Work Text:
When Wen Kexing breaks the water’s surface, his gaze searches for Zhou Xu as if to situate himself amongst constellations, but the man has already turned to swim toward shore.
“A-Xu,” Kexing says. He swims gracelessly to catch up with the beautiful jiaoren he spied in the current, to make certain it wasn’t a trick of the light or another of Zhou Xu’s disguises. Look at me, he thinks.
A-Xu emerges from the water dark in his sodden robes, immediately stripping his outer layer and setting it on the fallen log. Wen Kexing’s eyes linger over the movement, A-Xu’s shoulder blades cleaving as birds’ wings, shrugging off this first layer.
Kexing stumbles over low rocks, causing A-Xu to turn, and he sees A-Xu’s face and forgets to breathe.
“What happened to your masterful dexterity?” Zhou Zishu jokes, laughing at Kexing’s dripping face. “A moment ago you boasted triumphantly from the boat.”
Behind them, the river trills its soft lushness, but Wen Kexing’s eyes under his waterlogged lashes are dark and dilated with hunger. He licks his lower lip and swallows. “Do you know I’m attracted to men?”
Under the moonlight, the second and third layers of Zishu’s robes are sheer and sticking, betraying delicate collarbones and a lithe lined waist.
Zhou Zishu catches Wen Kexing’s line of sight, and smirking, meditates his qi into a gentle warmth that spreads through his body, gently drying his robes and turning them opaque.
Kexing mourns a low whine in his throat. “Are you that sore a loser?”
You’ve already seen too much of me, Zhou Zishu thinks. “Lao Wen should go get some firewood before he catches cold.”
“I can think of other ways to get warm,” Wen Kexing attempts, also removing his outer robe, but he knows the battle is lost because A-Xu has already moved to collect kindling. He sighs and wrings water from his hair before setting off as A-Xu directed, and misses the brief glance Zhou Zishu steals of his own figure outlined in his doused clothes.