Chapter Text
“Huaisang! Go practice your saber right now!”
Nie Huaisang sighed. His brother was always bugging him about practicing the saber, trying to make him into a warrior, into a man. It was really quite annoying, especially since it took so much time away from his painting.
“Huaisang!”
“Yes, da-ge.” Huaisang snapped out of his thoughts, trying to look at least a little bit interested in his brother’s words and orders.
“Where is your saber?”
“...I left it in my room.”
“How many times have I told you, the Nie Sect always carries a saber! Go retrieve it right now, and don’t let me catch you without it again!”
“...Yes, da-ge…”
Really, though, Huaisang’s brother was quite boring, at least in his opinion. He focused on nothing but fighting, never taking time to enjoy life and its pleasures. Huaisang knew that his brother only wanted to protect him, wanted to prepare him for the war that was surely coming, but really, look at him! He would never be a grand warrior like Nie Mingjue or his father. He would never be a skilled cultivator like the Twin Jades of the Lan Sect. Why not focus on what he enjoyed, and what he was good at, instead of always trying and failing to be something he simply wasn’t?
But his brother didn’t understand that, and likely never would. Huaisang knew that Nie Mingjue would forever value fighting and honor, and would leave no room for anything or anyone else.
On the walk back to his room, Nie Huaisang moped, thinking about the arduous saber practice that was surely ahead of him. His brother’s sergeants and officials always drilled him half to death. Standing out there in the hot sun, holding up a heavy saber and swinging it around, it was surely torture! Nie Mingjue was trying to torture him!!
Even at the Cloud Recesses, where he was tortured with constant tests and lectures, he was spared the agony of saber practice!
Nie Huaisang remembered the long, long year he had spent there. He had barely passed, much to his brother’s disappointment. He simply had no interest in learning about cultivation, not when he could spend his time doing something more fun!
And although he had been the only Nie Sect member attending the lectures that year, he had made some great friends, and managed to have fun in the most strict, rule-following, depressingly boring place ever created.
Wei Wuxian had been a great partner in crime, always stirring up trouble and providing a convenient place for all the blame to be placed regarding their shenanigans. Nie Huaisang hadn’t meant to get him in trouble so many times, really, it was just that his brother really would kill him if he embarrassed the sect!
Jiang Wanyin participated in their jokes and pranks, too, but always gave a token protest. The glimmer in his eyes whenever he joined in on the fun proved that he enjoyed it just as much as the rest of them, though.
They drank together many times, breaking one rule.
They had been disorderly, breaking another.
They left the Cloud Recesses on several occasions to go to Gusu, which definitely broke more than a few rules.
Nie Huaisang personally broke the rules about explicit images many times over, bringing pages and pages full of pornographic images and text. He personally saw to the sexual education of the entire Cloud Recesses; really, he should be thanked!
There was also that one incident with one of his more expensive pornography books, which Wei Wuxian ended up destroying! Nie Huaisang definitely wasn’t taking the blame for that one.
Of course, Nie Huaisang had also kissed Jiang Wanyin, several times, in fact, which was definitely against the rules. That was probably Nie Huaisang's fault, as he had been the one to start it all, not that either of them could complain.
Looking back on it now, Nie Huaisang couldn’t help but miss it. Even though Teacher Lan had always been breathing down his neck, and although Lan Wangji was always lurking around the corner and scaring the soul out of him, at least there were people there who were the same as him and liked to have fun. At least there was someone to explore with and teach, both in equal measure. Nie Huaisang's sex education had been all theoretical, of course he wanted to practice it with someone!
They weren’t exactly the same as him, of course. Both Wei Wuxian and Jiang Wanyin were both skilled young masters, already highly capable swordsmen at the age of fifteen. Huaisang had definitely spent enough time watching them spar while fanning himself rapidly, he definitely realized how well they could use their swords.
He was a painter, he appreciated their forms, alright? He knew beauty when he saw it, and was sure to tell Jiang Wanyin exactly what he saw and liked later that evening.
Both Jiang Wanyin and Wei Wuxian also had strong golden cores, setting them up for successful and powerful cultivation. The methods they learned in Teacher Lan’s ultra-boring classes would actually have meaning to them, because they could use them.
Nie Huaisang’s golden core was relatively weak. Even if he wanted to, he could never cultivate like them.
In some ways, Nie Huaisang envied them. Wei Wuxian had the carefree air of someone who had no expectations put on their shoulders, someone who walked through life purely on a whim. He had no older brother telling him to improve, and he was already good at what he did!
Jiang Wanyin was the epitome of a dutiful sect heir, despite his occasional escapades at the Cloud Recesses with Wei Wuxian and Nie Huaisang. He was everything that Nie Huaisang wasn’t, everything his brother wanted Nie Huaisang to be. He was good at fighting, he had a strong golden core, a forceful personality.
Nie Huaisang didn’t want to fight, he didn’t want to cultivate, and he especially didn’t want to have anything to do with running his brother’s sect. But if he did, he would want to be just like Jiang Wanyin.
But more than that, Huaisang envied Wei Wuxian and Jiang Wanyin’s relationship with one another. Sure, they argued and fought, both with words and with fists. The number of times Nie Huaisang had to hold Jiang Wanyin back from fighting his brother were incalculable! They wrestled each other, they sparred against each other, and even their normal words towards one another had an edge of rivalry.
But whenever Wei Wuxian got in trouble, Jiang Wanyin would be there to scold him and throw his arm around his shoulders. When Wei Wuxian got beat with the discipline paddle, Jiang Wanyin complained and carried him around on his back. He was the first to scold, but also the first to defend, and when one of them was in danger, the other would leap to their defense. They could tease each other, but God help whoever mocked one of them in front of the other. Wei Wuxian would harshly insult them back, while Jiang Wanyin, in a fierce show of temper, would jump directly to fighting. He reminded Huaisang of Nie Mingjue, in that way.
Huaisang would give anything for a brother who would defend him like that. A brother that he could interact with, who would have his back directly. He knew his brother did defend him; he fiercely punished any comments about Nie Huaisang’s uselessness and wouldn’t stand for his brother to be talked down about. Nie Mingjue would defend his brother in a fight, too, and Huaisang knew he would even enjoy it.
But Mingjue would never trade comments with him, would never be close enough to Huaisang to tease him and for Huaisang to tease back. He would never drink with Huaisang or get drunk with Huaisang. He would never cause trouble or break rules with Huaisang; he just wasn’t that kind of person. Mingjue would never carry him after a punishment; would only scold him. It would never be him and Mingjue against the world, but him against Mingjue. As long as he was the kind of person his brother never wanted him to be, it would continue on like that.
Nie Mingjue was like an untouchable martial god. He protected Huaisang and loved Huaisang, but Huaisang knew he would never show it, not in the ways that Huaisang so desperately craved.
Perhaps if he were more like Jiang Wanyin, he could be the man his brother wanted.
Nie Huaisang entered his room, looking for his saber. It hadn’t been touched in weeks, and sat in a lonely corner, almost covered by Huaisang’s clothing trunks and spare trinkets.
He picked it up, extending it straight out in front of him. His arms shook from the effort of holding up the heavy blade.
Nie Huaisang loved his brother, more than anything else. But he still couldn’t help wishing that things could be different between them.
And he couldn’t help envying Jiang Wanyin, for being who he couldn’t be and having what he couldn’t have.