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The Cloud Recesses, as its name implies, rests high on the side of a mountain, remote at best and for at least one of its occupants, downright isolated. News filters through slowly to the lonely house among the gentians, but it does filter through, eventually. Sheng Lin learns of Wei Wuxian's presence in Cloud Recesses quite by accident, the way she learns most things: through listening to the conversation of the disciples who, three times a day, come to bring her meal and take away the empty dishes from the last one. Perhaps it's that the duty is most often left to junior disciples, barely in their teens, but it's never ceased to amuse her how much gossip there is in a clan that's known to the rest of the world for the lack of it.
They don't know she can hear them, of course. It's a secret she'll take to her grave, because losing these few pieces of the outside world that still reach her is not something she's prepared to face.
So, Wei Wuxian. Son of Cangse Sanren. The junior disciples speak of him in tones that seem to veer between disdain and reluctant awe. Sheng Lin considers the things she remembers and the stories she's heard, and thinks that if he's anything like his mother, she can well understand both. And if he's here for the guest lectures, that must mean he's about Wangji's age — just the right age for a boy raised in freedom and indulgence to be sure that he knows better than all the adults around him, that rules are made for other people.
It makes her laugh aloud to imagine how he must infuriate poor Wangji. She expects she'll be hearing about it when her son next visits her — probably at length, in the clipped, tight tones he adopts when he's frustrated almost beyond his ability to control his demeanour. She looks forward to it, and to soothing the tension from him with duets and gentle conversation, the way only she and Xichen have ever been able to manage.
She had not given any thought to the possibility that she might meet Wei Wuxian herself.
The sounds that fill the air around her home never change much, and Sheng Lin is familiar with every one. The crunch of footsteps along the gravel path, at a time that is not a mealtime and on a day neither of her sons are scheduled to visit, startles her out of her meditation. For a moment, she's torn between indulging her immediate curiosity or hiding; while the younger clan members never speak of her with fear or derision, at least not where she can hear, she's well aware that until the last of the current clan elders have died, she has no hope of feeling truly safe in the Cloud Recesses. But before she can make a decision, a voice calls out, and she realizes it's just a boy.
"Hello? Is anyone here?"
Curiosity wins, a trait she's never quite been able to stamp out with all her years of solitude and meditation. Not, she supposes, that she's tried particularly hard. She goes to the door and opens it, and finds herself face to face with a teenager in guest disciples' robes, gazing up at her with surprise in his wide grey eyes.
"Hello," she says, and the sound of her own voice surprises her in return. It's been so long since she's spoken to anyone but Wangji and Xichen; there's an irrational instant where she half expects Lan Qiren to jump out of the bushes and start shouting accusations at her, just for this one simple greeting. But of course he isn't here — no one is here but herself and the boy.
His smile is wide and infectious; she finds herself smiling back without quite knowing why either of them are doing so. “I knew a place like this must have someone living in it! I'm guessing I probably shouldn't be here, huh? I was exploring and I saw the path, and I just had to know, you know?" Belatedly, he seems to remember himself and bows. His form is perfect, but she can tell he's just going through the motions, eager to get back to talking. "I'm Wei Ying, courtesy name Wuxian."
Of course. Sheng Lin can't hold back her laughter; it rings through the clearing, loud and bright and unfamiliar to her own ears. "Your reputation precedes you, A-Ying," she says gently, still chuckling. She's not entirely sure at first what possesses her to use such a familiar address, but watching his face — the way it slackens briefly in surprise before the smile returns, just as bright but a little wobbly around the edges — she understands. Cangse Sanren is long since dead, and from what she knows of Yu Ziyuan, it's been a long time since anyone's mother called him anything so fond. "I'm Sheng Lin,” she adds, returning his perfunctory bow with a shallow one of her own. "I knew your mother."
He swallows, and she can see how much work it suddenly is to keep the smile on his face. "Can I... I mean, do you think you'd..."
Something soft and tender blooms to life in her heart, a third flower in a garden she'd thought only large enough for two, and she steps aside in the doorway to let him in. The trouble they'll both be in if they're discovered is immense, but Sheng Lin is used to living in fear, and this boy needs something that she can provide. Perhaps something that only she can provide.
They talk for hours, that first afternoon, until she has to shoo him out of the house and back down the path for fear that he'll linger long enough to encounter the disciples who bring her dinner. If any suspicion is raised, she explains, they will not be able to risk meeting again — for the crime of seeing her face, he would be ejected from the Cloud Recesses.
The look in his eyes at that makes her smile behind her sleeve as she drinks the last of her tea. They've spoken enough about Wangji that she thinks she knows why the thought of being expelled frightens him, and it has nothing to do with the trouble he'd be in.
Her suspicions are confirmed some time later, when she next sees her younger son. It's three days before he’s supposed to come to visit her; he's breaking a rule, being here now, but she knows from Wei Wuxian — A-Ying — that it isn't the first one he's broken, of late, so she's not as surprised as she would have been before. She sees him into her home, then pulls him into a hug, leaning up to kiss his forehead just over the warm metal of the emblem on his ribbon and wondering at how tall he's grown. "Wangji," she says, soft and warm. The tension he's carrying eases slightly, and she smiles. "Tell me what's on your mind."
It all comes spilling out in a torrent of words more rapid and numerous than she's ever heard from him at one time. He tells her about the arrival of the guest disciples, the frustration and confusion he's felt around Wei Ying, the frivolous escapades he can't seem to stop getting drawn into. Then he tells her about the cave under the Cold Pond, the spirit of Lan Yi, and the Yin Iron. She remains silent through it all, listening, though something in her thrills at how easily he confesses everything, knowing he doesn't have to beg or even ask her to keep his secrets. He's leaving tonight, he says, to go seek the other pieces of the Yin Iron, to keep them out of the hands of those who would use them in the way their creator had. This is why he's visited early — he doesn't know when he’ll be able to come again.
She watches his face for a long, quiet moment after he finally finishes speaking. "There's something else," she says at last, reaching out to take his hands. "Wangji, what aren't you telling me?"
His shoulders slump, and she knows immediately that this is the thing that's causing him the most distress, that's needling at his heart like a thistle, working its way deeper with every breath. "In the cave," he begins, halting and uncertain in a way he hasn't been thus far, "Wei Ying was being targeted by the Chord Assassination Technique. He did not have a ribbon. It recognized that he was not a Lan."
She realizes what he's going to say seconds before he says it, and her heart does a great, swooping leap in her chest. Perhaps she ought not to get so invested in her son’s affairs, but she's heard the way Wei Ying talks about Wangji, and now she's heard the same from him as he speaks of Wei Ying. The way Wangji says his name, the way he cradles the syllables in his voice like he's holding some small, precious, delicate thing. It is all she's ever wanted for her sons: to find whatever sets their hearts alight, and go after it until it is theirs. She's grateful Wangji isn't looking at her, unsure of her ability to keep her emotions off her face as he admits what she’s already guessed.
"I tied my ribbon to his wrist." He swallows, looking miserable. Guilty, as if he has anything to be guilty for, as if this one thing makes him no better than his father. “I— a-niang, I didn't even ask him."
He looks so small and young, then, that she can't help but reach up to frame his face with her hands, stroking her thumbs across his cheeks slowly, soothingly. "Oh, my A-Zhan,” she murmurs. There's a million things she could say, advice she could give, but she knows the one thing he needs to hear from her right now — the one thing he will only believe from her, and no other. "It will be all right, my love."
Wangji leaves an hour later, and she watches him go, seeing the balance and calm restored in the way he holds his body, the way he moves. She's so proud of him, her brave son. "Come back home," she whispers to his retreating back. "Come back safe."
He does, but not until the Cloud Recesses has already burned.
*****
After that, the world seems to lose its sense and reason, and all Sheng Lin can do is watch from the window of her quiet little house as war marches steadily nearer. Xichen, who has been sect leader in all but name for some time now, officially takes up the mantle, but still visits her faithfully each month; Wangji, seeming to care less and less for the letter of the rules with each fresh piece of news that reaches them, comes every few days now, if only for a moment or two. She watches his carefully blank face, the tightness around his eyes and lips, as he tells her that Lotus Pier has burned and no one has yet found its young master, his sister, or his shixiong; she holds him close, weeks later, when he whispers in a trembling voice that Wei Ying has been taken by the Wens. That they're saying — here, he falters, and she aches for him, for both of them, all of them, boys forced to become men too soon — that they're saying they threw him into the Burial Mounds.
She should have known then. If anyone could survive that place, could bend it to their own will instead of letting it break them, it would be Wei Ying. She'd seen something of it in his eyes the first time they'd met, the steel under the playful smiles: no one but Wei Ying himself would decide the manner of his death.
*****
Still, somehow, she hadn't envisioned this. Hadn't foreseen kneeling in the Cold Pond Cave next to her bloody, broken son as he struggles for each breath, feeling the hollowness of his heart beating in her own chest. She's not supposed to be here, but she's done with conceding to the whims of the elders, after what they've done to Wangji. Just for loving Wei Ying to the end. Just for doing what he knows to be right, because it goes against their damned principles. She will not let him suffer alone, now of all times.
And for sixteen years, she doesn't.
Xichen, diplomat that he is, doesn't bat an eye when she tells him in no uncertain terms that she'll be allowed free access to Wangji and the boy — Sizhui — that he'd rescued from that cursed place, or she'll leave the Cloud Recesses and take the both of them with her. He only smiles and inclines his head slightly, and promises to make sure Lan Qiren and the other elders don't interfere. And then, softer, in the voice that belongs not to Sect Leader Lan but to her son, her A-Huan, "Please take good care of him, a-niang. I think he's angry with me for allowing this to happen." His smile fades a little. "I can't blame him."
Slowly, so slowly, as the years go by, Wangji begins to heal. Sizhui helps — the first time she sees Wangji smile again after Wei Ying's death is when he takes Sizhui to see the bunnies, sitting him down and piling the small, soft creatures onto him one after another as he giggles and tries his best to stay still as instructed. It's a balm to the rawness of her soul, watching them, and for the first time in a long time she dares to hope. And with patience, with time, her hope is rewarded with more of those quiet smiles and with, a little at a time, the easing of Wangji's grief. The sense that, while the burden won't ever be any lighter, it's becoming easier to bear.
It's Sizhui who brings her the news that changes everything. He comes and goes freely from the gentian house, knowing not to speak of it to the elders but also confident that no one will stop him, and a surprise visit is not unusual, but the bewildered look on his face as he steps in and bows to her tells her that something here is.
"Nainai," he begins, sinking gracefully down to sit across from her at the low table where she's drinking her tea. "I'm not sure what's going on, but... Hanguang-jun has brought a stranger back to his home."
She blinks, thinking of her son and the careful distance he keeps between himself and nearly everyone else in the world. "A stranger?"
Sizhui nods, and as she pours him tea, he relates the story — the night hunt at the Mo mansion, the odd man in the mask who had seemed to be trying to help and hinder them at the same time, the dancing fairy statue. She listens carefully, turning it all over in her head, trying to fit pieces together as he speaks. It makes little sense, but her heart is beating faster anyway, a strange, nonsensical hope beginning to take hold of her.
"And then," Sizhui says with a frown, "Mo-qianbei carved a flute from a piece of bamboo and summoned the Ghost General with it."
Sheng Lin’s breath catches in her throat, and her heart leaps as if it's trying to burst from her chest. The Ghost General. The right hand of Wei Wuxian. Somehow, against all odds, A-Ying has returned to them. To Wangji.
"It was the strangest thing, though," Sizhui murmurs, a faraway look in his eyes as though he's seeing the scene again in his mind. "Hanguang-jun grabbed his wrist, as if... as if he was afraid Mo-qianbei might flee. As if he couldn't bear to let him go. And once the Ghost General had disappeared, Mo-qianbei took Hanguang-jun's hand as well, as if he felt the same."
Sheng Lin can picture it so clearly in her mind that she can't help but laugh, the sound bubbling up and out of her without her permission. It's only when Sizhui starts and reaches for her in concern that she realizes she's crying, too, tears spilling down her cheeks and soaking into her robes. "Nainai," he says anxiously, "are you all right? Are you ill?"
"No, dear one, I'm fine," she tells him, reaching out to touch his cheek fondly. "This is a good thing. I expect you'll understand why soon enough."
*****
She doesn't dare go to Wangji, doesn't want to take a second of this time away from him — it's so much more than either of them ever thought he might have, and she's blissfully happy just like this, knowing that in another little house in the Cloud Recesses, a man who's mourned his lost love for sixteen years in stoic silence has, in some beautiful twist of fate, been given another chance.
Wangji comes to her, though, the following day, and neither of them say a word for a long time — the moment the door is closed behind him, her son crosses the room in two quick strides and sweeps her up into a hug, which she returns gladly, her soul thrilling at the feeling of his arms tight around her and the life she hasn’t seen in him for sixteen years.
"Sizhui tells me," he says dryly some time later as they're sitting down to have tea, "that he had a very confusing conversation with you yesterday."
She laughs, unable to keep her joy in now that it's been unleashed. "I think I frightened him," she admits. "Oh, Wangji. I'm so glad for you. Is he well?"
Wangji nods, and the tenderness in every line of his expression makes her feel a little like she's intruding on a private moment, even though Wei Ying isn't actually present. "No one must know," he says, though it's obvious enough that it doesn't really need to be said. "Not yet. There is more to this than even he and I are aware of yet." And then he smiles, sudden and radiant. "But someday."
"Someday," she agrees. When whatever mystery has been brought to light with Wei Ying's return is solved and put to rest. Sheng Lin allows herself to think of her son in wedding red and smiles too, a small and private thing. Someday.
*****
In the end, it's not the triumphant finale she'd pictured. She's spent so much time caring for Wangji's heartbreak that it hadn't occurred to her to expect Xichen's. For a while, she ignores the rules of seclusion to go to him just as she had for Wangji, and Lan Qiren, just as he had then, pretends not to notice, and she thinks of so little else that the realization that Wei Ying had not returned to the Cloud Recesses with Wangji only hits her in the middle of the night one night, several weeks past the day it had happened.
No wonder Wangji has been so quiet, of late. She grits her teeth and reminds herself that she's far too old to be stamping her foot like a child. What is he thinking?
She asks him just that, point blank, the next time he comes to see her. He smiles as if he'd expected it — as if he'd expected it sooner, really, which is fair — and shakes his head.
"Xiongzhang needs me," he says in his calm, certain way, "and Wei Ying needs his freedom. The world has been telling him where he can and cannot go for too long."
Sheng Lin regards him with an odd mix of pride and agitation swelling in her chest. Oh, Wangji. Her dear son. Her dear, brave, kind, steadfast, impossibly dense son. "And how long has it been," she asks evenly, "since anyone told him where he is wanted?"
Wangji stares at her, and she can see his mind working as it always does, methodical and sure, holding her words up against what he knows to be true. She waits as he sifts through his memories, as he recalls the no doubt countless times each day that he’s confessed his love with gestures and looks and perhaps even touch, but never — if she knows him at all — never with plain and simple words. She can see the moment it clicks, the minute widening of his eyes, and she refrains by great force of will from any appearance of satisfaction when he stands hurriedly.
"I have to go." His bow is quick and perfunctory, and only when she's sure he's out of earshot does she let her laughter peal out through the house and out of the open windows. Dear, sweet Wangji.
"I expect," she murmurs to no one at all, "that it won't be long before we are planning a wedding."
*****
To her delight, she'd been right, those many months ago. Wangji looks glorious in red. And she never has to wait long for news of the outside world to come to the gentian house, these days. News, and laughter, and soon enough — if the tender, wistful way A-Ying looks at Sizhui is any clue — the chatter of little voices.
She's going to have to get more teacups.