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Lan Wangji greets Wen Qing as an equal, despite her name and her robes and the entire cultivation world’s calls for her head. They stand by a field outside of Yiling, a mismatched pair of former classmates. The two are of almost equal height, her farmer’s robes contrasting with the white and blue fine silk of his.
“Lady Wen.”
“Hanguang-jun. So, you have come to see him again? Will you visit with us in our graveyard home?”
“Mn.” His face is impassive, but he shifts his shoulders minutely. If he was someone else, he would be fidgeting. “Can’t. No nighthunt close. I came to ask you…”
She waits, quietly studying this paragon who is time after time drawn to the pariah who saved her. They called themselves soulmates, Wei Ying told her, when they were young and everything was brighter. Such days feel far, especially at moments like this, when she is so aware of the new calluses on her hands and the space where her sword once rested by her side.
“What would you ask of me?” She has nothing to give, nothing she will part with. But she knows why he has come to her, what he risked this trip to say.
“Tell me.. why does he,” Lan Wangji stops again, breathes heavily before continuing. “Why will he not listen? I hoped... you, your family, for you he would…”
He trails off again, looking at her with as much intensity as she is looking at him. The question comes so close to what she will not say, it neighbors what she has promised to keep secret. But there is an answer she can give him, this man who loves her friend (for, what other word can she use?).
“He is…” She can’t explain, she can’t bare the truth, but maybe he will understand enough. “He is devoted to leaving something, somewhere for us to be safe. For as long as he can.”
“Wei Ying… is dying?”
Sighing, she locks her eyes with his. He was always quick, behind his silence. His eyes almost flutter shut, and he moves himself to say a farewell.
“He anticipates it,” This stops him, but his face and eyes are now shuttered further than most days. “He sees himself as beyond saving. I try to help, to keep him… There is nothing he will hear. Not even from you.”
“What is killing him?” He asks so very softly that she could leave it without answer.
“Selflessness.” It is the only true answer she has. Not fever or starvation or recklessness, but his steadfast selflessness. Lan Wangji can hear that truth, even without knowing of the core transfer, because it pervades the entirety of Wei Ying’s character. Their friend is a man who does not know how to live without putting something before himself.
The stillness that overtakes him is sharp, not statuesque but pained and on the verge of falling and if he was someone else his eyes might shine with tears. There is no tremor in his hands, no fearful shift of muscles over his jaw, only absolute stillness as his breath itself halts.
“For Wen Yuan.” In two quick movements he hands her a rabbit shaped puppet, and bows his farewell. “Goodbye, Lady Wen. Thank you.”
She almost startles at his rush, and takes the toy from him before she can think better of it. He leaves her then, the heavy silence not quite dispelled.
“Goodbye, Hanguang-jun. Thank you.” Wen Qing speaks quietly as he rises into the distance on his sword. The sun is not near setting, and she still has medicines and seeds to gather before she returns home to her family’s refuge amid the dead.