Chapter Text
The sword master is looking at her hands like he’s afraid she’s going to slap him.
This fear is not unfounded, she thinks, she might. Even though Zidian rests easy on her finger, cool metal against burning skin, and the distance between them is way too big for her to cross for such a simple action, there’s a still a part of her that wants to.
“Care to repeat that?” She asks, still in disbelief, even if the words have taken roots into her head, making their way down her throat.
“I’m sorry, Madam. The young mistress’ core seems to be troubled, at this pace she will never be able sustain a sword of her own” The man is still afraid of bodily harm, but he’s also the sword master of Lotus Pier and he knows where respects are owed “Her energy is fine, and she can hold her stances perfectly, but for some reason she can’t do it for long, and it wears her out way too much even with the practice swords, one of her own would take too much. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you your child might not be able to cultivate properly, no matter how much she trains, she might sooner kill herself in trying than to achieve the level of power that is expected of her. My personal recommendation would be to cease her training, she’s a smart child and a kind one, as long as she can protect herself in some way, she will be okay”
Would she? Be okay?
Maybe.
Her sweet little Yanli had never been sturdy, her frame delicate but not in the beautiful way she remembers people saying she was at her age, a frail air surrounding her in ways that no other child on the pier seemed to be bothered by, she should have expected it. Her sweet little Yanli, her only daughter at the moment, her oldest child, won’t ever be able to cultivate properly and she should have expected it. This makes her think she had somehow known, but then again, denial was one hell of a drug.
Mix it with hope and it then becomes a poison.
She thinks on how they’ll tell her such news, she’s small and has barely started her formal training, exited to tell all about it to her baby brother while Jiang Cheng just laughs at anything she says to him.
Will it break her heart? Or will she take it in stride?
Even, if after all of it Jiang Yanli made it fine, and was okay with it… Would she? Would her husband? Be okay?
“Thank you for telling me first, you’re dismissed” She tells the man in front of her, who is looking at her with sharp eyes.
Still, he gives her a nod and a bow, and then retires. He leaves her alone in her silence, and in her worry, and in some anger.
It’s not fair, she thinks, her sweet little Yanli, weak little Yanli, sickly and fair little Yanli… Are the gods so cruel as to take their ire on a child like hers, bound to the misery that seems to run into their bloodstream, is this all they seem to be?
“At least she’ll have a husband, for sure” The thought comes uninvited.
She feels sick, heavy with the burden of the doubts, of the possibilities that now she has cursed her own baby into a miserable marriage, the only future Jiang Yanli can hope for now that her own cultivation would never give her the security that comes with her name, she was never meant to be the heir of the Yunmeng Jiang, but she was never meant to be only a bride to give away in hopes of political gain, she was meant to…
Her daughter was meant for greatness. Both of her children were. Even with the news, she would make sure of it. This was her promise to her child.
Gods would be damned, she was a Jiang now, and attempting the impossible was kind of their thing.
But she was also a Yu, and cultivation wasn’t the only way to fight and protect oneself.
She needed to talk to her husband, and then write a letter to her mother. Then…
Then she needed to sit her child down and break her heart.
Jiang Fengmian would like to think he was a peaceful man, uninclined to meaningless violence, a cold head that handled the Yunmeng Jiang Sect with steady hands and steadier feet, a man of calm and understanding, but even himself had to take a moment to question if all of these claims were true as he had to physically contain himself from taking his own sword out to go slash some dummies until the new hole in his chest had sealed over.
Yu Ziyuan was always direct with her words, and even now her voice refused to tremble as she relayed the information that the sword master had given her, the news of their daughter’s future, the one hurt he thought might make him break this façade of control he holds over everyone else in the sect.
He never expected Yanli to be the best cultivator of the world, or to break her back studying way too hard, she was their oldest child but she had a brother already, she was free to be herself, to enjoy and learn at her own pace, to become the child of the Yunmeng Jiang Sect Leader and the fearsome Violet Spider. He had never expected Yanli to be the best, but he expected her to become great.
Would she? Be great?
Could she?
Cultivation wasn’t everything, but she was fragile, and sickly, and too kind for her own good. His sweet little Yanli, who would be seen as weak, mediocre, as easy…
The anger he could read in his lady’s eyes, he wished he could let it carry on them both, to allow them to be upset for their loss, but they both knew that they had to stand taller than ever, stronger than ever, and even if it pained them; more together than ever.
“I’m writing mother about it” Yu Ziyuan told him, her voice made out of the same steel as the ring on her hand, the one she was playing with at the moment “Some of our cousins, they aren’t cultivators, but they’re of the Yu Clan and they are specially trained to maintain our name, our dignity, our strength… She will know what to do about this, Jiang Yanli will be okay”
Jiang Fengmian was stunned for a second, because he knew of the Yu way of training, of the “break them until they’re stronger” mentality that his own lady still had towards their disciplines, of the merciless ways they were taught to fight to win, to kill, to only accept defeat if death itself was taking them already or to get up and keep fighting until it came. He knew of the steel knives, small enough to be kept in the hems of delicate dresses and embroidery needles dipped in poison, he knew of the explosive powders and skin melting liquids that could be concealed in vials that resembled those of spices, how their mixing process carried out in the kitchens; an art in its own right.
And then he thought of his sweet little Yanli, out in a world that would see her and think her easy prey, another pretty decoration of a wife, someone to take advantage of, and remembered; she’d been learning to cook, and she had spent a long afternoon telling them of how she had loved it.
She would be okay.
The news had been taken better than expected but still devastatingly enough that everyone in Lotus Pier seemed to try their best to keep away from the main house, the young lady was sad and it pained them to see her like that, the Madam was angry at the world and extra mean to everyone to retaliate, the Sect Leader was frustrated and even outsiders could see the way his shoulders slumped and the way he was losing his supposedly eternal patience, especially when he had to take the young master, because even the baby had picked up the negative energy of his family and with too many emotions and too little of a body to contain it, the four year old had decided that crying over every single thing would be the best way to handle it, after all, crying was what he did best at his age.
“A-Cheng, please, settle down, it’s okay, everything is okay” Jiang Fengmian tells the boy as he bounces him on his shoulder, he’s getting too big for him to be carried around but he was upset and it seemed cruel to just let him swallow in misery he doesn’t even understand “Your sister is okay, she’s had a shock but she’s strong, you know it, she will be fine. And your mother loves you very much, that’s why she’s upset that your sister seems sad, and if you’re sad too, we all will be even sadder”
His intentions were good, he knows this, but he realizes that maybe his words aren’t the right ones as Jiang Cheng only seems to sob harder, his little chest barely has enough space for the breaths he’s taking to feed so much wailing, and Jiang Fengmian finds himself at a loss.
He has to admit this experience has made him realize that what he thought was enough time with his family most definitely is not.
He doesn’t know where Yanli goes to hide when she’s in a mood, and he has barely seen her in the two days since they broke the news to her, barely remembers what she likes to eat so he can’t even ask the cooks for her favorites to cheer her up, and doesn’t know her size or her tastes to get her a new dress from the market so that he can make her excited about the prospect of her future trip to Meishan, it’s a whole mess, his only daughter is already 9 years old and he barely knows her, and now she’s going away, because she had to break for him to notice her.
He thinks it might be even worse with Jiang Cheng, who is only in his care at the moment because every other set of hands seems to be too busy or too angry to deal with him, and he can barely hold him right because he doesn’t remember how to do so, can’t recall the last time he did as such, doesn’t know if he likes to be bounced or if he would prefer to be laid on his stomach so that he can rub his back to calm down, he doesn’t know where do they keep his toys or which of them he’s allowed to use at all, what he would like to eat, if he can be bribed with sweets to quiet down, or if he would prefer some meat to be entertained for a while. He doesn’t even know which clothes fit him best in his chest, if he were to propose to take a warm bath to calm him down a little, or if there’s anything else besides the heavy ambient of the family meetings that has him so upset.
He truly feels like a stranger, and it hurts to know he had never realized before that the distance that he keeps towards his wife was this consciously done, and this unconsciously affecting his entire family.
“A-Cheng, I know your father has been falling short, and that everything seems scary right now, but I promise you we will fix it, and we all will be okay, you have us to protect you, to care for you, don’t cry so much, let’s go to the kitchens, okay? We’ll find something to make for your sister to cheer her up, alright?” He asks, determination in his steps.
Now that he sees the cracks, that he notices the chips, he knows what is broken, and he can fix it.
He would fix it.
Even if it seemed impossible at the moment, with a sad child hiding in the corners of Lotus Pier, heartbroken and afraid of being sent away, and another barely allowing him to hold him close enough to wipe away tears as he struggled through shuddered breaths as everyone around him seems upset, and a wife that he has never known what to do with but who he knows loves so fiercely it’s hurting her and those around her at the moment.
Even then.
Because he was a Jiang and attempting the impossible was kind of their thing.
They would be okay.