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Zishu stares at his future consort-to-be and can’t help but wonder how far Prince Jin is willing to go to earn his favor, to keep him in a tight leash with no path left to escape. Wen Kexing stares back, and smiles.
The wedding is to be held in matter of days, a proper consort for the head of the Window of Heaven. They don’t know each other very well, and if Zishu has anything to say regarding that, they won’t know each other very well even after the wedding.
And yet his future consort resists his future as nothing more than another chain holding Zishu back. Wen Kexing refuses his place as a trophy, mute and pleasant consort and follows Zishu around like a bad cold.
His future consort follows him in a parade of spectacular colored clothes. White, light blue, teal, purple and lastly red. Red is the one Zishu hates most, maybe because Wen Kexing looks unfairly striking in such color.
“Ah-Xu! Ah-Xu!,” Wen Kexing runs after him even when Zishu tries to walk faster between the people running around in the market. “Ah-Xu don’t leave poor me, here all alone. If spring comes and goes again and again, and I lost vitality, isn’t my husband supposed to wait the final winter with me?”
Zishu narrows his eyes. “Who’s your husband?”
They haven’t finished the week yet, and while his marriage may be set in stone, Zishu plans to fight it until the very last moment.
“A husband who doesn’t love his wife, doesn’t the saying goes… better to just let the poor bride die in peace?” Wen Kexing opens his fan and makes some waves to manage some of the heat, in this sunny day.
Zishu finally stops and rolls his eyes. “Who’s a wife now?”
Wen Kexing smiles, like a cat, like a really lazy purple colored cat playing with his food before eating it. “Ah-Xu, don’t deny me right in front of these good people, what would they think of me by hearing your words,” Wen Kexing smile gets wider. “That you found me in a brothel or something as bad as that.”
“I may just sell you to one, to get rid of you.” Zishu says without heat. He does suspect Prince Jin may have found his ‘fine wife’ in such a place, just because who else but only one without an option would be willing to be stuck with someone like himself. Also Wen Kexing is a beauty who knows how to captivate, there’s no denying that.
“Wouldn’t that make you taste vinegar?” Wen Kexing tilts his head, heavy amusement dripping from his aspect.
Zishu shakes his head and walks ahead, leaving Wen Kexing behind. He knows the bills for all the sweets his future consort is going to eat, are going to reach him in Four-Seasons Manor rather sooner than later.
---
The wedding happens in a blur of red but then again Zishu’s life has been always about red. All the blood staining his hands, all the blood that won’t be washed away, all his friends that have left this living world and he supposes, won’t be acknowledging him in the afterlife.
Wen Kexing looks striking in red. The color suits him, so very well, that just for a moment right there in their wedding banquet Zishu can’t bring himself to regret his status a newly married man.
Zishu drinks, and drinks –but is never enough. Not nearly enough to face the sun day after day.
---
Wen Kexing all majestic in red cries during their wedding night, something about his tragic past, his worst days, loneliness and rage –Zishu’s heart goes soft, and just like that Wen Kexing pushes him towards the bed, and makes a space for himself between Zishu’s legs. Zishu doesn’t mind it that much, in a day or two he will, but not tonight.
By the next morning Zishu wakes without a fuss, his new consort sprawled over him in tempting display of nude creamy-pale skin, and messy long brown hair.
Zishu can’t be to say a man to lose himself in passions but, he has to accept the man snoring softly in his arms tends to draw out a part of him he is not used to. The worst and the best alike. Wen Kexing and his pale soft skin, and Zhou Zishu who wants to bite him hard all around to paint him red, red, red.
But Zishu has never been one to overindulge, and just like this, he starts disentangling himself from the other, to get ready for his morning routine.
Wen Kexing feels him move, and opens one eye lazily. “Leaving without a proper goodbye, my lord-husband?” He shifts on the bed and stares coolly at the Lord-General of the Window of Heaven. “Are you maybe, visiting a Concubine after spending the night with me?”
Zishu wants to roll his eyes at the dramatic antics of the other but refrains. “Just go back to sleep.”
Wen Kexing laughs and spreads out on the bed. In a moment of distraction he has put his discarded wedding robes on again. Red silk not even tied properly and pale skin, and Zishu shouldn’t even be considering it but, but the damage is already done. He is married and he doesn’t even feel bad about it.
“Want to try what we did yesterday again?” Wen Kexing all but purrs.
“How about we try it the other way around?” Zishu asks, eyes trailing Wen Kexing’s figure none too subtly. “And this time you will be the one under me?”
Wen Kexing laughs again. “Yes, you could try and make it happen, Ah-Xu!, Just come back here.”
And Zhou Zishu is just a man in the end. He takes off the little of clothes he had put on, and goes towards the bed with the man in red silk. Morning practice will have to wait, Zishu can accept that. Wen Kexing hugs him like an octopus, with arms and legs, once he climbs the bed again.
Married life is all about making sacrifices, he supposes.