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There was something seriously, seriously wrong with his friend.
What other reason could there be for this drastic change in character? Never before had Chongyun given another person the time of day when it came to romance and other such ambitions, but recently he seemed to go out of his way to seek it out. It wasn’t too noticeable at first, just stray glances towards any attractive young women they may pass by. It evolved into charming smiles and casual, yet earnest flirts towards anyone who’d listen. And oh, how people loved to listen.
Xingqiu had the terrible misfortune of witnessing everyone else see how Chongyun had grown into a fine young man. Of course he very much appreciated the new view, and adored the way his voice deepened. He was much firmer, much more sure of himself than he had been in the past. Not only this, but also the smiles he finally allowed himself to wear in public were one of many blessings that adulthood had graced Chongyun with.
It wasn’t that he was displeased with what his friend had grown up to look like, if anything he was relieved to see him finally grow into his claymore.
No, there was no discontent towards his friends appearance at all. His annoyance was due to genuine concern for both of their well being.
While Xingqiu may be worried about Chongyun’s odd new behaviour, this simple worry was vastly outweighed by the urge to strangle Chongyun whenever he mentioned yet another lady’s name without prompting. It had been fine the first few times, but if he had to hear another word he was afraid he would, in a best case scenario, fall to his knees and scream into his elbow out of frustration.
-
It was the beginning of winter when Chongyun had finally settled for a girl. It was the beginning of winter when Xingqiu had to come to accept that maybe there had been nothing wrong with his friend after all.
She had light hair and bright eyes, and her clothes were simple yet elegant. She smiled and laughed easily, her own positive energy seemingly only being overshadowed by Chongyun’s. They seemed to shine next to each other, both so light, both with such an abundance of brightness in their hearts.
Xingqiu found it easy to approve of her when Chongyun asked him for his opinion. Well spoken and well mannered with an undeniable love for Liyue and loyalty to her name. A phenomenal choice, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to bother remembering her name. Her talk of glaze lilies and horsetails, of silks and cottons bored him to no ends, and he wondered not just once how his dearest friend found enough kindness in his heart to care.
Still, Chongyun seemed happy, and he seemed devoted.
And he finally, finally shut up.
-
Just as the season Chongyun had first loved her in, she was like winter.
Despite being as sweet as valberries and sunsettias, Xingqiu couldn’t help but feel as though there was a certain type of distance that she forced between them. Like a wall of ice on a frozen lake. With a fierceness of the biting winds and towers of snow on dragonspine, she claimed Chongyun and his time for herself only.
During these days Xingqiu would hear much about botany and needlework. He cared little for these topics, but he still listened intently to everything his friend said. How could he not, when every word was laced with such warmth and fondness?
Her smiles and her hands and how small she was, these were the things Chongyun would mention most often. He enjoyed holding her, enjoyed how she felt like flower petals and crystalfly wings. He enjoyed her voice, enjoyed listening to it. He was infatuated with her in every sense of the word, and he wanted to be someone she could learn to love.
Chongyun dressed nicely for her. He swapped out his traditional exorcist’s wear for silk in different shades of yellow so that he could complement her many shades of pink. More often than not he’d also have a silk flower in his hair, a gift from her. If him and Xingqiu met after a long day, he would smile at him and brush his bangs behind his ear, tucking the flower into Xingqiu’s hair instead.
“These have always suited you better,” he once whispered.
“How so? Because my family name depends on them?” Xingqiu asked, light and teasing.
Chongyun grinned, hand still resting on Xingqiu’s cheek. “When it comes to nature, none would fit you better than violetgrass. Silk flowers simply match your beauty.”
Xingqiu laughed and pulled Chongyun into a hug, inhaling the sweet scent of peach perfume that she had left on him so that he could forget the way his breath had left him.
-
About a month after Chongyun shut up, he started all over again.
“You should be a bit more classy, A-Yun. If you wanted to flirt around, you shouldn’t have gotten a girlfriend,” Xingqiu said.
Just like any other day in the past week, they spent it in Xingqiu’s bedroom. Xingqiu would lay in bed, idly manipulating the water in his cup and letting it spin around as he read. He wished to go outside, but he quickly discarded that thought each time Chongyun opened a window.
Usually his friend would lay next to him and Xingqiu would read to him until his breathing evened out. Despite the many denials about how tired he truly was, the deep bags under his eyes gave everything away.
In his youth Chongyun had more time to care for himself. He had been just as hard working, determination having been something he had inherited rather than something he had been taught. Still, there had been more freedom in their pockets, and more instances during which they could spend it. Each year that passed they spent more and more of their freedom as though it were mora, until one day they finally received the burdens of their fathers in return.
Xingqiu remembered the day Chongyun left. There had been a certain type of sorrow that clouded his thoughts, but all this was overshadowed by the immense pride he felt each time word came back of his successes.
In this time he himself had grown to not only assist his brother in their family’s trade, but also officially take on the title as the heir of the Guhua Clan. Thankfully, being the second heir meant his freedom stretched wider than the Guili Plains, and so he could spend a good amount of his days indulging in his own pleasures.
When rumours of a certain exorcist’s return spread across Liyue Harbour he could barely contain the giddiness in his heart. He was sure he’d grown into a man that his dearest friend would be proud of, and if the stories were to be believed, the same could be said for the other.
Chongyun had come home looking like a daydream, so much taller and broader than he remembered, and still so completely, utterly Chongyun. Xingqiu remembered how he’d pulled him closer as though he was afraid of losing him again, how he himself had been hugged so, so tightly as if he had been the one to leave.
Xingqiu also vividly remembered how, after having invited Chongyun to his home like he always had so many years ago, Chongyun had shut off the second his body hit Xingqiu’s mattress.
He’d tricked him into letting himself rest by arranging situations like this ever since.
On a normal day, Chongyun would sleep, and Xingqiu would give himself a minute to let his gaze drift across his face. He wished he had the right to lean down, to inch just a bit closer so he could count those light eyelashes, or rediscover every cut that had faded from their teen years, or brush his bangs away so he could leave the smallest kiss on his forehead. On a normal day, Xingqiu would indulge himself in his dreams. On a normal day, he would wish away his fatigue.
Today was not a normal day.
Today Chongyun stared up at the ceiling blankly and mentioned about a hundred names Xingqiu couldn’t find it in himself to care about.
“Oh,” his dear friend had said, not even having the tact to look guilty, “didn’t I tell you we broke up?”
-
He met the second girl Chongyun had chosen when winter had ended.
She too had light hair, but unlike the first, it was a cold, scathing sort of light. Her eyes were dark and haunting, they made Xingqiu want to puff out his chest and prove that he wasn’t bothered by how terribly judged he felt by her stare. Next to each other they both seemed unapproachable, his friend’s cryo vision seemingly resonating with her frosty disposition, amplifying it tenfold.
She came from another exorcist clan, Chongyun had explained, a sort of barely suppressed excitement in his voice. In Xingqiu’s mind this explained things, because why else would he pursue someone like her?
If someone had to ask him, he’d say Chongyun was the epitome of warmth. The way he carried himself may seem cold and distant at first, but one simply had to strike up a conversation with him to see the way his eyes glinted and his mouth curled upwards naturally. This was not to say that the partner he had chosen wasn’t kind, but Xingqiu could never quite find a reason to actively attempt to thaw someone’s heart as to be worthy of their love.
Chongyun however claimed that she was warm. Warm and kind and sweet.
Xingqiu couldn’t help but disagree.
-
In a way she was like spring.
In many, so many more ways she wasn’t.
She was, however, a new beginning. Refreshing and welcoming and generous, at least according to Chongyun.
During these days Chongyun spoke on and on about his exorcisms and evil spirits and her. Xingqiu enjoyed this time, he’d always adored the many stories his friend would tell him. He’d tell him that he loved the chills that gripped him in haunted areas, loved the way it felt to craft each talisman to be stronger than the last, loved the way she loved the things he loved.
She was clever, and ambitious, and so, so perfect.
Xingqiu felt relief in the fact that Chongyun had finally found someone to match his spirit.
-
Summer came, spring bid its goodbyes, and Chongyun smiled at him all the same.
He’d accompanied him to a haunted location he’d been hearing rumours of. The thought of setting up another elaborate trap that would result in him treating Chongyun to a nice, cold dinner consisting mostly of desserts, had briefly crossed his mind. He remembered when he could barely hold himself back from causing these little misfortunes. There’d always been a bit of guilt each time Chongyun had returned, dragging his feet, but the night they spent together afterwards was quick to remove both of their negative feelings. Back then Xingqiu had assumed he simply enjoyed Chongyun’s mood swings, but he knew better now.
There had been one night after another one of Chongyun’s failed exorcisms attempts during which they both decided that it was warm enough to sleep outside. They stuffed their bags with cold snacks and thin blankets, and snuck out of Xingqiu’s window when everyone had gone to bed.
Xingqiu, despite initially proposing the idea, complained about the cold as they made their way up one of the many hills and mountains surrounding Liyue Harbour. Chongyun had laughed freely, the cool breeze being enough to quell the smaller bursts of his congenital positivity at this hour.
They’d lain together, sharing the food and the blankets they had brought, gazing at the stars which held no meaning to them.
Chongyun had quietly proclaimed that one day he would finally best his condition and become the greatest exorcist in not just Liyue, but all of Teyvat. It was barely a whisper, and yet it was. It felt as though simply saying it for the wind to hear was enough, as though this was his way of forming a contract with the world.
Xingqiu had admitted that, despite his many dreams, he felt content with the life he had right now. Of course his freedom would be restricted by his family name in the near future, however as long as he could keep that which he held dear he couldn’t complain.
It was then that Chongyun had looked at him with such pure earnesty that he was already used to seeing in his eyes. His mouth had curled up in that easy smile that he only allowed himself to wear when they were alone together.
It was then, when Chongyun had promised him that he could always keep him, when he formed yet another contract that night, this time between them both, that Xingqiu realised just why he sought out his friend’s presence so often. Today Chongyun smiled differently. Today he grinned, holding his hands to his cheeks to cool himself down.
It may have been years since Chongyun had properly exorcised his first spirit successfully, and yet he still could barely keep himself from blacking out when he got too excited.
On days like this Xingqiu would ignore the tremors still wracking his body, knowing the leftover negative energy would soon be cleansed by his friend’s presence alone. On days like this he quietly wondered if, in a world where congenital positivity was something one would only hear of in fiction, Chongyun would still be enough to banish the evil that still desperately held onto him after leaving a place like this. On days like this Xingqiu congratulated Chongyun and practically demanded that they should celebrate at a nearby inn.
“It’s good..” Xingqiu slurred after an unhealthy amount of drinks, “It’s good.. She’s good. It’s good that you’re with her... She’s good for you… Being like.. Being an exorcist like you.. Or whatever...”
He wished to formally give Chongyun his blessing. This was finally what Chongyun truly wanted. Their dreams were, after all, not that different. To pursue whichever aspirations you may have and to be able to share these with those you love.
Chongyun blinked at him, sipping at his iced water. Despite having learned to handle his positivity he was still as careful as ever.
“Who?”
“Your.. The girl, that woman you’ve been seeing”
Chongyun blinked again before blushing brightly, this time seeming almost ashamed of himself. “Ah. We ended it. Didn’t have the same ambitions.”
It took a few seconds before Chongyun’s words processed in his mind. He was about to ask about a hundred questions as to what the hell that meant, but the inn was almost too comfortable, especially when his friend let him lean his head on his shoulder and oh.. Oh wasn’t it late already anyway?
-
It was when the summer heat had reached its peak that Chongyun had taken to another woman.
Dark hair, long and shining like the finest silks his family traded in, and dark eyes that still found a way to outshine all others. Her skin was pale and unmarked, and her hands soft as though she had never known a day of work in her life. Still her entire being seemed to awaken at the prospect of adventure.
Carpenting, that’s what her family dealt in. Despite having never worked on any larger projects herself, her hands were small and swift, and her eyes were quick to spot each and every minor detail. More than once would she pleasantly surprise Xingqiu with her perceptiveness.
She had gifted him a wooden crane once.
“I’d like for my work to be spectacular,” she had told him, “Though for it to be worth something to someone, I need to know what exactly they love. Too bad people never really say what they mean.”
-
In every sense of the word, she was just like summer.
So lively, so wild, so loving. Her laughter was like windchimes, her freedom like the clouds. She made you want to drop everything and, as though you were a kid, believe that all things were achievable. Xingqiu felt she was blinding, but did people not build ships to chase after the sun?
Chongyun seemed to light up when she was around. Despite the many guests at the gathering that had been arranged for her birthday, he still let himself laugh unabashedly.
He’d started to let himself smile easily years ago, but to hear him laugh so much so often was new to even Xingqiu.
When they were younger Chongyun’s smiles were rare. It wasn’t that he wasn’t kind enough, it was simply because he had yet to gain full control over his condition. Back then he had still believed that his excessive yang was something to rid himself of, rather than something he simply had to embrace and overcome.
He remembered seeing the corners of Chongyun’s lips twitch as he tried to hold himself back.
His face had always been cold, but his eyes were another story. Even now they would still glimmer with excitement, or determination, or amusement. He’d always been an open book, but perhaps that was because he had no qualms about being read.
Xingqiu averted his eyes politely when Chongyun pulled his lover closer, complete and utter awe in his eyes. He mentally patted himself on the back when he excused himself, making up a lie about how he would love to stay, but he unfortunately had so much paperwork to sort through, and he should really get to it. The both of them had asked him to stay a while longer, but he’d grown up knowing when his presence became obtruding.
It took a lot more effort than expected not to look back, knowing his friend would soon be led away to a more private place. He wondered briefly how Chongyun would hold her waist when he kissed her, if his condition would take him over and he’d show her a type of passion he usually held hidden within him. If he would tell her he loved her when they became one.
-
Despite the many expectations that had been laid on him at birth, and the way those expectations had only piled up as he aged, his family had never been cruel to him. No, unlike what people may whisper of how the rich ruled their children with an iron fist and a chain to match, Xingqiu had never experienced that sort of lifestyle.
He had always known to separate his duty from his pleasures, however other than the usual obligations there was nothing holding him back from how he wished to express himself. The many books, the martial arts classes, the many times he would return from an outing having dirtied yet another silk blouse, his family would smile at him all the same. As long as he was sure to take the time to care for the parts of the business that had been handed to him there were never any complaints.
Though his mother did make quite the fuss when he had returned from an adventure with more than half of his hair chopped off. He’d worn it short ever since.
Freedom had been promised to him ever since he knew the concept of it. It was this same freedom that made him decide to abandon his duties for the day and hike up to the peak of one of the nearby mountains to clear his head.
The day had been long, and Xingqiu’s patience had run short. His fingers itched to grab the hilt of his sword and bury it deep into an evil creature the way he always had in the past. On days like this he envied simpler men who took on commissions at the adventurer’s guild. On days like this he thanked the archons that he himself was not a simpler man, and instead had gotten the privilege to be the person he’d grown up to be.
As most moments tended to, summers seemed to last a lifetime while you were in them, yet once they reach their end you could barely remember them passing. Summers and springs and winters compiled themselves of multiple moments, and yet when looking back at them Xingqiu had always separated them into four separate points in time made of multiple seconds stitched together into one memory.
The winter he’d first started reading martial arts books.
The spring he’d first started practicing the Guhua arts.
The summer he’d first picked up a proper sword.
The autumn he’d first met Chongyun.
He held all these memories and so many more dear to him. It was these things that reminded him that, despite his many regrets and uncountable shortcomings, he held his life and the people in it dear to him. What was one or two or three hundred things he couldn’t have in comparison to the abundance of things that he’d been blessed with throughout his life?
If he closed his eyes he could sometimes still feel the comfort of Rex Lapis seep through him.
“Will you ever consider choosing a spot that’s less of a hassle to get to?”
Xingqiu turned around and smiled. It had been months since they had last sat here together, and yet the other’s presence did not faze him in the slightest.
“I’ve considered, but how else would you find me, my dear?” he challenged.
“I’ve always found you in the past, have I not?”
Xingqiu would’ve argued that this was only because Chongyun had grown accustomed to his habits. If he were to change said habits, would he still be found? He had decided to keep this to himself. After all, Chongyun knew this already. After all, he wanted to be found.
“Will you sit with me?” he asked instead.
Chongyun sat down next to him, parasol in one hand, popsicle in the other. If only I had a book, Xingqiu mused, this would be just as it had been when we were children. Minutes passed, both of them looking out towards the ocean, or perhaps watching over Liyue Harbour the way they had been taught to since the fall of their archon. Back then they had known each other inside out, and today they still do, albeit in a different, less extreme way. Perhaps they were both relieved that they could no longer see through each other like glass. Perhaps it was more comforting not to be found sometimes.
“Why did you come find me?” Xingqiu asked after an hour or so had passed.
“I needed to clear my head,” Chongyun said, and Xingqiu laughed.
“Does this imply that you lose all sense of thought when you’re with me?” he teased. Light, easy, with no meaning.
Chongyun grinned, “Quite the opposite, actually. It’s like there’s so much going on in my head, but as soon as I’m with you there’s only one thing on my mind, and I can finally think clearly.”
Xingqiu reprimanded himself for the way his heart seemed to skip. “And what’s that?”
His friend leaned closer, their shoulders touching now. He took his hand and laced their fingers together, squeezing it lightly. Familiar, comforting, absolutely and completely mind racking.
“You.” Simple. Light. Easy. With no further explanation nor meaning.
-
Liyuen summers had always been harsh, but they’d never lasted this long. This year the heat seemed to demand the cold of autumn to step down so that it may rage on until everyone had been sufficiently dried out.
Despite having learned to best his condition, Chongyun never even stood a chance.
Xingqiu had practically forced him into the waters of Luhua Pool. Chongyun had promptly begun to freeze surrounding him with the little strength he had left. It had been a losing battle from the start, but he had learned not to surrender no matter how the world decided to beat defeat into him.
Years ago during a similarly hot yet significantly shorter summer, the two friends had found refuge in this same place. Back then Chongyun had still insisted on sitting in the shade instead of the water. He hated the way his clothes would stick to his skin and weigh him down for the rest of the day. Xingqiu had submerged himself entirely after this discovery, almost as though he meant to prove a point.
Eventually he had forced his dear friend into the water. That shade of red, while endearing, could not have been healthy for anyone.
When Chongyun asked, he’d told him that he had simply taken a nap when he overheated. It wasn’t a lie, after cooling down he did sleep all the way from Luhua Pool to one of the nearby inns. He’d been more controllable and cooperative than usual, most likely due to Xingqiu quickly taking action.
He’d always made sure to save Chongyun as much embarrassment as possible, only retelling the more harmless parts of these blackouts, the ones that weren’t going to keep him up at night with a hundred or so regrets for things he couldn’t help but do. Xingqiu was as prideful as one could be, and on this occasion he believed he deserved an award for being such a good friend.
Because, and this was something he made sure no one would ever catch wind of, on that day his dearest friend had done more than just gone back to sleep.
Even now Xingqiu remembered the warmth of Chongyun’s lips on his. He still remembered how they felt, bitten to a tender softness. He still remembered the disgust and guilt he’d felt that night for letting himself sink into that feeling for a brief moment.
On this day Chongyun’s shade seemed to match that which he had worn back then. Try as he might, the fight he had picked with the world since he was born was a losing battle. Xingqiu moved closer to where his friend was attempting to cool down, breaking the ice that was already melting the second it was created.
“You good, A-Yun?” he asked, brushing sweaty bangs from Chongyun’s forehead and letting water drip on his face.
Chongyun sighed and shook his head, “I feel like I’m fourteen again.”
“Can’t be that bad. You’re still coherent, right?” Xingqiu smiled, not being able to keep the pity out of his voice. He was met with an annoyed look which he ignored as easily as he always had.
“Am I though?” Chongyun looked away from him and squinted up at the sky, “My mind is here but I feel like I’m gonna say or do something stupid.”
Xingqiu offered him a smile, combing through his hair. “And if you do? I’ve taken care of you in the past, I’ll take care of you again.”
Chongyun looked back at him and softened when their eyes met. He reached a hand out to take Xingqiu’s and pressed a kiss to his knuckles.
-
There was a week or two, right in between summer and autumn, during which Xingqiu couldn’t find a single trace of Chongyun.
Not a word of exorcisms nor a whisper of his congenital positivity could be heard from. Be it the streets of Liyue Harbour all the way over to Qingce Village, the man seemed to have vanished from existence.
Each day Xingqiu would bring his work up to that same mountain where they had stargazed together years ago, the same one they still would know to go to if they wished to hide and still be found. He would bring a blanket and a box of food he picked up at Xiangling’s restaurant with him. The days grew colder and the jueyun chilis paired with archons knew what warmed him like nothing else could.
It was on a warmer day that he finally returned.
“I’m sorry for leaving,” Chongyun said. He’d always been quick to feel guilty about things like this, especially after his trip away from home.
“I was never upset,” Xingqiu said, not turning back to look at him. He knew his friend would face him properly when he was ready.
“I.. She.. She left me and I… I really thought we were getting somewhere, right? But,” he sat down next to him and Xingqiu turned to look at him.
He’d half expected him to look like a mess. Red rimmed eyes, furrowed brows, lips bitten despite Xingqiu having desperately tried to make him stop doing so for years. He expected him to look distraught and broken, he expected to pull him closer and run his hands through that eternally messy hair and tell him that it’ll be alright. Instead, Chongyun looked as cold as the day he met him.
Clear cut and precise, that’s what Xingqiu might say. His clothes seemed fresh from the wash, his hair had been tamed, and his eyes were as guarded as he hadn’t seen in years. He didn’t want to be seen, and yet he made an effort to be found.
It made him feel almost uneasy, how calm he seemed to be.
“But..?” Xingqiu asked, offering his hand. He felt comfort wash over him at the squeeze Chongyun gave him when he took it.
“She said something,” he turned to look into his eyes, still guarded. He was searching for something, Xingqiu knew this much, and it made him want to hide just as much as Chongyun was. Instead, he let himself be seen, because he knew it would be reciprocated. “She said something about how.. How she can’t be with me because she can’t make me happy.. Or something.”
Xingqiu nodded, telling him he could continue.
Minutes passed and they watched the sun slowly setting in the distance. It was after dusk that Chongyun turned to meet his eyes again. Still blank, still searching.
“Qiuqiu.. What is it exactly that you feel for me?” he asked. Blunt and pure, with no judgment nor expectation.
This was what let Xingqiu blink back at him, open and honest, no embarrassment or guilt bubbling up in him.
“I’m in love with you,” he said simply. The words were unfamiliar, and yet they spilled from his lips easily and without fear.
Chongyun stared, and stared, and stared, until he finally found what he was looking for. Almost instantly his eyes softened and opened up the world of emotions Xingqiu had been kept from, and he smiled at him. A small smile, barely there.
“I see. So that was the problem.”
Xingqiu smiled back, “What was?”
Instead of answering, he lifted Xingqiu’s hand and pressed his lips to his knuckles
-
Oh, how infatuated he was with the bite of winter
Oh, how enamoured he was by the comfort of spring
Oh, how he intoxicated he was with the rush of summer.
Oh, how he loves autumn.