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Chapter Text

The night was still, like lake-water that was left tepid after the calming of a storm.

Sliding the door shut gently behind him, Zhou Zishu slipped out from the room. He had held Wen Kexing's hand in his, palm folded tenderly against palm, until he felt the man's breathing ease into the soft lilt of slumber. The lingering heat from where Wen Kexing's arms had encircled around his waist like an entreaty was still a brand through his robes. He wished every night could be this way. He could only wish that each of the remaining nights he had left could be this way.

The dining hall was quiet now. The ruckus of a few hours before had coalesced into a gaggle of haphazard cups strewn across the long table, the sole witnesses to the wine-weary stragglers hunched, half-asleep. The younglings must have had quite the night. Cao Weining was pillowed against the low table, a lavender pile of hair and limbs that could only be Gu Xiang against his side. Ai, even his good disciple must have been cajoled to partake in the festivities, judging by how his head was lolling uncomfortably to one side. Beiyuan and Wu Xi ought to have retired for the night. Ye qianbei was nowhere to be seen either but must undoubtedly not be passing up the chance for good wine, albeit elsewhere. Only Shen Shen remained, looking rather worse for wear, the jade cup still clutched in his hand like a lifeline.

Despite the heaviness in his heart, Zhou Zishu could not help but be amused. Lao Wen ah, was there anything to boast about drinking three xiao mao tous (and one cavalier second-rate jianghu hero) under the table? He snagged the remaining two jars of wine by the table, and mimicked raising a toast to a barely-cognizant Shen Shen who tilted his head, although unsure if it were in greeting or if it were to combat the state of spinning the room must appear to be in to him.

The cool slide of wine down his throat tasted like ash tonight, in spite of how his senses had been blown wide open along with his meridians, ever since he forcibly removed the seven nails from his body. It was not quite the same as before the nails, but compared to how he was moving through the world like a fly in amber when the nails were in place, this was a world of difference away. Thoughtlessly, he wiped off the errant drops of wine dribbling down his chin with the back of his hand. Ah, to think that the nebulous dream of wandering to the ends of the earth with a drink in hand and his soulmate by his side was originally just within reach. 

Unknowingly, he stretched out his hand through the window frame, to some unseeable light in the distance. 

Only to curl his fingers into a tight fist. His nails dug small crescents into the soft flesh of his palm. All he had now was the inexorable march toward death.

Lao Wen, ah. How could he bear to leave this man?

The anguish in the man's eyes, liquid with angry despair, when he had first seen the nails embedded in his chest, surfaced to view from the depths of his mind. What would his face look like this time, if he told him how many days he had left, if he told him how foolishly eager he had been to hurtle headlong into death after that fateful day?

He was reminded of a story his shifu used to tell him, of how stray cats would run away and hide when they sensed they were about to die. Under the bushes, in darkened corners, away from prying eyes.  He remembered being confused then, wondering why they would not prefer somewhere warm and bright, a familiar face or a comforting touch to be the last thing they experience. It was only in the summer when his shifu had passed and the many summers after that where death dogged his every step that he began to understand. When muscle and flesh hardened in death with a once-beloved face no more than a frozen rictus, when the belly bloated with guts yearning to spill free, when blood pooled beneath bleached skin, who would not wish for the velvet curtain of obscurity?

Without warning, the door slid open with a snick. The uncomfortably pleasant burn of wine in his belly kindled into something like anguished fury.

"Lao Wen, what do you want? Can't a man get some fucking peace with just wine and the night for company."

A beat of silence, and then, quietly, almost fearfully, "Shifu."

His limbs were a little less coordinated than he remembered, and he risked breaking the remaining jar of wine as he swivelled from his perch on the window ledge. That wasn't right. He frowned. There was surely more wine than this.

"Shifu!" Zhou Zishu closed his eyes. This good disciple of his could be really loud when he wanted to. Why couldn't he go and be loud elsewhere? Say, wasn't he all but halfway to being unconscious just now? Ah, youthfulness was truly enviable.

Opening his eyes brought Zhang Chengling's face into view, closer than he expected. He blinked. Since when could this hare-brained disciple sneak up on him? He was really drunker than he thought. Pah, barely one jar in and he was already halfway to being piss-drunk. Truly dismal.

"Shifu, you're scaring me. Why have you been drinking? Didn't Dawu say it'll hurt your constitution, especially with your meridians still being slowly treated?"

"Chengling ah," he punctuated his words with a disarmingly gentle pat to the boy's cheeks. "Life is made for living. One must live each day as if it were his last."

The furrow between Zhang Chengling's eyebrows grew deeper, forming a veritable valley. His bottom lip trembled. "But shifu, you have many more days ahead now that you will make a full recovery. Many more days where you can torment, ah, I mean teach me all the moves from tai-shifu. Everything will be well now we have shishu back too."

The fright on his face morphed into alarm when he realised his words merely galvanised Zhou Zishu into guzzling down wine with renewed gusto. In his drunken state and with his qi forcing his withering meridians wide open, Zhou Zishu was not in full control of his strength when Zhang Chengling tried to wrestle the jar out of his grasp. The jar shot out of both their grasps and shuddered apart on the ground with a scream, the last dregs of wine seeping into the wooden floorboards.

Wordlessly, he knelt and palmed at the darkening floorboards, uncaring of the shards of broken porcelain, as if he could reach into the crevices and gather up spilled wine, coerce the shattered pieces back into its original form with his bare hands. He couldn't help but let out a laugh. "Water that has been thrown out cannot be restored."

"Shifu..." Zhang Chengling started but fell silent, electing instead to sweep away the shards with quick, broad strokes, gently prying Zhou Zishu's hands away from the remaining pieces.

Zhou Zishu let himself be half-supported, half-manhandled onto the bed by his disciple. Sourness inundated the bridge of his nose, spreading across the ridges of his eye-sockets. He was a deflated waterskin, leaking at the seams.

"It's too late, all of it is too late..." 

The daylight filtering through the shuttered windows elicited a groan from the man lying prone on the bed. 

Last night's poor decisions were making themselves known in the form of the meat cleaver splitting Zhou Zishu's skull into two. 

"Zishu." Wu Xi! What was he doing at his door at this hour? What hour was it, even? He squinted vaguely at the light streaming in, feeling like a moth trapped in a paper lantern. Righting himself into an upright position, he gingerly flexed his hand, surprised to find that it had somehow already been bandaged during the night, albeit clumsily. 

Figuring it was no use trying to pretend to be sleeping, he cleared his throat. "Enter." 

Wuxi stepped over the threshold and trailing behind him was Zhang Chengling, head hung low, painting the very picture of contrition. That little sell-out! As if on cue, the boy shrank behind Wu Xi just a little bit but his face held no morsel of remorse.

"This lowly disciple apologises for disturbing shifu's rest!" Zhang Chengling clasped one hand over his other fist and bowed low. Silly boy. A wave of fondness welled up in him and his gaze softened.

"Here, something for your head." Wu Xi handed over a bowl of liquid, pointedly looking at the empty jar of wine lying innocently on its side by the bedpost. Ah, at least his disciple had the good sense to clear up the other (broken) jar of wine last night. 

Suitably chastised, Zhou Zishu gulped down the contents of the bowl, wincing a little at how the swift motion aggravated the pounding in his head.  Just as he was about to place the emptied bowl on the bedside table, a hand reached out, a viper in attack, clamping firmly around his wrist. 

"Zishu, you - " Wu Xi, normally unflappable, widened his eyes, the hand grasping his wrist tightening infinitesimally. 

"Dawu, what's wrong with shifu?" Zhang Chengling crowded close, doe eyes round with anxiety. 

Zhou Zishu did not struggle, his gaze fixed on a point somewhere at the far end of the room. Paper could not hope to swathe and enshroud fire forever. 

"When did this happen?" Wu Xi demanded. When? Ah, where to begin? Should he start with detailing how he drunk himself into a stupor by the very cliffs where he saw Lao Wen plunge to his death? Or maybe how he stumbled down from the room in the inn he was shuttled off to, thinking it was all a dream, only to find out that Lao Wen was well and truly dead? Or perhaps seeing Lao Wen's corpse, lying placidly in that little room, and setting fire to it with his own hands? 

Zhou Zishu let out a shaky exhale of breath. "Wu Xi, it's too late." Forcing a smile onto his face, he continued. "I feel a lot better these few days. I've forgotten how it feels to have qi flowing free, without those meddlesome nails pinning things down."

Wu Xi's face was an agonised mien. "Your meridians weren't fully repaired yet, even with the ongoing treatment. By taking out the nails prematurely, the unfettered qi will only start ripping your meridians to shreds, if left to flow uncontrolled."  

Confused realisation bloomed on his disciple's face. He fell to the floor, knees scraping across the floorboards as he grasped Wu Xi's sleeves in both hands, tears blotting his face. "Dawu! This lowly disciple begs you to find a way to save shifu."

"Chengling, get up! Who asked you to clean the floor with your knees." Zhou Zishu snapped, hands swiftly plucking at his disciple's collar, as if desiring to pick him up by the scruff of his neck. 

"Shifu!" Zhang Chengling let out a wail, beginning to cry in earnest, his shoulders shaking with the force of his preemptive grief. Zhou Zishu let him go and turned his face away, choosing to fix his gaze on Wu Xi's pained face.

"Wu Xi, all I ask is not to burden Beiyuan with this as much as possible. And most of all, Lao Wen must never know." 

"What must I never know?" 

Speak of Cao Cao, and he shall appear. Silent as a ghost, Wen Kexing swept into the room, his hawk gaze quickly assessing how Zhang Chengling was still a blubbering mess on the floor, how Wu Xi was standing woodenly by the bedside, where Zhou Zishu was still sprawled on.

"A-Xu." Zhou Zishu did not meet his eyes, choosing to stare at the strand of hair that had come loose from the orbit of Wen Kexing's normally immaculate bun. He still looked unfairly put-together for a man who had cheerily acquiesced to downing three jars last night.  

"Lao Wen. Had a little too much to drink last night?" The jab fell a little flat as he himself winced, the throbbing in his head receding only ever so slightly with the hangover cure slowly taking effect. 

"Dawu, how is my shixiong's treatment progressing?" Wen Kexing's voice was calm but sharp eyes were already darting between the emptied wine jar and the pitiable sight that Zhou Zishu likely made, his fingers not so subtly massaging his temples. 

"Early in the morning and already so many unsolicited medical opinions." Scoffing, Zhou Zishu made to stand, fed up with the hullabaloo. A hot flash shot through his body, leaving his head spinning and his limbs momentarily bereft of any strength. It definitely did not feel like a normal side effect of an ill-advised night of drinking.

Wen Kexing caught him neatly around his shoulders. Trying to shake him off, Zhou Zishu unkindly aimed a palm strike against his chest which would have potentially caused a broken rib or two (and probably an internal injury) if Wen Kexing had not redirected his palm by locking his wrist against his. His remaining arm hurriedly came up to wrap around Zhou Zishu's waist in a steadying motion. Even so, the flush of qi a hair's width from Wen Kexing's face undeniably held more force than it used to, the minute change easily discernible to a trained eye.

"Your qi, why is it so - "

Panicked, Zhou Zishu broke free, stumbling back a few steps, struggling to regain his composure. "You owe me a good fight after stealing my thunder from right under my nose at the Heroes' Conference. Why, afraid to go a few rounds with your shixiong now?"

"What did you do." The tremor in Wen Kexing’s voice was two tectonic plates slowly shuddering apart.  

"The nails, shishu, he… he…"  

"Zhou Zishu!" He froze. He could count on one hand the number of times he ever heard Wu Xi raise his voice. "Unless you want your meridians to blow apart and wrench the last breath from your body right now, you should know better than to use your qi unnecessarily.” 

Ah, the cat was well and truly out the bag. Zhou Zishu did not resist anymore as he was guided to sit on the bed once more, accompanied by both Wu Xi and Wen Kexing. One wrist was firmly within Wu Xi’s grasp as the man probed deeper into his meridians. 

“A-Xu…” His name was a benediction, a question, and a fervent prayer all at once. Wen Kexing’s trembling fingers circled the fine bones of his other wrist, soothing up and down the faint tributaries of his veins. Zhou Zishu could feel the way the coiled tightness belied the banked madness in the man’s frame. He did not dare to look up at his face. 

A long moment of silence, punctuated by Wu Xi’s sighs. 

“Xiaozi, go and fetch the Sword Saint Immortal.” Zhang Chengling scrambled into motion, leaping to his feet like an attentive meerkat, all but flying out the room. Next to him, Wen Kexing’s head, hanging low like an overripe fruit, perked up instantly. 

It was almost comical, were it not quite so sad.  

“Dawu, is there something, anything that could be done?” Fix him, the wild look in Wen Kexing’s eyes seemed to say. 

“I can’t be certain.” Wu Xi frowned. “The original treatment plan was to repair his meridians as much as possible before the nails were removed, so that when the full force of his qi was released from their chokehold, his meridians would be able to withstand the qi circulating around without flying apart.” 

“And now?” The hand around his wrist tightened. 

“His meridians aren’t nearly in good enough shape to handle it. Using qi would have hastened the breakdown.” 

Now it was Zhou Zishu’s turn to hang his head like a chastised disciple. Ah, perhaps that explained the sparks of numbing pain that skittered up and down his limbs; he had chalked that up to some bizarre byproduct of regaining his senses all too suddenly, like the spread of pins and needles after having laid on one’s arm all night. His lips twitched into a grim smile as he remembered the surge of righteous rage and anguish that he rode on, descending onto the platform at the Heroes’ Conference with only Lao Wen’s vengeance in mind. One last flare of life before the end, it would seem. 

As if sensing the morbid turn his thoughts had taken, Wen Kexing let go of his wrist, palms coming up to frame his face. “A-Xu, a-Xu, won’t you look at me?” 

“What for?” To see the look on your face as if the very earth you were standing on was crumbling apart? He looked, nevertheless. 

Wen Kexing’s eyes were dark, a pained smile stretching those beloved lips. He could immolate himself within the depths of that gaze. 

Just as it looked as though he was about to speak, Ye Baiyi burst into the room, looking every bit the disgruntled senior. “What is the meaning of this?” For once, Zhou Zishu was disproportionately glad for the man’s predilection for showy entrances.   “Hare-brained idiots, the lot of you.” As he said so, he rudely inserted himself between him and Wen Kexing, hand clamping down on his wrist. 

“Qin Huaizhang’s disciple.” Unconsciously, Zhou Zishu straightened up in attention. “Having tasted hope for delaying your death, now you don't want to live anymore? Pah, I should have cut you down with my broadsword that night and spared everyone the trouble!" 

Wen Kexing bristled, hackles immediately rising on his behalf. He darted a ruthless swipe at the white-clad man, only to have it swiftly deflected without much fanfare. 

"Insolent nitwit. Didn't anybody teach you to respect your elders? Careful, aren't you worried maybe I'd squash your shixiong like a bug out of anger?" 

"You - !" The rising flush on Wen Kexing's face was almost fetching, if under other circumstances.

“I want a word with this reckless fool alone. Apart from the only person capable of giving a medical opinion, the rest of you, scram!" 

Face like a thundercloud, Wen Kexing reluctantly let a placating Zhang Chengling steer him out of the room. Zhou Zishu eyed Ye Baiyi warily as the man flicked his sleeves and settled more comfortably beside him on the bed. 

"Sword Saint Immortal, his pulse profile gave clear indications about the state of his qi and I have a good idea about the state of his meridians since the start of the treatment. I have an idea or two but they might not work without external help. What are your thoughts?" Zhou Zishu glanced up at Wu Xi in shock. An idea or two? He did not want to get his own hopes up. 

Ye Baiyi looked pensive for a long moment and then he nodded decisively.

"Qin Huaizhang's disciple, I'll ask you a question first. How willing are you to let that insolent shidi of yours trade his life for yours?" 

Coldness suffused his veins. If that was what Lao Wen chose to do, he would follow him onto the Yellow Spring Road and drag him back into this world, kicking and screaming, and murder him himself. They lived together, or not at all. 

Ye Baiyi's lips curled into a sneer. "As I thought. I say, what's the point of going to all the trouble when you're just going to off yourself?" 

"I didn't say anything - "

"It's written all over your dainty face." 

Zhou Zishu blinked, unsure what part of that sentence he should be taking offense at, if at all. 

"How willing are you to suffer the pain of death, no, pain worse than death, pain that would leave you wishing you were dead - " 

"That I can do." Zhou Zishu interjected. 

"Idiot. I wasn't finished." Ye Baiyi snapped. Then turning to Wu Xi,  "Dawu, if I'm not wrong, the problem lies in his qi running his meridians into the ground. How much of his meridians would you say was repaired during your initial treatment?"

Wu Xi inclined his head. "I'd estimate about sixty per cent, give or take. Probably in poorer shape now. Given a few more weeks, I would have brought that up to eighty per cent or more and removing the nails then would have brought some discomfort and pain but his meridians would have held out relatively well against the flow of qi." His voice turned grave. "Theoretically, it is possible to accelerate that and essentially reconstruct his meridians to bring it up to speed but it will undoubtedly be an excruciating process. Not to mention all that free-flowing qi would still have to be kept in check."

"The way I see it, someone would have to shoulder the burden of some of that qi by taking it onto themselves, and also help to recirculate it when the meridians are strong enough to take it." 

"There's no risk to the one helping to do that?" Zhou Zishu was quick to ask, his pulse still thundering through his veins. He was still feeling rather off-kilter at the thought of Lao Wen dying for him. 

"Shazi." It was the first time he heard something resembling fondness in this qianbei's voice. "If there were any permanent damage liable to occur, would I offer to be the one to do it? I still have so much I need to do in this world, who wants to risk his life for your miserable one?" 

Oh. 

"I'm sure that shidi of yours would jump at the chance any day. Hell, if you told him to jump, he'll ask, how high? Idiot. But he's still way too unstable. He came close to a qi deviation just a while ago. Ai, some things still require one to dirty one's own hands after all."

Wu Xi cleared his throat. "Zishu, you need to know that this approach is highly experimental. I'm confident you will keep your martial prowess to some reasonable degree but there's no knowing how long the recovery will take and the pain will be indescribable, not to mention if the treatment will take at all." 

"I'll take my chances." Zhou Zishu smiled grimly. 

He would bet it all on this round. There was nothing left to lose. 

Wen Kexing had evidently been pacing just outside the room, whirling back in right away once Wu Xi called them in. 

"A-Xu!" He was a whirlwind of teal and maroon, robes fluttering as he swiftly reclaimed his spot by Zhou Zishu's side. 

"I've decided, Lao Wen." Zhou Zishu patted his hand lightly, looking for all the world like a man accepting his fate. 

"You… you… " The beginnings of a tremulous smile on Wen Kexing's face froze and his brows furrowed. The slick sheen of wetness in his eyes was the first few drops of morning dew at dawn. All in all, a rather terrifying sight. 

"Shifu…" Not meeting his eyes, Zhang Chengling shuffled closer but maintained a respectful distance, as if afraid his shifu would try to pick him up by his collar again.

"All of you, stop looking like your grandmother just died." Ye Baiyi scoffed, looking thoroughly disgusted by the display of emotion flooding the room. "As long as there's still a breath in my body, none of you young fools are allowed to die before me." 

"Now that Zishu has decided, we should start right away." Wu Xi remarked. "The longer his qi runs amok without regulation, the more battered his meridians will become. I'll start making preparations." 

With a look at Zhou Zishu, as if apologising in advance for the miasma of pain he was about to subject him to, he left the room. Zhou Zishu stared after him in a daze. He wasn't afraid of pain but there was no denying that he must have grown soft after leaving Tianchuang, compared to the days where he had ruthlessly tried some of his newer interrogative inventions on himself.  

"Xiaotu-zaizi, let's give these two idiot lovebirds some space." Saying so, Ye Baiyi started to shepherd a wide-eyed Zhang Chengling out of the room.

"Wei, what kind of qianbei are you, to stuff our disciple's brain with all this nonsense?" Wen Kexing's barb was half-hearted at best, further undermined by how his hand instinctively drew Zhou Zishu's hand into his lap. 

Zhou Zishu raised an eyebrow but did not withdraw his hand. "Our disciple? Aren't we getting ahead of ourselves?" 

"Is he not? Don't worry, a-Xu. If you're not willing to share, there's plenty of time to recruit more disciples once you're better." Here, his voice wavered slightly but he ploughed on. "But of course, Manor Lord Zhou's words are gospel. As your shidi, I can only obey your will." 

Zhou Zishu laughed. "You're already such a handful, what do you have to say for yourself? If anything, I'm relying on you to do the recruiting. You have to earn your keep." 

That drew an indignant squawk from Wen Kexing. "I cook, I clean, I dispense wisdom to the sole disciple of Siji Manor out of the goodwill of my heart as his senior, and you say I need to earn my keep?" 

The future seemed to stretch, taffy-sweet, between them: a familiar courtyard raining peach blossoms, two figures exchanging blows in a ceaseless dance, the steps to which only they were privy to, the clink of jade cups and interlocked wrists, intermingling laughter of a dozen disciples keeping the hallways alive throughout the four seasons.

"I'm not afraid, Lao Wen." A non-sequitur, an arrow that cut to the quick. 

"But I am." 

His was the plea of one who had lost too much, who could not keep those who he wanted to keep, hollow with horror that was lived and re-lived everyday. Here was the heart of the Ghost Valley Master, he who feared none and was feared by all, clutched bloody and raw in his bare hands. But here was also the heart of his shidi, held in the vessel of a skin-warm jade pin, a moment in shared sunlight, an imprint of lips on the same wine gourd. 

Zhou Zishu vowed to nestle it safe within his ribcage, for as long as his own heart still had a beat. And if his heart could no longer beat on its own, there was no doubt that the other would do so on his behalf.

Chapter Text

The memory of pain was said to fade with time. 

Zhou Zishu was no stranger to pain. Every night the nails resumed their torment, picking up where they left off the night before. Yet, in the morning, even as the ache lingered, he felt good as new, ready to brawl and tumble through another day again. In his Tianchuang days, pain was a confidant who would not sell out one’s secrets if one knew how to endure and conceal; pain was an exquisite tool that could tease out confessions and ruin lives; pain was a language he learned how to speak.

Now, pain was a debt collector, doggedly numbering his days. If he had to scalp the skin off his bones, upend the blood from his vessels, just to see the light of day again, that was a price he was willing to pay. It was one that no one else should have to pay in his stead, least of all his shidi. 

The hand that was running a thumb over his knuckles in broad loops ceased its motion just as a flash of purple darted into the room. “Sickly ghoul!” Behind Gu Xiang, her ever-present shadow followed in less of a flurry, customary sheepish grin suffusing his cheeks. “Your little disciple said you’re dying faster than you should be?” 

She shrank back a little, hand over her mouth, using Cao Weining as a human shield from the many pointed daggers flying at her from Wen Kexing’s murderous gaze. Just a few paces behind, Zhang Chengling started after her mournfully. “Xiang-jiejie, that wasn’t at all the gist of what I said…” 

This morning he awoke expecting to nurse his wounds and grievances alone and instead, he had been blessed with this. A veritable clown-house, this was turning out to be. He let out a long-suffering sigh. Thankfully, the squabbling between the younglings was cut short with the return of Wu Xi, Beiyuan and Ye Baiyi in tow. Ah, truly ridiculous how everyone had seen fit to assemble themselves into this tiny square of a room. 

"Drink." Wu Xi instructed, pressing a frighteningly large bowl of steaming liquid into his hands. Uncharacteristically docile, Zhou Zishu did as he was told. 

"Zishu." Beiyuan started but then stopped, as if grasping for words to say. It had truly been too many years and too many li of distance between them. If not for Ye Baiyi, perhaps they might never have met again, them in Nanjiang and him soon to be on his way onto the Yellow Spring Road. 

"It'll be alright." Zhou Zishu aimed for reassuring nonchalance but might have missed the mark, what with the grimace warping his cheeks. His tongue chased at the bitter astringency the medicine had left in his mouth. 

"The medication may take a while to take effect. The pain will start small as your meridians begin to respond but it likely won't remain that way for long. I had no choice but to give you a much more potent dose compared to what you were used to in order to accelerate the reconstruction. The needles will need to go in soon after to open up your acupuncture points and smoothen out the flow of your qi." Here, Wu Xi paused. "Sword Saint Immortal, I will need your help then with the recirculation."

Warily, Zhou Zishu eyed the small bundle, no doubt containing those needles he spoke of, that he had laid out by the bed. 

"In the meantime," Ye Baiyi deftly picked up the reins of the conversation, "any words of comfort for this poor dunce before he enters a world of pain?" 

"Shifu, this disciple awaits any final instructions!" Zhang Chengling, who had been mostly silent till now, straightened his back and gazed at Zhou Zishu, eyes suspiciously wet. Next to him, Gu Xiang smacked him on the arm. "What final instructions! Peh, peh, peh, so inauspicious." 

"Chengling, cover your ears." Zhou Zishu suddenly instructed. 

Bewildered, the boy did as he was told. Gu Xiang’s mouth slowly shaped into an “o” of gleeful anticipation.  Then, Zhou Zishu turned to the man sitting beside him.

"Wen Kexing, you lying scumbag of a snake, may your descendants rot in the deepest recesses of Hell and be boiled alive a hundred times over, should you ever lie to me about something as important as your life and death again.” 

Wen Kexing took it all with the air of someone who had already been expecting such an outburst, genuine contrition flattening the curve of his lips. Only after Zhou Zishu finished his tirade did he ask, quietly, carefully, "a-Xu, have the fires of your fury finally been extinguished?" 

"No." Zhou Zishu cast a baleful eye at him. "I just ran out of breath." 

Gu Xiang chortled. “Oh ho, Master, you truly deserved that for being so hard-hearted to us!” Next to her, Cao Weining started nodding his head in agreement, probably remembering the screaming grief unfurling in her collapsed frame when she had heard about her Master’s death, but stopped with an awkward cough when Wen Kexing turned his gaze on him. 

Zhou Zishu was only speaking half in jest when he said he ran out of breath. Barely a few incense sticks' worth of time had passed and already, the tightening in his chest was growing unbearable. He gritted his teeth. Dozens of lines of fire were slowly meandering up and down the length of his limbs. 

Wu Xi took one careful look at his face and nodded at Beiyuan. Everyone else was ushered out of the room as Wu Xi settled by his side, fingers deftly pulling out needles from the parcel. 

Wen Kexing had graciously vacated his spot by Zhou Zishu's side but he hovered, barely a palm's length away. There was an obstinate jut to his jaw, as if expecting to be evicted too but fully ready to fight tooth and nail to disregard the order. Wu Xi paid him no mind, concentrating on heating up the needle tips. Dutifully, Zhou Zishu shucked off his inner robes, feeling oddly bereft in just his pants while under the scrutiny of so many other individuals.

He barely noticed it when Wu Xi slid the first needle in, the warm prick of metal so familiar yet so different from the cold dull invasion of the nails. When the last needle slid into place, however, Zhou Zishu abruptly rocked forward, fists clenched so tight he felt his bones creak in protest. Distantly, he registered Wen Kexing's cry of alarm but he was too focused on trying not to bite through his own lips to offer up any words of comfort.

"Hold him upright. He may need help keeping that position during the recirculation." 

Almost immediately, there was a line of warmth against his back, and he was suffused with the familiar clean scent he had come to associate with Wen Kexing. Large hands came up around his shoulders, grasping firmly, the chest against his back falling and rising in tandem with his own breaths. 

"Zishu," came Wu Xi's urgent voice by his ear. "Can you move your qi? He can help keep it moving but we need you to kickstart the exchange."  

As if he were moving underwater, Zhou Zishu slowly loosened his fists, his palms curled leaves shaking in the storm. Opposite him, Ye Baiyi sat in lotus position, hands outstretched.  The flow of qi in his body felt unnatural, like so many burrs catching on the soft underbelly of a woodland critter. It caught on the crevices where his meridians were splintering, snagged on the uneven grooves left behind by days of forceful weathering. 

He pushed. Hard. 

The connection snapped open, qi skipping like pebbles over the fabric of a rushing river, and he felt something give. Sweet iron immediately flooded his mouth and he choked on a breath. His body was wet clay. He was the silt settling into the riverbed. 

Someone was calling for him from behind him. Vaguely, he felt fingers that were not his own wiping at the blood that was already forming a fine crust over his lips. 

"... he … too much? … too dangerous to halt … " 

His hearing shuddered in and out, the blood thundering through his head obscuring most of everything else. In front of him, over the churning glimmer of qi, Ye Baiyi's eyes were closed in deep concentration, his face oddly flushed. He could feel the strange undertow of that push and pull, rather unlike the usual qi transferences he was accustomed to. The initial swell of agony had quietly subsided as more of his qi was slowly being drawn out and held in check by Ye Baiyi. The sparks of pain that were skittering down his limbs and crisscrossing his torso surfaced to the foreground but that was not something he could not bear. 

Time stretched noodle-thin, and his awareness shrunk to the single pinprick of space between one breath and the next.

"Zishu… Zishu!" Wu Xi's voice sounded by his ear with the distorted quality of being submerged in water. It sounded like he had been calling him for quite some time. "I'm going to take out the needles now. That's enough for today. I want you to slow down the flow as much as you can once I take them out."  

He barely felt the last needle being drawn out from his flesh, far too busy with trying not to get drawn under. Inch by inch, Ye Baiyi was slowly feeding back his qi into him. Even so, gradual as it was, it felt as though a wall of heat slammed into his body when Ye Baiyi released his palms. The arc of his torso, held rigid during the transference, caved like a willow tree under too much weight. 

"A-Xu!" 

Familiar arms caught his wilted form, tilting his head to rest against the curve of Wen Kexing's clavicle. He was getting cold sweat all over Lao Wen's robes, Zhou Zishu thought vaguely but he was far too drained to move. He saw, rather than felt, Wu Xi take his wrist in a gentle grip; his hand did not even feel like it was attached to him at the moment. 

"How did I do," he asked, bloodied teeth bared into a tired facsimile of a grin. 

Wen Kexing drew whimsical shapes into his hair as he murmured nonsensical things against his temple. "You did good, you did so well, a-Xu. Our a-Xu was so strong." 

If he had the strength to, Zhou Zishu would have rolled his eyes and given him a slap on his wrist for saying these things in front of other people. As it was, he was slowly drifting away, an unmoored boat, until Wu Xi finally cleared his throat. "It's still hard to tell at this stage if it’s working as it should but you will be needing at least a good few more rounds. Perhaps for shorter than a shichen next time. It takes too much out of the both of you." 

They had been at it for almost a shichen? Zhou Zishu blinked. As if waking from a long dream, he noticed Ye Baiyi getting up from the other end of the bed, looking a little worse for wear. 

"Ye qianbei…" 

Ye Baiyi straightened and glared at him. "Who asked you to look at me like that? Haven't you heard that your face will get stuck that way if the wind blows the wrong way?" 

Zhou Zishu felt the derisive exhale of breath from the man behind him. Wen Kexing did not follow it up with further comment, though.

"Rest, Zishu. We'll pick this up again tomorrow. Your body needs to recuperate." 

In hindsight, rest was certainly a good idea. Mind over matter was but a fanciful adage at this stage; he could barely lift a finger. 

Wen Kexing deftly worked his hair loose, sliding the jade pin from his mess of a hair bun and carefully depositing it in Zhou Zishu's palm. He curled his fingers, painfully slow, around it, the jade warmed slightly by Wen Kexing's hands. He shivered, the cooling sweat a balmy second skin over his bare torso.

Still not speaking, Wen Kexing dipped a washcloth in the lukewarm water, long fingers expertly wringing off the excess. The valleys of his knuckles shifted, tendon and muscle bunching with each motion. Lao Wen often acted as though he loved the sound of his own voice but Zhou Zishu knew his words wore a multitude of different human skin faces for different people and different occasions. He wanted to peel apart each and every layer, scour deep beneath the dewy veneer and into the fleshy bulb of the very root. Ah, but there was something nice about this too. There was something oddly comforting about this silence, just two souls laid bare, in quiet acknowledgement of one another. 

Limp against the bed frame, Zhou Zishu followed the other man's movements with his eyes, all too aware of the tender hunger in his own gaze. He closed his eyes as cloth touched his skin, chasing away the chilled flush that was beginning to set in.

"Lao Wen."

Wen Kexing hummed in response, carefully swiping over his clavicles and down the planes of his chest.

"A-Xu ah, after you're better, I'll make any dish, any delicacy, for you at the drop of a hat. You just name it." 

He gently gathered up the loose hair over one shoulder. Supporting his waist with one hand, he started wiping Zhou Zishu's back with firm, broad strokes. His movements gentled when he got to the two large welts still adorning his shoulder blades, a nasty reminder of his time under Prince Jin's care. He clucked his tongue, fingers nipping at his waist. "Our a-Xu has suffered so, and grown thin for all his suffering. I ought to make something nourishing, fatten you up. Your slim waist is as alluring as ever, a-Xu, but your ribs are beginning to show." 

As he helped him into a fresh set of inner robes, Wen Kexing continued his verbal musings. 

“A-Xu, after all this is settled, let’s go away for a while, just the two of us. Bathe in all the sunlight the world has to offer, drink all the good wine there is to be drunk.” 

Picking up a wooden comb from the bedside, he clambered onto the bed behind Zhou Zishu. He ran the comb slowly through the tangled mess of his hair. The motion was hypnotic and Zhou Zishu could feel himself being lulled to sleep, the cadence of Wen Kexing’s voice curling around him like incense. Soon, his hair was a curtain of dark silk again but he showed no signs of stopping, the teeth of the comb a whispering caress. His body grew heavy, as if tied down with the leaden weights he used to inwardly gripe about as a young disciple while learning the swift-moving steps. 

As Wen Kexing began to pull away, Zhou Zishu fumbled for his wrist. "Lao Wen, will you do this for me in the morning?"

Wen Kexing met his gaze; it was the parting of clouds to reveal the sun. There was a softness to the light in his eyes. Gently, he pried the jade hairpin from Zhou Zishu's grip, setting both pin and comb by the bedside. 

"Everyday, a-Xu. For as long as we both live." 

Zhou Zishu slept through most of the day, waking only when the sun had sunk below the horizon. Even so, he was barely cognizant enough to force down a bowl of soup and proceeded to pass out, dead to the world once more. Wu Xi seemed a little concerned by his lethargy, brows furrowed when he took his pulse again and again, but could not seem to pinpoint any grave detriment done to his already deteriorating body. At the very least, the treatment was not doing further harm and at best, it was borrowing some much needed time for his meridians to be repaired.  Forcing his meridians into accelerated reconstruction while easing the load off them by the daily recirculation process was one thing but in the intervening periods, his meridians still had to weather the unrelenting force of his qi. He certainly felt the physical toll of it, especially right after each recirculation attempt. Perhaps passing out was truly a small mercy. 

The next few days passed in a similar fashion. True to his word, Wen Kexing came by every morning. Sometimes, he chose to fill the silence with his usual nattering, deft fingers quickly pinning up Zhou Zishu’s hair with ease while he plied him with hackneyed lines of poetry. Other times, he took his time, playing quietly with the tails of his hair. Each time though, without fail, he slid the jade pin through the thicket of his hair bun as though he were an artist putting the last flourishes to a masterpiece. Ah, but why should he bother to put his hair up at all when he would have to take it all down a mere few shichen later? There was a cherished absurdity to this daily ritual, a tenuous promise in the act itself. 

Today was one of the better days. By early evening, Zhou Zishu was fairly lucid, propped up against a frankly frightening number of pillows, scavenged from multiple rooms and proudly presented to him by Gu Xiang the day the treatment started. The gentle notes of floral incense lingered in the room. 

There was the sound of shoes scuffling by the door. It stopped, then started again as the door slid open. 

“Chengling?” He glanced at the boy hovering in the doorway with some surprise. Funny how quickly things coalesced into habit. Lao Wen’s attentive ministrations had become so commonplace these few days that it was odd that it was not the man himself bringing him dinner. 

"Shifu." Zhang Chengling greeted as he trotted in, setting the tray of food on the bedside table. Zhou Zishu blinked. That was a lot more food than usual: a bowl of steaming rice, filled to the brim, a bowl of soup, and several side dishes.

"Chengling ah, have you eaten?" He picked up the bowl of rice, and started partitioning some out onto one of the plates that had more room to spare. 

Zhang Chengling nodded but was undermined by the traitorous growl of his stomach. He flushed. "Shifu, I've really already eaten just now." Then, in a smaller voice, "I may have eaten a little quickly. I just didn't want these dishes to grow cold." 

"Shazi." He could imagine how this foolish disciple of his must have wolfed down a few mouthfuls of food, barely tasting it, before rushing over to deliver his food. "You could have just brought food for two and eaten here with me. Here, help your shifu with this. I can't finish all of this on my own." 

Zhang Chengling accepted the plate of food with a sheepish grin. Ah, to be a growing young lad again. He could only imagine how much effort his shiniang had to put in to feed so many bottomless stomachs when Siji Manor was in its prime, filled to the brim with a whole gaggle of gangly disciples.

Zhou Zishu ate at a sedate pace. Truth be told, he was rarely truly hungry these few days. Sure, the treatment process sapped a lot of his energy but he was often left nauseated and wracked with pain, much of his appetite washed down the drain. Even now, the lingering bloom of a headache and the odd flash of heat across the plains of his body left him feeling innervated. He washed down a mouthful of rice with some soup and paused, eyebrows climbing up his forehead. Zhang Chengling looked a little out of sorts, furrowed brows accompanied by an uncharacteristic thousand-yard stare. 

"What're you in a daze for?" 

Zhang Chengling whipped his head up so quickly Zhou Zishu was almost worried he might break his neck. "Nothing, shifu!" 

Zhou Zishu narrowed his eyes. Nothing, his foot. He who was committing heinous acts would naturally feel ill at ease. No matter, he had plenty of experience coaxing words out of unwilling mouths. 

"What's wrong, is shishu running you into the ground with his teachings? Surely it cannot be worse than the long hours of practice you've been subjected to." 

"Shifu…" A bolt of alarm dashed through him at the way the boy refused to meet his gaze. Was there something wrong with Lao Wen? 

"Chengling, look at me." Zhou Zishu's tone was one that brooked no argument, the edge of steel in it having been known to make grown men cry. "Is something the matter with your shishu?" 

Zhang Chengling finally looked up, a light sheen of tears blurring his eyes. "It's not that… It's Cao da-ge. We recently got wind of what happened to his shifu. They say that some of his sect's disciples and his shifu were ambushed by a legion of Scorpion operatives while en route for… for some sect business." 

Mo Huaiyang. Duxie must have known about the three liuli fragments in his possession. It was rather unlike him to strike out in the open, though. He, or perhaps Prince Jin himself, must have gotten impatient. In another world, he would have lain in wait for a more opportune moment, perhaps waited for bloodshed and chaos to be unleashed and reaped the benefits without dirtying his own hands. But the key to the armoury… it must still be in the Ghost Valley, or with Lao Wen himself. They still would not be able to access the armoury without it. 

Then, in a smaller voice, Zhang Chengling added, "They must have somehow gotten hold of the armoury key as well. Maybe there was a mole within the Ghost Valley. The key went missing after the ambush on the Qingfeng Sword sect entourage. Shishu looked really furious." 

"How long ago was this?" Knowing Duan Pengju, having assembled all the fragments and the key, they must already be en route to the armoury by now. What did Prince Jin want from the Wuku? The Yinyang scrolls to treat his internal injury? No, the Prince he knew was not as small-sighted as this, even if there were personal stakes at play. Ah, there was no time to waste thinking about the fine details of it now. He set the rice bowl down and started to get to his feet. Alas, the spirit was willing but the flesh was weak. Twin bolts of pain shot up the pillars of his legs and nausea sank its teeth into his belly. He shot out a hand to steady himself on the bed frame, grimacing at how the tiny motion rekindled the lines of fire along the lengths of his arms.

"Shifu!" Zhang Chengling was at his side in a flash. "Shifu, it's all my fault, I shouldn't be blabbering about all this to you." He knocked his own temple with a loose fist and muttered to himself, "Shishu will have my hide if he knew." 

Ah, Lao Wen ah. He could scarcely believe that he would have been that careless with something bequeathed to him through the blood and suffering of his parents. What was he up to? Was he baiting the tiger into the jaws of a steel trap, with the armoury key as the coveted meat on the hook? The praying mantis hunts the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind him. Could Lao Wen be sure that he was truly the oriole this time? Or perhaps, having shed the past sins of the Valley and reclaiming the pelt of human skin, had he grown soft, basking in the reclaimed light of a life that should have been his from the start? Zhou Zishu would not begrudge him that. Heavens only knew how he had longed for that eponymous window of light, when each day in Tianchuang had only led him further into darkness. 

There was a strange lethargy buoying his limbs. He collapsed back onto the bed, a dandelion in freefall, the weight of his eyelids at odds with the lightness in his body.  

First thing… First thing in the morning tomorrow… He was going to have words with Lao Wen. 

The last thing he saw was an inexplicable look of horrified realisation on his disciple's face. 

Zhou Zishu surfaced from a long, dreamless sleep with a gasp. 

Sunlight slanted in through the narrow slits of the heavily-papered windows. It had been barely dusk when he had closed his eyes. Unease was an unfurling lotus flower in the pit of his stomach.  Ignoring his protesting muscles, he propped himself up, hands scrabbling against the bedside table for purchase. A cup veered dangerously close to the edge and he clumsily steadied it with one hand, casting a cursory glance over at the table. 

The hairpin. 

It was gone. 

The sense of foreboding grew, settling underneath his skin like the first snow of winter creeping in under the guise of night. He pushed himself off the bed, the coldness of the floorboards seeping into his bare feet. The hallway outside was cast in an orange glow, the papered doors belching and caving with the faint motion of the wind. He felt like he was moving through the limpid waters of a dream, strangely disconnected from the motions of his body. He grasped instinctively at the reins of his meridians, a stutter of qi quickening his steps. 

"Lao Wen?" 

His gut told him that the room would be empty, stemming from the very same instinct that gripped him by the throat when he first noticed the hairpin’s absence. Even so, faced with the sight of a made bed, clearly unslept in, the distinct lack of familiar robes draping over the back of the seat by the dressing table… 

His knees hit the floor; he was a puppet with his strings cut. The sweet tang of blood burst, overripe, on his tongue. 

Everyday, a-Xu, for as long as we both live.

The words rattled around in his head, a long thread slowly fraying as he picked and worried away at it. 

Lao Wen! Had he yet again gone where he couldn't follow?  

Another sharp bloom of iron swelled up in his throat, and his last thread of consciousness unspooled along with it.

Chapter Text

There was a dream-like quality to the shifting miasma of sunlight on the far wall. A sense of déjà vu drenched him in cold sweat. For a moment, Zhou Zishu was back in that unfamiliar inn room, the last image of Lao Wen’s serene, bloodied smile as he hurtled from the cliff an indelible imprint in his mind. What was real and what was a figment of his own creation? 

His heart wanted to thunder out of his chest. It was only when the blurry figure to his right coalesced into a familiar form that he felt like he could breathe again, a thin whistle of air slipping through from between his teeth. 

“Zishu!” Beiyuan exclaimed, the scroll in his hand tumbling to the floor in a clatter. “Thank Heavens you’re awake.” 

Zhou Zishu shuddered back into reality, hands scrabbling at bedsheets. “Lao Wen. Where...?” 

At that, Beiyuan got a slightly pinched look to his face. A hand came to rest on his, patting lightly. “Wen-gongzi set off for the armoury just about three days ago. Cao-shaoxia and Gu-guniang ended up tagging along. We’re not sure when he will return but he did say he would send word if he could. It shouldn’t be long now.” 

Ah, he had been out for longer than he had thought, then. The vice-like grip that had his heart in a chokehold relaxed infinitesimally. Surely Lao Wen would not risk that little brat’s life, even if he might be less careful with his own. And yet, he could not shake the feeling of disquiet, nor could he forget the visceral punch to the gut he had felt at the discovery of the hairpin having gone missing. Why else would he have taken it along with him? Or perhaps it would have made more sense to have left it behind if he were truly on a final ill-advised crusade, a little something for him to remember him by. Ah, perhaps he was reading too much into it. 

Wu Xi was suddenly by his side, an inscrutable look on his face. “You’re awake at last. Drink.” 

He cupped the back of Zhou Zishu’s head, the other hand gently tipping the bowl of medicine against his lips. Zhou Zishu swallowed it all with some difficulty. It felt like there were brambles growing along the inner walls of his throat. When they had made the promise to go drinking when they had last parted ways so many years ago, he had not imagined that this was what it would entail. Thinking thus, an uncontrollable swell of mirth burst forth from within and he hacked out a string of chuckles that petered off into coughs. 

“Is he running a temperature?” Beiyuan asked, concern marring his fine features as his eyebrows steadily climbed up his forehead. He placed a hand over Zhou Zishu’s forehead, looking even more baffled. 

“He’s lucky to be alive with that stunt he pulled.” Wu Xi remarked placidly, although there was nothing very placid about his gaze. “What part of ‘do not use your qi’ is so difficult to grasp for the ex-leader of Tianchuang?” Then, to Beiyuan, “Perhaps I should have upped the dosage of sleeping aid in his food after all.” 

So there was something in his food! Zhou Zishu glared at him, the effect of it somewhat diminished by the beleaguered air that was hard to divest himself of considering the sorry state of bedrest he was in. Beiyuan sighed and then suggested rather delicately, “that Wen-gongzi of yours… Maybe the two of you should have a talk when he gets back.” 

Zhou Zishu inwardly agreed but he was too tired to delve into the intricacies of such a conversation which inevitably had too many landmines. He stared at a point above his head instead, blinking once, twice, and then more furiously as he felt his vision blur and warp. A familiar tightness was spreading like a spiderweb of chainmail across his chest and lines of pain marched up and down his limbs and torso. Something was desperately trying to excavate him from inside-out and his body decidedly did not like that. He gritted his teeth. 

Wu Xi took one look at his face and  grimaced. He looked genuinely apologetic as he took his wrist, examining his pulse. “I’m afraid this is the best we can do for the time being. I’m not sure you’re strong enough to undergo a round of recirculation right now but the medicine needs to get into your system if there is to be any hope of your meridians holding out at all." 

"How long do I have," Zhou Zishu ground out. It would be a pity should his body wither away if… no, when Lao Wen returned. 

"No one is dying on my watch," Wu Xi snapped. He pinched the bridge of his nose and let out an exhale as Beiyuan placed gentle hands on his shoulders and kneaded. "The medication coupled with the numerous recirculation attempts had been working so far. This is just… a setback. For now, an increased dosage of the medication will have to do." 

Then, deliberately gentling his tone, "Zishu, I know you must be used to treating your body as no more than a tool these past years. You must know that this road to recovery will be a long one." 

After that, there were no more words, just Beiyuan's quiet presence and the nondescript sounds of Wu Xi’s bustling against the silent wash of pain. There was nothing to do but wait patiently for the sweet surrender of unconsciousness. 

The next time, some indeterminate amount of time later, Zhou Zishu awoke to the now-familiar sensation of a faintly warm damp cloth swiping over the flesh between his fingers. The cloth soothed its way around his wrist, tracing a line up his forearm as careful fingers rucked up the sleeves of his inner robes.

"'M not getting naked." 

A pregnant pause, and then the tinkle of familiar laughter. Lao Wen! 

"A-Xu ah, who has been helping to clean you up in my absence? Should I be having words with them?" Hidden under all that mirth was an edge to that well-loved voice. 

His eyelids felt unbelievably heavy and gummy, as if someone had deigned it necessary to pour wax over them. He frowned. He was probably the one doing that to some poor soul or another back in his Tianchuang days. 

"Lao Wen, c'mere. I can't see you." He slurred, the hand not entrapped by the wet cloth flapping uselessly. It was suddenly of extreme importance that he saw that beloved face again. 

Another laugh, this time throatier and sounding like it came from deep within his belly. "That's because your eyes are closed, esteemed Zhou-daren." 

Still, the voice came closer until Zhou Zishu could feel his breath, the flutter of bird's wings, against his cheek. Fingertips brushed gently against his heavy eyelids. 

"Rest, xingan. I'm here now." 

Awareness continued to steal by in flashes. He was unsure which of it came to him in fever dreams and which of it was actually real. His veins were makeshift vessels haphazardly plastered into a whole from the sum of its parts, his blood, splinters caught in the unsealed gaps. He was a wine gourd slowly leaking. He remembered large hands pressing against his shoulder blades, felt as though they were reaching into him and pinching splintering vessels closed. He remembered the rise and fall of agitated voices, the sweep of a hand over his brow, the pungent drip of liquid down his throat. Over and over, like a broken pinwheel in the wind. 

And then, blissfully, nothing. 

The final time he blinked awake, Wen Kexing's face hovered just above his, his hair a dark spill of ink over his shoulder. His customary hair-piece was missing, his hair a loose fan around his face. 

For a moment that seemed to stretch into eternity, neither of them spoke, merely resting in the intimacy of sharing breaths. Then, absurdly, as if he were the one surfacing from a long sleep, Wen Kexing shuddered, drawing in a deep breath. His eyes were wild with tenderness as he swept the stray hairs from Zhou Zishu's face. 

Lao Wen, Zhou Zishu tried to say. His tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. 

A dribble of water pressed past his lips, accompanied by the soft crush of another mouth. So that was how he was being fed while he was unconscious. Ai, Lao Wen's shamelessness truly knew no bounds, taking advantage of an invalid while he was down! 

As if sensing the direction his thoughts had taken, Wen Kexing's expression morphed into the very picture of a wronged maiden, doe eyes liquid, trembling lips downturned. "A-Xu, don’t look at me like that… What was this shidi supposed to do? Let you wither and shrivel away into a dried husk?” 

At any other time, he was sure to have seized the chance to turn it into yet another attempt at flirtation. He must have truly worried Lao Wen this time. "Although of course, if a-Xu was left wanting and longs for a repeat performance under different circumstances…" Wen Kexing cast him a leer for good measure, although the effect was somewhat ruined by the wetness of his eyes. 

Ah, there he was. Zhou Zishu felt his lips twitch into a semblance of a smile, just a sliver of teeth between the cracked terrain of his lips. He was sure his smile looked as ghastly as he felt. 

Wen Kexing looked at him like it was the singular most beautiful thing in the world. 

"A-Xu." He murmured but failed to follow it up with anything else. “A-Xu, a-Xu, a-Xu…” 

Zhou Zishu let him, calmly tracking the shape of his mouth with his eyes. There was something intrinsically wondrous about having someone’s name to call and to have one’s name so carefully spoken, held like a beloved toy in the unbearably soft palate of a puppy’s mouth, a pearl nestled in the velvet of one’s palm. For the first time in a long while, he allowed himself to believe that there was time enough for such things. 

It was a good few days before Zhou Zishu was able to resume his earlier treatment plan. The taste of the medication was an old friend by now, and he could now gulp it down without so much as a twitch of his eye. Even the initial scream of post-recirculation agony felt less acute. The same stoicism, however, could not be said to be extended to the very many revelations that were being unearthed this morning. 

“Is that what I think it is,” Zhou Zishu asked flatly as Wen Kexing plucked two scrolls from the recesses of his wide sleeves and presented it on the bedside table with a flourish. He was still propped up against the pillow, unabashed in how his veritable birdnest of hair was still waiting to be made presentable. The very same man who said hair-combing duty was entrusted to had burst into his room earlier than usual, a slightly manic gleam in his eye. 

Zhou Zishu eyed the sprawling characters on the scrolls with some trepidation. The Yinyang scroll. He squinted. The Yinyang scroll and apparently, a hitherto-unknown continuation of it set apart in a separate scroll.  “If this is some other harebrained scheme of yours that involves harvesting your organs in order to keep my life force going, I don’t want it.” 

Wen Kexing shot him a very put-upon look. “I happen to like my organs where they are, thank you.” Zhou Zishu relaxed, tension that even he was unaware of bleeding out of his frame. “Somehow everyone had grown fixated on the upper scroll and the bottom scroll had faded into obscurity. The frankly ghastly things in the upper scroll certainly was splendid fodder for overactive imaginations and wagging tongues.” Wen Kexing tutted. “The bottom scroll is less horrific than you’d expect. It’s a, ah, cultivation manual of sorts. I think it'd help with enhancing the protection around your meridians. At least, based on what Dawu said." 

His eyebrows ticked upward slowly. A cultivation manual? 

“And how did you come by this? Did Duxie or Duan Pengju just happen to willingly hand it off to you out of the goodwill of his heart after you hijacked his plans to ransack the armoury?” 

We Kexing laughed. It was not a friendly sound. “I’m sure that the fearsome scorpion must be enjoying his wintry burial at this point, with the rest of his dismal entourage of operatives accompanying him into the depths of Hell itself.” He sniffed. “If anything, they were riding on my coattails.” He mimed pulling at an invisible hairpin from his own hair bun. “A pity that they were too busy scrambling away like dumb ducks in a torrential river to notice that the real key was in my hair all along.” 

Zhou Zishu noted that he had deliberately said nothing about Duan Pengju. He filed that away for future questioning, more intent on unravelling a different, more pressing thread of query. 

“So I’ve been wearing the key to the armoury on top of my head this whole time?” Zhou Zishu felt rather foolish. That certainly explained its absence. Not a hidden message about parting and death but a perfectly sensible, practical reason. Of course. 

“Of course, who else but you would I have entrusted it to? A-Xu, don’t be upset, I’m more than happy to craft a replacement for you. Ah, but I can’t guarantee that it will be the key to another legendary armoury!” Wen Kexing was very animated for someone who had presumably gotten up at the crack of dawn. A steaming bowl of beancurd, lovingly made by said man, still sat untouched on the table. 

“Am I that petty,” he scoffed. Wen Kexing’s face fell a little inexplicably. Zhou Zishu felt momentarily wrong-footed. Was he supposed to have demanded for a replacement? Was Lao Wen aware of the meaning that lay behind a token like this, beyond the fact that that particular hairpin had doubled as an all-important key and needed to be safeguarded by someone he trusted? He cleared his throat to hide his confusion, wobbly hands reaching out for the bowl of beancurd that Wen Kexing wordlessly handed over to him. 

Then, something occurred to him. 

“Was Prince Jin there?” Zhou Zishu asked urgently. 

Wen Kexing frowned, his voice sharp enough to draw blood. “That scoundrel? Why should you care if he was?” His face turned even darker. “If he had dared to show his face, I would have loved to rend him limb from limb.” 

Zhou Zishu relaxed. Ah, it was a good thing that he had not been present then. His death would have caused chaos in the Imperial court, the other circling wolves surely taking the chance to strike in the ensuing power vacuum. Distasteful as it was, there was still safety in the status quo, in known variables. Thoughtfully, he slurped at a mouthful of beancurd, gaze still on Wen Kexing's thunderous face. 

“- no, I would have severed each finger and toe and served it to him first. Then, as he slowly bled dry, I would have returned the pain he dealt you a hundred-fold.”

Zhou Zishu held his gaze, undaunted and far from repulsed. As he watched, the shadow over that face gradually bled away. It was a fascinating transformation, to say the least, the way furrowed brows gave way to the downturned strokes of "eight" and how teeth that were bared into a silent snarl melted into an indulgent smile. 

“A-Xu, do you not know that it’s poor form to talk about another man while you’re with me?” Wen Kexing affected an exaggerated pout, clever fingers reaching out to twine around the soft downy wisps of hair at Zhou Zishu's temples. 

Zhou Zishu caught his hand in his with the other hand that was not precariously balancing the empty bowl. Wen Kexing's eyes went wide, lips shaping almost comically into an "o". 

"I'm going back to bed," Zhou Zishu informed him. "That was too much excitement for one morning for little old me."

Wen Kexing dutifully took the bowl from him, something softer than tofu lingering in his eyes. A beat, and then he was reaching over to guide him back down into bed with steady hands, tucking the quilt over and around him. As Zhou Zishu rolled over to face the wall, quilt tucked securely around him, he felt a firm touch tread over the curve of his bottom, the warmth of a large hand unmistakeable even through layers of fabric. Before he could react, the sound of footsteps had already receded, the door sliding shut.

Bastard, he thought fondly.

The waning light of the day cast an ephemeral glow over the assorted cutlery and dishes laid out on the dining table. Wen Kexing had disappeared midway through the afternoon, right before Zhou Zishu drifted off into another siesta, and had, apparently, cooked up a storm in the kitchen. Under the watchful eye of Wu Xi, Zhou Zishu was deemed to finally be acceptably lucid and energetic enough to partake in the evening festivities. 

And so now, here he was, sitting through yet another rendition of their escapades. 

For all that she often spoke before thinking things through, he was loath to admit that Gu Xiang truly had a gift for storytelling, even if it was not exactly in the ah, conventional sense. A lot of colourful turns of phrases. It was almost easy to imagine being there with them, atop the snowy mountain with Scorpion and Tianchuang operatives dotting the white plains. His mood soured slightly, his thoughts shifting to Duan Pengju. Who knew if that man had survived the snowy blitz? He had a knack for getting out of the worst of situations relatively unscathed, a skill that he grudgingly acknowledged was valued in the line of work he had left behind. Ah, even if he died, someone else would take his place, much like how a hydra’s head would regrow, two-fold, for each head taken off. Even so, it would have been satisfying to see the light leave his eyes for good, considering his part in orchestrating Han Ying’s death. 

“Well, and since we blew out part of the mountainscape earlier to squash them to death like ants under a boot, we had trapped ourselves unwittingly within the Wuku,” Gu Xiang paused and widened her eyes for dramatic effect. 

Across the table, Zhang Chengling sat, elbows propped up on his knees, a spoonful of rice halfway to his mouth but not quite making it there as he listened raptly. Ye Baiyi, on the other hand, had no such problem, already onto his third bowl of rice. How this qianbei had managed to remain fed all this while was truly a mystery to him. Adjacent to the pair of junior and senior, Beiyuan and Wu Xi had twin looks of indulgence on their faces, having heard variants of this story multiple times. 

"And then, and then," Gu Xiang gesticulated with her pair of chopsticks, almost taking out Cao Weining's eyes with them. Cao Weining, bless his heart, merely ducked, eyes wide, and then proceeded to ply her rice bowl with an assortment of dishes that she was too busy waffling to take notice of. Ah, truly a keeper, this one. "Master blew a hole through the wall of collapsed rock and snow with successive strokes of pure, unadulterated qi!" 

"Alright, alright," Wen Kexing groused but looked fairly pleased with himself despite his disgruntled air. "Ai, have some mercy for your poor husband-to-be. So much nattering!" 

Cao Weining waved his hands in front of him. “Not at all, not at all! It is a gift to be blessed with the sound of ah-Xiang’s dulcet tones.” In spite of himself, Wen Kexing huffed out a laugh. It was good to see the boy looking and sounding a bit more like himself. In the initial wake of the news of his shifu’s death, he had been a subdued ghost, and then later, an angry wraith seeking retribution for the wrongs committed against his shifu and his sect brothers. 

"Speaking of said husband-to-be…" Zhou Zishu was a dog with a bone and he was not letting this one go. "What ever happened to the grand wedding between these two lovebirds?" 

Gu Xiang's face flushed and she stuck her tongue out in retaliation. "Hey, sickly ghoul, wasn't it because of you that we're postponing it?" Next to her, Cao Weining flapped a hand in a placating manner, trying to salvage the situation. “Zhou-dage, we couldn’t in good conscience get married without you there!” 

Zhou Zishu blinked. The patchwork quilt of consciousness and unconsciousness that had made up his hours for the past weeks had had a strange effect on his recollection. It was as if he was looking at a large hanging picture but through the sliver of a keyhole, being accorded a small field of view at any one time. It had indeed been a long while since Cao Weining had shyly asked for Gu Xiang's hand in marriage and he had assumed the natural progression of things would have culminated in a wedding. But of course, between the tragedy of having one’s shifu murdered in exchange for a few scant fragments of liuli and trying to exact revenge and figure out a way out of an avalanche-covered armoury, there was little breathing room for anything else. It just failed to occur to him that he would have been such a major factor, given that he was only an ambiguous elder figure to Gu Xiang (and Cao Weining) by proxy via his… whatever it is he had going with Wen Kexing. 

"What have I told you about calling him that?" Wen Kexing flicked her forehead with deadly precision, his tone light but his gaze hooded. She had the good grace to look chastised this time, sinking back into her seat with a pout and a vague look of apology in his direction. "Sorry, Uncle Zhou…" 

His thoughts were still a sluggish stream of river silt ever since he properly awoke. He barely registered some indignance at being called “Uncle” by that little brat who was not even that much younger than him, truth be told. By the time he returned to his senses, his bowl had already been piled high with an assortment of dishes: leafy stalks of kailan, a bevy of beans and lotus root, the silky upturned belly of steamed fish, dotted with ginger and scallions. Dishes that were curated to be light and easy on the stomach. 

"Eat, a-Xu." Wen Kexing admonished, chopsticks still wavering in the air before him. 

A line of warmth curled, like a softly unfurling vine, around him and it had nothing to do with the heat of the food he just swallowed. Dutifully, he shovelled vegetable and fish into his mouth in lieu of answering, something tenderly mortifying about being seen and cared for in this way. 

Perhaps it was the foreign feeling of having enough food to warm his stomach (without nausea reaching in and grabbing his intestines), or perhaps it was the soft threads of conversation weaving through the air. He felt his eyelids growing heavy, the hand propping up his chin on the table wavering like a china plate spinning on a stick. There was a noticeable quietude that had fallen over the table when suddenly, he felt a hand on his waist. Without warning, another hand snaked under the back of his knees and he was being bodily lifted into the air. His eyes flew wide open, all traces of sleep chased out of his being. 

“Wen. Ke. Xing!” 

“En? I’m here! No need to call quite so loudly, dearest.” That bastard! If he had another mushy sticky thought about this man like the one he had earlier, he would rather be transmogrified into a dog right here and now!  

Distantly, he heard Beiyuan let out a long whistle, laughing, “Zishu, let me know if you still want that thin-waisted beauty from Nanjiang after this!” Ah, he was never going to live this down. 

In retribution, Zhou Zishu let himself hang fully limp in his arms as he was carried unceremoniously through the hallway. There, Lao Wen could take his whole weight, if that was what he so wanted, he thought uncharitably. Wen Kexing did not complain, merely shifting his weight around in his arms casually as if he were burdened not with the weight of a whole man - and a trained killer at that - but a measly sack of potatoes. Zhou Zishu pointedly did not grow hot under his collar thinking about that. 

Wen Kexing kicked the door open, carrying his stony-faced cargo into Zhou Zishu’s room. Actually, at this point, it was hard to say whose room it belonged to. It had been Wen Kexing’s room originally; however, after that night when Wen Kexing had drunk himself into a cheerful stupor and Zhou Zishu had carted him off to his own bed (then proceeded to drink himself into a cheerless stupor about his accelerated hurtle toward death, frightening the wits out of his poor disciple), they had more or less swapped rooms unknowingly and it had since stuck that way. 

Wen Kexing set him down on the bed with care. Zhou Zishu immediately rolled out of his grasp like an offended cat. He gave him a thin smile and turned to leave but Zhou Zishu caught his wrist. "Lao Wen.” 

Wen Kexing did not turn to face him but stopped in his steps, the curve of his back slowly caving under the weight of some invisible burden. 

“Lao Wen.” He tried again, voice softening into the tender underbelly of something as non-threatening and non-demanding as possible. 

"They slit her throat." Wen Kexing muttered darkly, apropos to nothing. “The messenger that volunteered to be sent out to meet that lying snake Duxie. She never killed anyone in her life. When this was all done and over, I would have found a way to let her, and others like her, re-enter the human world.” 

The wheels of his mind started spinning into overdrive. When that silly disciple of his had told him that there was a mole in the Ghost Valley, he had thought that there was something too simplistic in that secondhand account. Coupled with the fact that the real key to the armoury was with Wen Kexing all along, the key that was present in the Ghost Valley was clearly meant as a red herring. The only problem lay in when and how to deliver it into Duxie’s hands without arousing too much suspicion. He guessed that perhaps the key might have been presented as part of another barter; previously, his daring rescue from Tianchuang in exchange for Zhao Jing’s complete and utter humiliation in front of the world at large, and now, the key in exchange for… what? Leaving the Ghost Valley in relative peace? What did Duxie stand to gain from razing them to the ground in the first place? Or perhaps it was for Tianchuang’s benefit; ruthless certainty was prized over measly concepts of honor of not kicking one’s enemy while they were down. The Ghost Valley had always been one of the few things that gave Tianchuang cause for concern.  In any case, it would have been a win-win scenario for them: save their breath and get the key through the trade, then storm the armoury and pillage it of its secrets; if they truly still saw the Ghost Valley as a threat then, it would have been even easier to burn it to the ground with the supposed wonders of the Wuku. 

Alas, the Heavens had other plans for them. Or more precisely, Wen Kexing had other plans for them. 

As for when to deliver the key and the terms of the trade… He was certain that it was not an accident that the key had been offered up soon after the news of Mo Huaiyang’s unfortunate demise. As to where Cao Weining’s shifu was en route to, that was a little more open-ended. Truly just sect business or something a little less on the straight and narrow? There was a tenuous thread of connection somehow between the two events but it was hard to connect the dots, fumbling in the murky waters of the river as he was. 

Now wasn’t the time to push, either. 

“You weren’t there, Lao Wen.” Zhou Zishu rubbed his thumb over the divot of his wrist, almost in apology. He had a niggling feeling that Valley Master Wen would have been able to sort things out in person earlier, had it not been for him. “You couldn’t have known.” 

Wen Kexing finally whirled around, breaking free of his grasp, a wild look in his eye. “I should have. I should have known that anything else would have been too good to be true.” 

Then, muttering more to himself than to him, “Duxie deserved a slower death than the one I gave him at the armoury, drawn out till the end of time.” Wen Kexing started pacing the length of the room, a caged tiger prowling. Zhou Zishu followed his movement with his eyes, growing a little faint by the dizzying back-and-forth motion. 

“I thought that with all that had been said and done, the  path back to the human world would be clear-cut. No more death, no more darkness. And yet, cursed harbinger that I am… "

The anguish in his voice had not been diluted by the tide of time, still raw as a broken trunk cleaved into two. Zhou Zishu could only imagine the amount of agony he kept bottled deep within, each small hurt over the years carefully catalogued and held fast in his bare hands, no matter that those hands would bleed and bleed with each visceral reminder of pain. At first, the small, vulnerable hands of a child, fisting, helpless, in the bloodied clothes of his parents' corpses. Then, the strong bracket of hands, more ghost than man, that learned to crush and cleave and maim, to transmute the hurt into another being. 

And yet, those same hands had never quite forgotten the meaning of tenderness. The very same hands must have held Gu Xiang’s tiny hands when she was but a small slip of a thing. They had held Zhang Chengling’s shoulders when he had awoken, snot-faced and inconsolable, from the throes of yet another nightmare. He knew that they had been unbearably gentle around his own waist, each night he had awoken with the pain of the seven nails thrumming through his body. 

When Wen Kexing paced within reach, Zhou Zishu caught his hands in his. “Lao Wen, these hands of yours… They have never forgotten what it means to be human. And they won’t.” 

Wen Kexing startled, and then stilled. His gaze was molten, his eyes unfathomably dark except for the flickering reflection of candlelight in his irises. The lull in the conversation felt dangerously like an ellipsis left to fester. The gaping maw of a wound that was just barely starting to knit itself back together was now winking open again. 

Zhou Zishu watched as he closed his eyes, lashes trembling as he exhaled. Once. Twice. 

"Lao Wen ah, I’m not sure if you are aware, but you look like something a horse-drawn cart ran over," Zhou Zishu informed him without fanfare. Wen Kexing slanted a look at him. The bruised shadows under his eyes were showing. The slightly glazed look in his eyes was even more telling. No amount of rogue or powder, or cheerful jibes over dinner, could conceal that. 

Absurdly, it seemed like the right thing to say.

"I see how it is, this wife no longer has her youthful good looks and her husband starts giving her the cold shoulder. Ai, the beginning of the end of a marriage, indeed!" Wen Kexing lamented, eyes momentarily brightening in a way which lent little credibility to his theatrical wiping of his crocodile tears. 

"Who wants to be your husband," Zhou Zishu muttered but without any real heat as he flopped backward onto the bed. 

He drew down one corner of the quilt in clear invitation and rolled over to face the wall. There was a moment of silence, in which he wondered, maybe… maybe he wouldn’t stay. Then, the rustle of cloth as Wen Kexing changed out of his outer robes, when it came, was loud in the suddenly quiet room.  The bed dipped under Wen Kexing’s weight as he clambered on. A hand gingerly found its way around his waist. Zhou Zishu forced himself not to tense, his own body a vessel for the memories where bodies were tools and such closeness that had not been deliberately choreographed was a death sentence. He was sure it was much the same for Lao Wen. And yet, slowly, the wall of heat behind him inched closer until his back was flush against a familiar chest. They lay like this, one’s inhale transmuted into the other’s exhale, held and being held. It was a breathtaking moment of peace, and then: 

"A-Xu ah, there is something truly magical about this. Lying like this, just like two peas in a pod, or a walnut snug in its shell. Pork-and-chive filling oh-so-cosy within its dumpling wrapper. Look at us, two grains of sticky rice wrapped up in our very own lotus leaf!” 

How he had not foreseen that this man would wax lyrical about spooning in bed was truly an oversight on his part. "If you're going to keep this up, I'm going to kick you to the floor," Zhou Zishu grumbled. "The way I see it, you're the leftover fried rice, slightly charred, sticking to the bottom of my wok."  

There was a moment of stunned silence, in which Zhou Zishu worried that he might have gone too far. There was still a lingering quality of rawness, after Wen Kexing had laid bare the truth of what had transpired. "But you're the mouthful of rice that only I deign to eat," he quickly amended.  

As with all things that came out of his mouth in relation to Wen Kexing, he immediately regretted it. He felt the sweet curl of Wen Kexing's delighted grin against the nape of his neck. “A-Xu, the startling sweetness of that mouth of yours! I would gladly resign myself to being devoured by you any day.”

Inwardly, he groaned. Give the man an inch and he would take a whole mile. 

"Alright, alright. Even if you don't need it, this old one needs his beauty sleep." Thankfully, the man was merciful and did not bait him further. Even beautiful men like his Lao Wen needed proper sleep, not the surreptitious cat naps he had been taking in between his self-imposed care-taking duties. 

A soft exhale of breath against the shell of his ear, like the sigh of a candle before being put out for the night. “Rest well, a-Xu.”

Chapter Text

Morning came earlier than it should have.

"The one surnamed Wen, I know you're here. I saw you carry your blushing bride off to bed last night. So many other things to take care of and your one-track mind is just so eager to start digging into that dual cultivation manual of yours?" 

Zhou Zishu groaned and turned over with some difficulty, dislodging the arm that was slung about his waist. Dual cultivation manual? What on earth was he talking about? Had helping him with recirculating his qi finally addled his brains? Wen Kexing made a disgruntled noise, wandering hand making its way back to Zhou Zishu's waist. He was clearly awake, though, if the annoyed huffs of breath against his cheek were any indication. 

A moment of silence, in which Zhou Zishu fervently hoped that it meant that Ye Baiyi had grown bored of talking to the wall and silently left. Alas, it was not to be. "Wei, am I talking to a wall? I'm giving you two to the count of five to get dressed and make yourselves decent. I don't wish to see anything I'm not meant to."  

Zhou Zishu felt his ears grow hot. Just what did he think they had been up to?! Next to him, Wen Kexing let out a cat-like hiss, even as he righted himself and started draping on his outer robes as he was told. Paying him no mind, Zhou Zishu stared up at the uneven blots of sunlight dappling the ceiling. It was a surprisingly good night’s sleep but even so, exhaustion still settled into his bones like an old friend. Could one get tired of feeling tired? It would seem so. 

"One, two... five!" 

On cue, Ye Baiyi swept into the room, looking unfairly immaculate in comparison. 

"Old toad monster, has nobody taught you to count? Or do you just have cotton for brains?" Wen Kexing sniped waspishly. He had just finished drawing the sash around his robes and sat back onto the bed where Zhou Zishu now sat upright, looking all the world like he very much preferred to be horizontal again. Eyes narrowed, Ye Baiyi gave Zhou Zishu a once-over, gaze dragging from his explosion of a bed-head to his socked feet peeking out from beneath the quilt. He let out a harrumph, “Qin Huaizhang’s disciple, you’re looking better.” 

Wen Kexing gathered up the quilt with a flourish and drew it snugly over Zhou Zishu’s shoulders, glaring at Ye Baiyi as he did so with enough heat to melt all the snow on Changming mountain. “Wei, control your wandering eyes!” 

Ye Baiyi snorted. “As if you could control me.” Then, as if merely asking about the weather, “so when is esteemed Master Wen going back to the Valley as promised, hmm?” 

If Zhou Zishu was not fully awake before, he was now. He glanced at Wen Kexing who had stiffened to an impossible degree, the pulse in his jaw ticking like a firecracker about to be set off. Ah, he did recall that returning to the Valley was part of the terms of agreement set by the Sword Saint Immortal during the Heroes’ Conference, in exchange for others leaving the Valley Master (and the Valley) in relative peace. And yet, he was sure he had not read the situation wrong in that it was a set of terms that was loosely defined; whether Lao Wen chose to return for a short duration each time or for the foreseeable future was up to him, as long as the Valley was “sealed” in the general sense of the word, with no Ghosts wreaking havoc in the human world. 

So why was Ye qianbei being so forceful about it now? Judging by the amount of fire in Lao Wen’s gaze, it was a sore topic and probably one that the two of them had butted heads about more than once. He must have missed out on it during the days when he was still drifting in and out of consciousness. 

“Lao Wen, what’s he talking about?” 

Wen Kexing let out a noisy breath, looking as though he would rather someone pry his mouth open and plucked his teeth out there and then. “I have some pressing business back in the Valley, apparently.” 

Ah, that was not much to go on. 

Then, turning to Ye Baiyi, Wen Kexing was uncharacteristically quiet as he all but beseeched, "I have pressing business here too." 

Ye Baiyi scoffed. "Pressing business here? Your "pressing business" has since ceased to be pressing the moment he stopped hanging by the thread of his final breath. Look at him, does he look like he's about to kick the bucket any second?" Saying thus, he pointed an accusing finger at Zhou Zishu, as if admonishing him for having the gall to still be alive, never mind that he himself had an active role to play in prolonging his sorry lifespan. 

Zhou Zishu was not exactly thrilled about being referred to as if he were not right there.  He cleared his throat. "In case anyone has forgotten, I'm still here." 

Ye Baiyi paid him no mind. "Since this fool has survived all the odds he stacked against himself, shouldn't you be a good Valley Master and run along to sort out the mess that Xie-xiaozi left on your Valley doorstep?" 

A good few things were beginning to crystallise in his mind. The mess that Duxie had left on the doorstep of the Ghost Valley could only refer to the unfortunate massacre of Mo Huaiyang and the group of Cao Weining's sect brothers, unless there was some other trouble that he was unaware of. 

"The Valley doorstep?" Zhou Zishu casually inquired.

Ye Baiyi cast him a flat look. "Your lovely wife here didn't deign it necessary to let you know that the bunch of Qingfeng Sword Sect fools promptly expired right in front of the Ghost Valley's doors?"

So there was some truth to his conjectures, then. As to what Mo Huaiyang was doing at the Ghost Valley… He had been rather adamantly against his disciple associating with Gu Xiang, the flames fuelled by how he had all but eloped with her against his wishes. A sense of unease unfurled in the pit of his stomach. Instinct told him that Cao Weining and Gu Xiang must not be privy to this nugget of information. 

Wen Kexing shot to his feet, a snarl contorting his fine features. “Didn't I say not to bandy that around?" 

Ye Baiyi spread his arms, the picture of nonchalant innocence. "Why, afraid that that unruly girl of yours and your son-in-law will hear about it? Relax, I'm not about to run my mouth off and I'm sure the ex-leader of Tianchuang is better at keeping his mouth sealed than most." Then, he wrinkled his nose in annoyance. "Stop trying to derail this conversation. Are you or are you not going to get a move on? Or have you forgotten the promise you made in front of the whole jianghu that allowed you this new lease of life?" 

Ye qianbei was rarely deliberately malicious for the sake of it but this was truly grinding a thumb into the puckered edges of an old wound. For all that Wen Kexing had suffered, crawling out of that hellhole by digging his way out with bare, bloodied hands, this new life of his was what he deserved and no less. Zhou Zishu would love to speak to anyone - preferably with his sword or his fists, he wasn't  picky - in the jianghu who dared to disagree. And yet, the undercurrent of urgency in his voice certainly meant that there was some cause for concern; if anyone at the scene still lived at all, it would be no trouble spinning a tale about how the head of Qingfeng Sword Sect had met his demise at the hands of the Ghost Valley, never mind that it was actually Scorpion operatives that did the deed. 

Surprisingly, Wen Kexing did not rise to the bait, taking offence at something else altogether. "A-Xu's meridians are still fragile and he needs someone to work through the cultivation manual with him," he argued, hackles rising again. "And don't you dare try to suggest anyone else but me." 

Ye Baiyi let out a genuine bark of laughter. It was horrifying to hear actual mirth in this qianbei’s voice. “Oh ho, why, afraid that I’ll defile your ‘blushing virgin’?” The way his eyes creased into crescents suggested that he was clearly aware that said blushing virgin was, in fact, not a blushing virgin. 

"Anyone care to enlighten me what this cultivation manual everyone and their grandmother has been bandying around is all about?" Zhou Zishu finally exploded. The persistent headache that had been pounding out a pithy rhythm at his temples since he awoke was sorely exacerbated by listening to these two bickering like housewives who were fighting over the freshest fish at the market. 

The two of them exchanged glances, suddenly quiet. What, loud like a swarm of locusts when peace and quiet was preferred and now, silent as two colluding thieves when words were actually required? 

"Well, it's a dual cultivation manual, you get what's labelled on the tin." Ye Baiyi drawled and waggled his eyebrows for good measure. Against his better judgement, Zhou Zishu recoiled slightly at the terrifying look on his face. It only fanned the flames. “Chasing the rainclouds over Wushan, watering the chrysanthemums, sheathing one’s sword in another’s scabbard, shall I go on?” 

Zhou Zishu must have let out a noise of despair because he thankfully ceased his poorly veiled attempts at euphemisms. “Why, Qin Huaizhang’s disciple, are you actually afraid of your shidi eating your tofu?” 

Wen Kexing looked on the verge of stamping his foot. Someone was certainly intent on channelling his own purple-clad serving girl today. “Old monster! With your brain so full of horse shit, no wonder every word that comes out from your mouth is dirty!” Without further ado, he took a threatening step forward, fists already hurtling forth. 

“Lao Wen.” Zhou Zishu caught his fist, mid-swing, in his hands and desperately tried to salvage a situation that was quickly careening out of control, a horse-drawn cart with a wild thing for its steed. “I’m already on the mend, you don’t have to feel obliged to - ”

To take care of him in that sense? To be one with him in the throes of passion? To water his chrysanthemums? Who would be watering whose chrysanthemums? What did that even mean anyway? Zhou Zishu groaned inwardly. Sensible words often fled his mind when it came to Wen Kexing. For all he knew, Ye qianbei could be exaggerating the extent of the pleasures of the flesh required anyway. In any case, there was something overtly clinical about the whole idea, and perhaps “pleasure” was not quite the right word. 

“Shifu! Shishu, he’s missing, where - ” As they say, disasters come in twos. Or maybe threes or fours, who knows, just never singly. Zhang Chengling barrelled into the room, almost running head-first into a disgruntled Wen Kexing. Zhou Zishu was almost glad for the interruption; it certainly saved him from having to complete his sentence.

His disciple’s doe eyes seemed to take in the weird atmosphere all at once, darting between Ye Baiyi standing by the window in his full regalia and Wen Kexing, haphazardly dressed, by the bed, one of his clenched fists being held loosely in Zhou Zishu’s hands.  

“Shazi, have you come to find your shishu to make breakfast for you?” Zhou Zishu finally broke the silence, lips curled into a small smile. He did not release his grasp on Wen Kexing’s hand. 

Wen Kexing deliberately released the tension, inch by inch, from his frame. His fists unfurled slightly, nails catching lightly against the flesh of Zhou Zishu’s palm. 

“Lao Wen, look at how thin our starving disciple has grown.” He was laying it on a bit thick but desperate times truly called for desperate measures. He really needed to have words with Ye qianbei alone. 

Rolling his eyes, Wen Kexing gritted his teeth into a smile. “Chengling ah, don’t you know better than to disturb your shifu early in the morning?” Eyes still spitting fire, he forgot to retract the full force of his gaze and Zhang Chengling shrunk his neck back a little, a baby tortoise instinctively seeking the comforts of its shell. Then, as if realising that he was scaring the poor child, Wen Kexing softened his voice, reverting to his persona of a long-suffering housewife. “Alright, alright, this lowly servant shall go and make breakfast, lest everyone under this roof starves.” He patted Zhou Zishu’s hand before letting go, an unreadable look in his eyes as he gently shepherded Zhang Chengling out of the room.

“You should take him up on his offer.” Zhou Zishu looked up at Ye Baiyi, momentarily startled. Before he could speak, Ye Baiyi continued in that no-nonsense manner of his, “if you wish to ever wield a passable level of martial skill again, or whatever passes as passable in this generation, your meridians now will never make it. You’ll sooner blow a hole in them before you blow a hole in anyone else.”

Ah, he was wondering about that. There had been a marked improvement since the days when not even a flicker of qi had him almost shaking apart but he suspected that reaching even the level of martial skill after his departure from Tianchuang would exact a hefty toll on him. 

“Thank you for qianbei’s insights,” Zhou Zishu replied, mind still churning with the implications. Here was the confirmation of his ineptitude, the finality of a nail driven into a coffin, settling like lead in his veins. It wasn’t quite like giving up all his martial skill in exchange for ten more years of his life; he wouldn’t be a completely useless burden if dual cultivation was truly viable. He should be grateful he was alive at all. And yet… 

Ye Baiyi studied his face for a moment. “You were planning to accompany that idiot boy to the Valley, weren’t you.” It wasn’t a question and so he gave no answer. “In your state? Pah, don’t even think about it. In any case, some stones are still better left unturned, some shadows of one’s past kept from the light. Maybe he will be thankful for that.” 

Perhaps. Yet, the memory of Lao Wen’s face, flushed cherry blossom red with the heat of alcohol and pressed against his waist, rose unbidden in his mind. The way his lips had curved shyly into a vulnerable smile, a question in his eyes, as he lay with the quilt tucked up to his chin. Will you accompany me back to that courtyard where my parents’ corpses lay? I'm ashamed that I have not been back even though so many years have passed but with you… with you, I think I can. 

It felt a lot like someone reaching out for the light. 

The off-kilter feeling from that conversation lasted throughout lunch, and after. 

Normally, watching Gu Xiang and Cao Weining flirt (or attempt to, it was really quite amusing) and make eyes at each other would lift his spirits but today, Zhou Zishu could not help but think about what it would be like should a different scenario have unfolded. Had Mo Huaiyang and his entourage of sect disciples made such a long journey to the Ghost Valley just to vent their grievances about Cao Weining all but defecting from the sect? Or had they been desiring a more forceful conclusion to things? 

He shuddered just thinking about it, hand instinctively reaching for a drink to wash it away. His hand was immediately batted away by a keen-eyed Gu Xiang who had paused mid-sentence to glare at him and shift the wine jar out of reach. "Wei, you're still not allowed to drink!" 

Next to him, Wen Kexing cast her an approving look. "Looks like I haven't raised you for nothing all these years." He deftly picked up the teapot instead and filled Zhou Zishu's cup, gently nudging it in front of him. Then, apropos to nothing, he sighed. "Thoughtfulness is a mark of a good spouse." 

Cao Weining was beaming so wide that his face might split apart, eyes sliding over to his bride-to-be. Wen Kexing, however, was looking at Zhou Zishu, eyes dark with intent. "Of course, I hear beauty that does not age with time is what makes a marriage last but alas, not everyone can be blessed with such a peerless beauty." 

Zhou Zishu sipped at his tea, ears growing hot, not giving any indication that he had heard anything out of the ordinary. He nudged a large serving of ginger scallion chicken into Wen Kexing's bowl in hopes it would stop him from embarrassing him any further. It only made the man break into a smile that was soft as catkins, his free hand reaching up in a very unsubtle motion for Zhou Zishu's. 

"I think Cao-dage and Xiang-jiejie would make such a dashing pair in their wedding garb!" Zhang Chengling suddenly burst out, gaze skipping like tottering pebbles over his shifu and shishu's joined hands. 

Gu Xiang's mouth curled into a small pleased smile, even as she admonished, "Little gold bean, what do you know? Have you seen many couples getting married?" 

Cao Weining, on the other hand, looked positively thrilled, and gushed, seemingly more excited than the bride-to-be herself, "We went into town the other day to look at some fabrics and I just know ah-Xiang would look lovely in it!” Next to him, Gu Xiang turned her face away, flushing pink. 

"Have you decided where to hold the ceremony?" Zhang Chengling piped up again between mouthfuls of rice. This disciple of his sure had many questions today. 

Across the table, Beiyuan and Wu Xi exchanged glances. Beiyuan cleared his throat, looking apologetic. "Wu Xi and I would be happy to have you here, of course, but it’s likely that we will need to return to Nanjiang soon once Zishu’s recovery is more or less settled.” 

Cao Weining bobbed his head in an adorable attempt at sketching a bow while still seated. “That’s no trouble at all! We can hold it anywhere, really.”  

Wen Kexing huffed out a laugh. “Really? Are you going to marry our ah-Xiang in a shoddy straw hut on some dirt road if there was nowhere else to hold it?” There was no malice in his voice, however. Then, after taking his time to take a long sip from his cup, he continued, "I heard that Siji Manor is beautiful this time of the year." 

Zhou Zishu’s heart jolted in his chest. Swallowing back his surprise, he gave Wen Kexing an inquiring look. “Ever wondered where those new disciples of yours disappeared to?” Wen Kexing was laughing with his eyes. Ah, Lao Wen and his annoying habit of answering a question with another question. 

“You mean those disciples that you took in on my behalf, without asking me?” Zhou Zishu grumbled but without any real heat. He had an inkling as to where this was leading but it felt too much like a dream to be true. “Quit prevaricating, Lao Wen.” 

Zhang Chengling was hiding a smile behind his fist. Was his disciple in kahoots with his shishu, going behind his back again? 

“Well, on your behalf, Manor Lord Zhou,” Wen Kexing slanted a teasing look at him. “I’ve entrusted them with the onerous and highly important task of restoring the manor to its former glory. To the best of their abilities, of course.” He pitched the next sentence a few tones lower, dipping into something almost salacious. “Please punish this lowly one as you see fit.” 

Then, he turned to face the rest of the table, although he was clearly still speaking to him. “So what do you say, a-Xu, shall we go home?” Zhou Zishu inclined his head, not trusting himself to speak. His heart felt ready to burst at the seams. 

“To home!” Beiyuan lifted his wine cup in a toast and was joined by Wu Xi. Gu Xiang jostled Cao Weining with her elbow, and he quickly raised his cup as well. Zhang Chengling knocked back his cup with a grimace, nose wrinkling, but his eyes were shining. 

To home, Zhou Zishu echoed inwardly. The tea kindled a line of warmth down his throat. 

His thoughts about Siji Manor took on a cotton-like quality after completing one of his final few rounds of qi recirculation. Half-lounging on the bed, he almost slipped right off, were it not for Wen Kexing’s steadying hand. 

“Lao Wen.” His tongue was a particularly annoying ball of wet wool. He tried again. “Lao Wen.” 

Wen Kexing chuckled. “I’m here, a-Xu. Why do you call so sweetly for me?” 

As if that was not his favourite pastime, truly a case of the pot calling the kettle black! He told him as much, to which that insufferable man merely laughed some more. 

Fussing at the collar of Zhou Zishu’s robes, he carded a free hand through his unbound hair. “A-Xu ah, are you happy about going home?” 

“Why ask frivolous questions when you already know the answer.” Zhou Zishu feigned annoyance but his mouth quirked into a smile. “It would make me infinitely happier if you would stick around to wait on me hand and foot.” 

Wen Kexing hummed in response. “Don’t worry, a-Xu, I won’t leave you hanging. I’d ensure that my shixiong has settled in comfortably before I leave.” Then, with forced cheer, “I’ll be back before you know it.” 

"If you don't return from the Valley in one piece, I will personally find you and… " Zhou Zishu twisted around to look at him and stretched out a hand, miming as though he were slowly crushing the air, breath by sorry breath, from his neck. 

Wen Kexing's gaze was opaque. He caught that outstretched hand, fingers curling around his wrist, and pressed a kiss to his fingertips. Teeth caught on the pad of his fingers, a gentle scrape against the whorl of calluses. His eyes were dark, irises a blot against the white of his eyes. Then, slowly, eyes still trained on Zhou Zishu's face, he shifted his grasp on that hand, tongue coming up to lick a long stripe along the lifeline on his palm. 

"Ai, Lao Wen, I give you an inch and you take a mile." Zhou Zishu shrugged his hand out of the other man's grasp, infinitely more lucid than he had been at the start of the conversation.

"I could give you much more than an inch, if you asked nicely." Wen Kexing waggled his eyebrows, the lingering heat in his gaze only adding to the slightly manic edge in his voice. 

"I should hope that it's much more than an inch." Zhou Zishu muttered.

Wen Kexing’s smirk grew but quickly collapsed into a pensive look. “About the dual cultivation manual…” He trailed off, looking uncharacteristically wrong-footed. 

“It isn’t that bad, is it. We haven’t even read through it properly yet, or at least I haven’t.” Zhou Zishu tried for insouciance, unsure if he was succeeding. He was pushing and counting on Lao Wen to push right back. “I’m game if you are.” 

Wen Kexing held his gaze for a solid beat. Then, looking anywhere else but at him, he soldiered on, looking like a man walking to his death trial. “If… If you would prefer, you could choose someone else. Or, or… You could imagine I was someone else. If that’s something that you’d like.” 

Zhou Zishu gave him an exasperated look. “And who would I want you to pretend to be? I don’t want anyone else but you.” 

Wen Kexing did not reply but his whole being seemed to melt at that. He resumed carding through Zhou Zishu’s hair, although whether it was for the sake of his hands having something to do or if it truly comforted him, he did not know. 

“Given how there hasn’t been a known precedent before us, maybe it’s best if we get a chaperone,” Zhou Zishu mused. He was less worried about himself and more for Lao Wen, whose qi might not have truly recovered from the near qi deviation last time. 

“Who needs a chaperone,” Wen Kexing retorted. 

“What kind of bad karma did I accrue to be saddled with being your chaperone,” Ye Baiyi groused. 

“Nobody asked you,” Wen Kexing hissed. 

Zhou Zishu sighed, “I did. We did. We agreed to ask him, Lao Wen.” 

“I’m going to wait outside. Yell only if you’re dying.” Without further ado, Ye Baiyi tossed the scroll onto Wen Kexing’s face, the manual landing with a resounding thwack against his cheekbone. Wen Kexing glared at his receding back, a red mark starting to form on his cheek. 

"I guess we should, uh, get on with it." Zhou Zishu gestured vaguely in the direction of the scroll. Wen Kexing cleared his throat, head bobbing in agreement, as he sat down next to him, spreading the scroll with a flourish across their knees. 

They stared in silence for a moment. 

“I thought there would be pictures,” Wen Kexing commented, after a while. Zhou Zishu pinched the flesh just above his elbow with maybe an unnecessary amount of strength. “Ow!” 

Wen Kexing gave him a very pitiful look, lower lip jutting out into a pout. 

Ah, how he wanted to kiss him. Zhou Zishu blinked, startled by the intensity of that errant thought. 

A beat. 

“Skin-to-skin contact is good, huh,” Wen Kexing noted, out of nowhere. Well, not out of nowhere as the manual did seem to suggest that. In fact, its instructions were surprisingly chaste in its vagueness. In short, skin contact was recommended to benefit the exchange, if it could be called that. It was more of an interlocking loop, where one fed his internal energies into the other while his partner used his own to bolster the other’s meridians, and vice versa. 

Zhou Zizhu cleared his throat and asked, a tad delicately, in a tone of voice more suited for weaving expertly through the mires of politics in the Imperial Court, “How would you like to do this?” 

Wen Kexing pursed his lips, cheeks rounding slightly as if holding in laughter. “I presume the first order of business is to get out of these robes.” Then, his expression turned sly. “I know my a-Xu gets thin-faced easily. We can keep our trousers on this time.” 

Pah, who gets thin-faced easily? Zhou Zishu glared at him and started undoing his own robes, as if to prove him wrong. He pointedly did not think about the implications of doing other things in subsequent rounds. 

“Here, let me.” Familiar hands began tugging at the sash of his robe. Not to be outdone, Zhou Zishu started prying at Wen Kexing's robes too. His normally nimble fingers were clumsy and he fumbled a little with the sash a few times before he could untie it. Then, he was parting the layers of Wen Kexing’s robes, the outer layer of dusty pink and the midlayer of red spooling off his shoulders.  

When they were both bare from the waist up, clad only in trousers, they settled on the bed, cross-legged and facing each other. Wen Kexing ran two fingers down his chest, skirting just shy of the scars left behind by the nails. He took his time, tracing over the terrains of his pectorals, and over the curve of each rib. He touched him like he himself was the one falling apart but also as though he would like to take him apart and fit his pieces back together with his bare hands. Watching him, Zhou Zishu became vaguely aware that he was being spoken to. He dragged his gaze back up to look at Wen Kexing's face and uttered, very intelligibly in response, “Ah, hnn?” 

“I said,” Wen Kexing asked, wildness lurking beneath an unbearably gentle lilt, “do they still hurt?” 

No, he wanted to say, not when you’re touching me like that . 

“Yes,” he chose to say instead because an admission of physical weakness was still ever so slightly easier than an admission of something more. “Just phantom pains.” 

Wen Kexing gave him a rueful smile, looking as if he were about to speak. Zhou Zishu held up both hands. “Are we going to start or not? The cows would have gone home by the time we got round to anything, with you and your dithering.” 

“Ah, never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that a-Xu would be this eager.” Wen Kexing teased but obediently placed his palms against his. 

Lao Wen’s qi was not foreign to him, testament to the many times that he had fed him streams of his own qi when the nails used to act up at midnight. Still, there was always something slightly off about having another thread woven into one's being in this way. Across him, Wen Kexing shuddered slightly, brows furrowed, as if in the throes of a bad memory. There was some resistance in the flow, small but still large enough to be tangible.

"Lao Wen, it's me. It's your a-Xu." He shifted his palms, coming up to grasp and knead at Wen Kexing's forearms. 

The hard line of that jaw gradually softened. Soon, hands came up around his arms to reciprocate his grasp. The stutter in the flow smoothened out, and they were two tributaries flowing into the same lake. A pair of lungs nestled within the same ribcage, breathing the same breath.

His awareness narrowed to the unobtrusive tide of skin drawing across his. His meridians were mimosa leaves unfurling, held in a gentle cradle. He was holding the gossamer threads of Lao Wen's qi and was, in turn, held. It felt like his very bones were being laid bare, his flesh parting to allow for the welcome intrusion of another set of flesh and bones to nestle against his, foreign yet so dearly familiar.

A-Xu , he could hear the shape of Lao Wen's mouth forming around the syllables of his name, a careful cocoon of silk unspooling. A-Xu.  

All too soon, the rushing tide eased. For a moment, he was left pinwheeling in slow-motion in the morass of darkness, a half-formed foetus enfolded in the maw of amniotic fluid. 

Slowly, he came back to himself, unsure if moments or hours had passed. If returning to himself after Ye Baiyi’s recirculation attempts was the rocky cacophony of  an avalanche, then this felt like a dandelion’s freefall onto a downy field, entirely unhurried. He registered the warm weight in his lap, the press of a bare chest against his. The weight shifted as Wen Kexing righted himself. In synchrony, they let out a quiet hiss. There was a feeling of over-sensitisation, some lingering connection between them pulling too taut with the distance and left to snap back like a carelessly drawn bowstring. Zhou Zishu reached out steadying hands around Wen Kexing’s shoulders, drawing him back into orbit. Up close, he could see each miniscule detail on Lao Wen's face; the shape of his irises coalesced like coal against his slightly flushed skin and the mole just under the crease of his right eye was an artist’s finishing touch to a dragon’s eye. He could hear the sweep of eyelashes against his cheek, the soft exhale of breath intermingling with his own. It was astonishingly intimate and everything he should have hated with any other person. 

He found he had no desire to move. 

"Wei, two idiots! Have you two gone and died of a qi deviation yet?" 

A wicked thought fluttered through his mind. With the same deadly precision with which he wielded Baiyi Sword, he pushed his face up against Wen Kexing's throat, almost nosing up against his Adam's apple, and moaned.

"Unh, Kexing! Your fingers, mm, c’mon, deeper - " 

The sound of the door sliding open aborted, accompanied by loud swearing, and the door was hastily flung shut again.

Wen Kexing's eyes widened, a sudden panic flaring in the whites of his eyes, and he instinctively pushed Zhou Zishu away from him. In the split second after he did so, however, he immediately returned to his senses and hastily cushioned his hands behind Zhou Zishu's back. Their combined weight tipped them backward, with Wen Kexing landing on top. Momentarily, Zhou Zishu felt the wind being knocked out of him. 

Wen Kexing instantly propped himself up, hands bracketing the width of Zhou Zishu's shoulders, looking down at him with his lips pursed, a doleful look in his eyes. 

"Ah, Lao Wen," Zhou Zishu gasped out between stutters of laughter. "You should have seen your face. Ah, what a priceless gift, I’ll remember this even when I’m being boiled alive in Hell for my sins, thank you!" 

"Zhou Zishu!" Wen Kexing scolded, a lovely curtain of hair falling over one shoulder. 

Zhou Zishu was too preoccupied with keeping his intestines in the right place to notice the devious air that was collecting like a gathering storm cloud around the other man. Ah, he hadn't laughed so hard in years that he had thought he must have forgotten how to. 

"Mm, a-Xu ah, who could have known that you've grown so shameless, to make such delectable noises for me as our poor scandalised  disciple was just by the door?" 

Zhang Chengling? The poor boy grew flushed and confused even at their harmless bantering! Shit. Why was he tagging along behind Ye qianbei anyway? Frantic thoughts aside, Zhou Zishu's brain latched onto the nonchalant way that Lao Wen had stated things, as if how he sounded in the heat of the moment were something that already had a permanent home in his brain. 

Taking advantage of his quarry finally being shocked into silence by his little lie, his jaw tilted upward into the curve of a question mark, Wen Kexing swooped in like a hawk homing in on its prey, teeth latching onto the soft skin of Zhou Zishu’s throat. He bit down hard enough to draw blood. 

A bolt of pain zinged through him, turning into something decidedly different as it went southward. Wen Kexing laved at the wound; the rough scrape of tongue enthusiastically lapped up blood like a baby kitten with a saucer of milk. 

"Fuck." The moan that slipped out from Zhou Zishu's mouth this time was not a product of his own theatrics. It ended almost as quickly as it started, Wen Kexing straightening back up again to settle on his haunches, looking like the cat that got the cream. Zhou Zishu shivered as Wen Kexing ran a finger over the purpling  mark, tracing a lazy path through the mess of saliva and lingering blood. 

"There, now you're officially my person." 

The breath caught in his throat. "Took you long enough," Zhou Zishu retorted, trying to hide the tremulous  flutter in his heart. Saying thus, he bucked upward, ruthlessly throwing off Wen Kexing's weight. Wen Kexing rolled off good-naturedly, like water off a duck's  back, a stupidly smug look still on his face. Rolling his eyes, Zhou Zishu sauntered up to the dressing table, fingers pulling at the skin around his neck to get a better look at Lao Wen's masterpiece.

"Wait, don't look yet, a-Xu!" 

The monstrous mark winked at him innocently high up on his neck, far beyond what any high collar could hide.

What the fuck. 

"Wen. Ke. Xing! You little leech, you get back here. I’m going to suck the marrow from your bones!" 

Wen Kexing still had the gall to cackle as he fled from the scene, unabashedly still only in his trousers. Momentarily, his receding silhouette was superimposed with a similar one, dressed in satin white, light-footed and elegant amidst a sea of blossom trees. Even back then, when they had barely exchanged more than a few moves and with each of their faces hidden beneath masks of their own making, they had whirled through the steps of a dance that only the two of them were privy to.  

Truly, it felt as though the blossoms would remain in full bloom in every season with him by his side. 

The peach blossoms were starting to bloom. Just barely, a slow flush of colour like a blot of watercolour seeping into the secret nooks and crevices of rice paper. 

The new disciples of Siji Manor - and Gods, it was still strange calling them that - had indeed done an excellent job of restoring the manor in such a short span of time, having erased most of the marks that Tianchuang had marred it with when attempting to burn it to the ground. Of course, things were never quite the same. The front door still had splinters and gouge marks from where they tried to force their way in. Lao Wen insisted that that gave it character and held stories that could be told to generations of disciples after. The papered doors and windows had to be replaced, many of them ravaged beyond salvation in the fire. The heavy-set table where his shifu used to receive guests had to be sent to an expert carpenter in hopes that it could be restored. 

All in all, there was still much work to be done. 

For now, Zhou Zishu tilted his head back, letting the dappled sunlight dance across his face through the sparse canopy of blooms. In the background, the sounds of the younglings bickering in the nearby pavilion ebbed and flowed beneath the susurrus of the wind. 

Was this what it felt like to live?

“A-Xu.” A spray of disturbed blossoms alighting from above was the only warning as Wen Kexing stole up to him. 

A lone bloom drifted, landing on Zhou Zishu’s upturned face. He paid it no mind, still basking in the thready rivulets of sunlight.  Wen Kexing plucked the little intruder from its perch on his nose. Then, gently curving away the strands of hair that had spilled over Zhou Zishu’s cheek, he tucked the peach blossom against the shell of his ear. 

He surveyed his masterpiece with a self-satisfied air for a moment, then recited, suddenly solemn, “I must be a ceiba tree by your side, assuming the image of a tree just to stand with you. Our roots, interlocking in the earth beneath; our leaves, intermingling in the clouds above.” Here he paused and glanced over at Zhou Zishu, eyes bright. 

“With each gust of wind, we nod in wordless understanding to each other. Nobody else understands our words as we do,” Zhou Zishu finished, a smile growing on his face as he turned to look at the man next to him. Sure enough, his smile was mirrored on Wen Kexing’s face. 

They held each other’s gaze just so, the edges of eternity blurring into the periphery. 

Above, the clouds wheeled, dream-like, in the sky.