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The years when Jiang Cheng was still young and would quiver at the crashing of the storms seemed forever ago. (He became a storm himself, rolling thunder and bright) . He’d held his breath and braved it as much as he could, but often found himself stumbling barefoot across the terrace to Wei Wuxian’s room.
The flashes of light would echo across the docks and the lattices, rendering the wooden beams into tall imposing trees, as if he were lost wandering in the forest between their wide trunks. The docks would pitch as the water turned beneath them, and even his learned feet would stumble. Somehow Jiang Cheng made it to his room, his heart racing, and he would shuffle his feet on the threshold. The sound would wake Wei Wuxian, who would roll over and mumble, but eventually open his eyes and gesture to his brother at the doorway. The blankets were warm, and the storm seemed suddenly inconsequential and far away. At least for this moment.
Jiang Cheng’s heart paled at his destiny, and the destiny he didn’t yet know he had. From the moment he was born, he was suspended above this void. To hold the Jiang sect in his hands, when he couldn’t yet stand firm on the tumult of the docks in a storm. Somehow he was meant to be a mountain, tall crevices that scrape the sky, the white fingers of clouds crowning his head. The praise of his father struck his ear, a dry snapping sound, as it glanced off of him, meant for his brother. But that did not stop him from watching Wei Wuxian, as he weaved beautiful forms through the air, as he left his mark on the paper. And though it hurt, Jiang Cheng found solace in an older brother. He did not feel so alone in his fated role, because above all things, he was unsure he could fill it. If there were two, he could brace himself against the wind. There was a comfort. And as much as he tried to blot it away now, it remained, and he felt the loss of it like a fresh wound, even so many years later.
Even now, for many nights Jiang Cheng dreamed vividly of Wei Wuxian’s childhood room. How it looked when the flashes of lightning illuminated it. Why was this his vision when he also felt grief that the great halls of the lotus pier of his youth were faded, replaced with his new projects? Why did Wei Wuxian haunt him so? And in such domestic ways? Jiang Cheng had done nothing in recent years but try to forget how Wei Wuxian’s touch was unusually soft. He tried to remember only the harsh and cruel, but in reality there were so few instances. There was no yelling, only that pause and then that laughter. Endless laughter, benign in all ways.
Why did that upset him so much? Maybe it was that he could see the spirit of his sister in him, and how she endlessly applied salve to his wounds, even after he’d pushed her away. How did he dare to impinge on her memory? But beyond that, with a soft voice, always lingering behind her? Or to be the reason for her smile? Jiang Cheng almost found himself angry at her, because he knew what she would say. Forgive him, Chengcheng. His breath caught at the name. He’s your brother. He’s all you have. And he always means well. He has a good heart. He could sob, both grasping at the words as they fluttered around his head and trying to wave them away. He didn’t have enough of his sister’s words. And now he was haunted by Wei Wuxian, somehow a gentle thought, even though he tried to blot it away, covering it with the dark light, the sharp eyes, and the endless worsening, the deep buzzing that grew louder and louder. The heavy sunshine of Lotus Pier as it was shaded by the tall, stark cliffsides, the sharp edge of a knife.
But then again, why was he tempted to spend so much time contemplating it? It should be nothing. He had his home back, and he could build it back however he wished. He’s long dead. And by whatever miracle, he didn’t come back. The spirits must have consumed every ounce of his spiritual energy, no matter how abundant and vibrant it was during life. Even years later, it was hard to believe that he was gone. Wei Wuxian was all-consuming, from the second he entered Jiang Cheng’s life. If Jiang Cheng grew to be a storm, then Wei Wuxian grew to be a volcano, exploding forth from the cave of Xuanwu. He couldn’t imagine how he could have fallen so, lifeless and torn into pieces, bloody, the vultures tearing away at his remains. But— no. No. There was no use thinking of it. All Jiang Cheng had to do now is keep anyone else from being drawn to his path. He could pace the boundary. He could be the warden. He could be the buffer.
His footsteps echoed endlessly through the forest. There was always more forest to traverse. There was never a bed in which to sleep. He could rest when he was dead. He did not let his mind linger on it, but there was a hope cached in his throat that then, he could see them again, and bury his head in his mother’s shoulder, feeling her fingertips on the back of his neck. Maybe his eyes would stop being so hopelessly dry. Maybe his sister’s voice could fill his head again. Maybe he could finally stop with his pacing.
Jiang Cheng embraced the rage, as he discovered when he dodged it, the grief would come. So he pursued the spectres, even though their flames never danced or warmed him in the same way. But he would have to stop, as he would cough and cough. The petals would flutter forth, and he would cast them away as if they never existed. They did not hinder his perpetual strength.
But they did not stop, as if the world knew something he did not, so on he strode, leaving a trail of petals in his wake.
x-x-x-x-x
Wei Wuxian had long been dead and buried. He felt the walls of his wooden box breathe around him, as his ribs lay still and quiet. The earth lay heavy upon him, nibbling at the edges of his casket. It whispered into his ear, where is your endless fluttering? Where is the flurry of your fingers? During life, you never paused, not even for a moment. But Wei Wuxian, dead, would just tilt up the edges of his mouth. Was he thankful for this rest, cast endless before him? An eternity sounded good to him. His flute could remain lost, carried away by the wind that once fed it.
Above the ground, the tragedy followed him. Whenever Wei Wuxian glimpsed his brother, the guilt would consume him, pressing the ashes into his eyes. He would rather hide his face, bending into the shade of a tree. But he hadn’t been able to conceal himself because of the coughing. The petals flurried everywhere, filling the empty spaces. It echoed loudly between the trees. He wanted to see him undetected, but instead he would bend and set his hands on his knees, and no matter how he tried, it wouldn’t stop. He was incapable of staying cached away. The sun always managed to shine on his face, almost as if it was out of spite. The moon never ceased to follow him. He was framed by the flowers’ color and fragrance.
He’d allowed the memory of Lotus Pier to grow obscure, as if all of it had been a dream. The bed of lotus he had been born into, the voices as they carried out over the water, bathed in sunlight. He let them fall into a pleasant, but distant, haze. Another life. Something that belonged to someone else and could be clutched close to their heart. He was haunted by the flame that dwelled in Jiang Cheng’s eyes before it hardened into icy bolts of lightning, cast in the furnaces of the gods. He couldn’t take it. He’d killed it. The grief would wrap its hands around his throat. He did what he could to blot it all away.
The earth was always able to forget. Could he have ever left a lasting mark? Every creature leaves its own scratching in the sand, but at any moment, the ocean can wash it away. The mountains grow, leaving notches on the wall as they rise, inch by inch. He tried to let the soil cover him up, swallow away every utterance that had ever left his lips. He would like to become the seed of a mountain, food for the roots of a tree. A looming rock off which he could fall, just to climb up and fall off again. Please forget me. But then again, the earth always remembered. It buried the remains, but each layer of soil left its evidence, each gust of wind whispering its secrets, if there were any eyes or ears willing to know it. But at least he was out of sight now. Even the spirits had given up on convening with him. His seat at their table had been empty for years.
At least it was a relief to be buried here, even if it was only relief to a heart as selfish as his. He couldn’t see the flowers wither at his touch anymore, oblivious to his good intentions. Instead the petals would rise and rise around him as he kept coughing them into his hands. Soon they would cover his face, and maybe they would become stuck in his mouth, fragrant and sweet, filling his throat, gently pressing and pressing. The softest violence. He wondered if anybody remembered him here. Maybe it would only be met with celebration. And in a way, he was relieved. He could do no more harm. Right? Anyway, he was already dead. What was the real loss? They all thought they knew him, drawn from formless shapes in the soldiering fire, traced from shadows on the wall of the cave. Connected with threads between the stars into whatever shape hovered before them.
But then, again, he walked upright, and he found himself without the comforting weight of the soil on his chest. Without the collar they’d placed around his neck. The sky yawned wide above his head. He could see storms again. And Jiang Cheng, unknowingly drawn close, was the greatest storm he had yet seen. The bolts of lightning whipped upward with great, deafening strikes, his jaw was sharp and shoulders wide. He held tremendous strength, but deep within, there was that familiar seed of pain, with that telltale wall built around it, impenetrable. Wei Wuxian knew it well. Now the great regalia wrapped itself around him, his dogs alert at his heels, but he was the same boy he knew, in a Lan robe a size too big, a flush of frustration across his face. Was that a comfort or a sorrow? In some world, Jiang Cheng could have been a new being, borne upon a shining light from the heavens. That, though, complete rebirth, was not what Jiang Cheng was deep within, that boy who kept every memory in a box under his bed.
Wei Wuxian could have bowed at his feet. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I thought my absence would have helped. Could he ever shape a softness using these fingers? No matter what, when he touched, deep bruising, streams of blood were left behind. And above it all, there was always that endless trail of flower petals he left in his wake. What he didn’t know is that he also dropped their seeds, which could sprout even in the darkest soil.
Maybe the world knew more than he did, as it cast him aside and raised him up.