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It is not immediately after the banquet—things were too disarrayed, too busy, with the business of Wei Wuxian saying aloud all the things that should not be said, and the vanished Wen remnants, and Jin Guangshan's anger at things that Jin Guangyao cannot control, and so hates more by the moment—but it is soon, only weeks after, that Lan Xichen speaks privately with Jin Guangyao on the subject of Su She.
His eyes and mouth are unhappy. He does not like speaking ill of people; does not like addressing ugly subjects. But he feels, he says, that Jin Guangyao (A-Yao, he always says, with such warmth, so differently from the way Jin Guangshan says it) should know the truth. A truth that he'd prefer not to be widely known, but which Jin Guangyao should know, since he had personally invited the man, had shown interest in him.
Jin Guangyao had taken the frantic, appeasing lies that had wanted to fly out of his throat—that he had not put much thought into the invitation, that Lan Xichen had overestimated his gesture, mistaking a basic kindness as a gesture of potential friendship—and imagined strangling them in his clenched fist, a motion that he conceals in an adjustment of his sleeve. "I am listening, er-ge," he says instead, attentive and a little anxious, but void of promise.
He learns, in carefully measured words, that Su She (Su Minshan, Jin Guangyao would correct another; but he does not correct Lan Xichen, and merely notes the discrepancy) had not left the Gusu Lan on good terms. His crime was more than the graceless assumption that he could continue to cultivate, could raise his head from obscurity after departing the sect that had taught him; he had been tested during the early, bloody steps toward war, and had been found wanting.
"I only learned of it much later," Lan Xichen says, "from Wangji. In the confusion of battle, some of the outer disciples were left outside of the place that the clan retreated to. The Wen began to kill them, trying to provoke those in safety to come out, or force the knowledge of how to enter that safe place from the ones left alive." He paused, his mouth tight. "Most of the disciples chose to die without a word. Su She... gave up all he knew."
There's a weighty moment of silence. With his hands linked in his lap, Jin Guangyao says, "I see."
He thinks, Is that all?
"And despite that," Lan Xichen says, "he only survived because Wangji came out, not knowing that Su She was the only one left alive." He breathes unhappily. He is uncomfortable, Jin Guangyao thinks, with wishing someone dead. He looks at Jin Guangyao like he wants to be comforted from it, but manages to cover the look up with a smile after a moment. "I'm sorry. This is... a matter that should have remained within the Lan sect, and never troubled you."
There is a part of Jin Guangyao that is weighing, in the back of his mind, the value of Lan Xichen's untempered good regard against the value of a young man who had stood taller merely at hearing his own name, a young man who might carry secrets of the Gusu Lan that even the indulgent Zewu-jun might hesitate to divulge to a lover.
There is a sharper and less calculated part of Jin Guangyao that moves him to flick his sleeves back, take up his cup of tea, sip. Say, still holding the warm cup, grounding himself in the feeling of it, "Er-ge, may I ask you a question?"
"Of course." No hesitation.
He chooses his words as carefully as he can, but they still bear a faint sting of accusation. "Has Su Minshan, in your opinion, done anything that he cannot be forgiven for?"
Credit to the First Jade—he feels the sting, judging by the surprise on his face, but it makes him thoughtful instead of angry. He considers, eyes half-shuttered under long lashes. He is thinking, Jin Guangyao guesses, of a night in a small hut, a night that was for Meng Yao the culmination of several nights of carefully laid groundwork, but to Lan Xichen must have seemed an honest, tormented overflow of emotion. Meng Yao had known that if they lived, if Nie Mingjue lived, that the honorable Chifeng-zun would not hide the death of one of his captains from his most trusted friend; he would not want Lan Xichen to trust unwisely.
(He thinks: Had he taken Lan Xichen to a private room, like this, shame and concern prevailing even if a sense of delicacy was utterly lacking? Jin Guangyao feels a sick stab of vertigo, as he had in the banquet hall—being the one that was whispered to, rather than the man being whispered about. It is a clear sign of power, of how far he has come, but it tastes bitter and strange in his mouth.)
Meng Yao had confessed to murder, that night. Painting it in as favorable a light as he could, but never obscuring the truth completely. He had wept tears that were genuine in fear and pain and a desperate sense of loss, knowing that Lan Xichen's image of him might irrevocably change, and passed them off as tears of guilt and regret. He had knelt by Lan Xichen's bedside—he was still too weak to rise, half the day—and told him that he didn't ask for forgiveness, that he only wanted a chance to make up for what he had done.
He sees all these things pass behind Lan Xichen's eyes, like faint reflections in a mirror. He doesn't think Zewu-jun will make himself a hypocrite, but he sees and understands the struggle within him. All men liked to think themselves fair and objective, until a blade struck close to their own heart.
"No," he says at last. "But although I might be judging him too harshly, Su She does not seem to be seeking to repay the wrong he committed. To take the education he received from our sect and form his own, without our acknowledgement or blessing—he does not show loyalty or gratitude."
To the sect who cast him out? Jin Guangyao thinks, and thinks with a curdling impulse to laugh, Ah, he's wiser than me, then—but he is wise himself, now; he has long put aside the foolish dreams he'd had in the Nightless City, long shut away the aching part of himself that misses Chifeng-zun's trust. Inwardly, if not outwardly, he has cut all ties with the Nie.
"I see," he says again, and then, lightly, because it is too dangerous not to say lightly, "but er-ge, I have not sunk into obscurity to do penance. Do you judge me for it?"
Lan Xichen smiles, but his eyes are very earnest. "You are kind, A-Yao," he says. "You have a sympathetic and thoughtful nature, and that is worthy of respect. If you want to give him a chance to prove himself, I cannot—and will not—stop you, but don't compare yourself to him. He's not like you."
Jin Guangyao smiles as if he's been given a compliment, and re-orders certain things inside his mind.
The second time Jin Guangyao invites Su Minshan to Koi Tower, the invitation is for him alone.
The meeting is positioned within a sequence of other meetings with leaders of small sects, men that Jin Guangyao has persuaded his father might be useful; men that, he helpfully points out, are easier to win over than the great sects and who wield some amount of power despite their smaller territory. Men who might grow to be ever more useful over time.
Jin Guangyao looks forward to this meeting, however, in a way he does not to the others. He is certain, by now, that Su Minshan will be valuable in one way or another; he is equally certain that he wants to speak to the young man again.
On the day he comes, Jin Guangyao takes him through one of the smaller gardens on the way to the room where they'll sit, citing the beauty of the day as an excuse to linger on the walk. Su Minshan is shy with a mixture of what Jin Guangyao now recognizes as shame, and what seems to be an inherent lack of social grace, and it is easier to coax answers from him when they both have something else to look at, the soft breezes and delicate colors of the garden keeping the mood relaxed.
He learns that Su Minshan has no living family except a younger sister, and the dead he names first is his elder sister; his parents died early, a uncle participated somewhat in the care and feeding of himself and his siblings, but neither seemed to elicit particular warmth or loss. He learns that Su Minshan's spiritual instrument is the guqin, and learns that Su Minshan is likely a cutsleeve—something already guessed, but now nearly confirmed—when Jin Guangyao comments that he hopes to hear him play sometime, and Su Minshan flushes dark with awkward pleasure.
When they are nearly to the place where they'll sit and discuss the future of the Moling Su sect, Jin Guangyao cups a bloom in his hand and asks, not looking at Su Minshan and with his voice full of gentle curiosity, "May I ask what your position was, in the Lan sect?"
Profound silence, like something fallen to the floor. Jin Guangyao doesn't let it linger, doesn't give Su Minshan more time to look wildly for how his words were barbed. He adds, still in that same easy tone, "When I was with the Nie sect, I worked as Nie-zongzhu's viceroy and assistant." He releases the flower, turns to Su Minshan with a small rueful smile. "My time with the Nie sect ended rather poorly, but I still value the skills I learned there. Many of them aid me now."
He watches the slow shock in Su Minshan's eyes, the fervent gleam of hope that nearly burns through his caution when Jin Guangyao's words take hold. Already halfway fond, he thinks; he'll have to tell the man soon how plainly his emotions are written on his face, advise them on how to hide them better. For now, he enjoys watching them, and keeps his own smile gentle and warm.
After a too-long pause, Su Minshan says, "I was only an outer disciple, but I worked in the library. Before I left, I'd even reached the point of fetching and cataloging books for Lan-zongzhu, and occasionally assisted his uncle."
Jin Guangyao made a softly impressed noise. "You must have a good memory."
"Not as good as Lianfang-zun's." Su Minshan pauses, thinking; he looks at Jin Guangyao searchingly. "But yes."
Jin Guangyao does not ask him about what he remembers, about how many techniques of the Gusu Lan he had walked away with, about how many they knew of and how many they hadn't assumed he knew.
He laughs, bright and only a little affected, and says, "I was already so impressed with your sword work, and the founding of your own sect—I shouldn't be surprised that Su-gongzi is talented in other ways."
It's almost cruel; the poor young man had just lost the last of his blush from earlier. Jin Guangyao is discovering, and is slightly concerned by the discovery, that he likes to see him blush. He turns away and says, keeping a slight laugh still in his voice, "I shouldn't be keeping you out here so long. We have business to discuss, don't we?"
Su Minshan swallows—it is audible, if only faintly—and says, "I don't mind it." His voice is slightly rough. "The garden is beautiful. I've never seen flowers like these in Moling."
Jin Guangyao tucks that away at the back of his mind—in time, he thinks; when their alliance is better established, when Jin Guangyao can be sure Moling Su has ground and ability to support a garden, he will send Su Minshan seeds and cuttings. He holds his sleeve for a moment alongside a blossom, nothing the similarities in cream and gold, and turns back to Su Minshan. "The lands of the Nie Sect are far more barren, and before that I came from the Yunmeng area... I'm still growing used to them as well."
Another extended hand, an affirmation, a reassurance. Su Minshan looks like he doesn't know what to do with it; like it's struggling inside his chest. After a moment, he says, "Jin-gongzi—Lianfang-zun..."
"Yes?"
He wet his lips. "Who told you?"
"That you came from the Gusu Lan? You're confident that I couldn't have learned it without being informed?"
He shakes his head. "The Gusu Lan," he says, words clearly heavy and bitter on his tongue, "don't like news of their failures spreading."
Jin Guangyao hums thoughtfully. "I think the Gusu Lan," he says, "have suffered a loss they aren't even aware of."
Su Minshan looks at him in that way again—baffled, hungry for something he doesn't know how to accept. "Lianfang-zun, whoever told you... do you know..." He hesitates.
Jin Guangyao thinks of stepping closer, of telling Su Minshan exactly what he knows, of saying, I know what it is to finally defend your own life and be despised for it; because nobody but yourself will see your life as worth defending. He thinks, briefly and idly, with the bright heat of a thought that he'll immediately cosign to forgetfulness, of taking his hands. He considers with his lashes lowered, and when he opens his eyes he allows the smile to ebb from his face. Lets Su Minshan see him serious, but not cold.
"Su-gongzi," he says, "there is no need to explain yourself to me."
Su Minshan lets out a small sudden breath, like a man stabbed in the gut.
"Shouldn't we be judged by the places we've reached, and where we stand now, rather than where we've been?" Jin Guangyao says. "And we've both come far, haven't we?"
It's like watching a man, after testing a stepping stone in a river, leaning little by little more of his weight upon it, finally come to trust it as a support. Su Minshan's shoulders relax a little; crooked and slow, he smiles.
"Lianfang-zun is correct," he says. And then, in an almost boyish rush, "I have long since—admired what I heard of you, but I could not have imagined..." He stops himself. In a more measured voice, he says, "We have business to discuss. But I have enjoyed this conversation."
He looks anxiously at Jin Guangyao, clearly worried that he has been either too subtle or too bold; Jin Guangyao will miss this transparency if he loses it. It's a bad quality, but almost hopelessly endearing. It half reminds Jin Guangyao of Meng Yao, before the Nie sect had taught him to hide his fear; before Nightless City had taught him how to hide anything behind a smile.
"I look forward to discussing the potential of your sect, but I can't imagine that it will be anything less than impressive," he says. "We will have many occasions to talk again, I'm sure."
Hint at Su Minshan's possible knowledge of the Lan, he's thinking at the back of his head; his father will like that, and easily loosen his purse strings to support the Moling Su. If Lan Xichen sees too much familiarity, or thinks he does, merely challenge him with his own words—isn't it up to me, to give him a chance?—and he should back off, too gentle to judge Jin Guangyao harshly. He pauses, reminds himself that he is still shifting weight onto his own stepping-stone; trust is not something given in two conversations. But he allows himself to keep planning, in one corner of his mind. Hope and excitement are both such rare things that he can't resist indulging just a little.
At the edge of the garden, Jin Guangyao says, "Su-gongzi, I hope you haven't minded me saying that we're somewhat alike."
He's playfully bashful in tone, dimples at the corners of his smile; this is another thing that is too serious to be said anything but lightly. Su Minshan's eyes dart to his mouth, but then wrench away to meet his eyes; Jin Guangyao's smile can't help but turn softer at the determined show of restraint.
"I am honored by the comparison," Su Minshan says; stiffly, but his painfully honest face is full of sincerity.
Trust isn't given in two conversations; Jin Guangyao reminds himself of this again. But the stone feels steady beneath his feet. He opens the garden door, and steps back to allow Su Minshan through.