cannot forgive Wei Wuxian. His brother turned his back on Yunmeng and left a trail of bodies in his wake. Their parents, Jin Zixuan... Jiang Yanli. Even now, returned from death, Wei Wuxian has chosen Gusu over Lotus Pier. Chosen outsiders over their family once again.
A breeze passes through Jiang Cheng’s office, and he looks out the window at the lake. The lotus flowers are mostly gone this time of year, replaced by seed pods. He closes his eyes and remembers throwing seeds at his siblings, smacking each other with seed pods, capsizing the boats and shaking water out of his hair. There’s a familiar ache in his chest. Usually he dispels this melancholy by hitting something, but he doesn’t feel like cleaning up the wreckage that would leave.
Instead he scoffs at himself and walks out of his office, onto one of the walkways that meanders over the lake. The ghosts of his family still appear here, even though it’s been years. He can see in the distance the dock where Jiang Fenmian taught him to fish, just because he’d complained about having pork too often. He walks to the pavilion, and sits at the table where Madam Yu once gave him an extra moon cake because he’d been too sick to light lanterns with everyone else.
There’s a large gash in one of the support beams of the pavilion. Jiang Cheng smiles bitterly at the sight. He hadn’t let anyone replace that beam, ostensibly because it was still sound. But he still remembers the first time he and Wei Wuxian tried to fly on their swords. He was stable on Sandu, but Suibian had run away from Wei Wuxian and lodged itself in the pillar. Jiang Cheng lifts his hand but can’t bring himself to touch the memory, fingers hovering over the scarred wood.
He cannot forgive Wei Wuxian.
When he returns to his office, he has a letter to write.