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It began as a birthday gift, crafted from a bolt of cloth no longer needed by Taizi Dianxia.
Xie Lian had gifted the bolt to Mu Qing, unthinkingly. Mu Qing wished he could bring such a gift home.
None but his own mother knew Mu Qing’s birthday.
Feng Xin’s was in the summer.
It started as a plain robe, a show of good will to his master’s constant companion.
Mu Qing didn’t have to hide that he was doing some cutting and stitching in his quarters. He was mending all the time.
But it took time.
By the time the cloth was cut he knew Feng Xin didn’t like him.
He was more than a servant by the time the embroidery began.
Lotus and reeds.
He kept it stuffed in the silk case of a sitting mat, and worked only by moonlight after each long day.
Candlelight would raise suspicion.
They were always ready to be suspicious of Mu Qing.
The vows led him to choose the drakes. Yuanyang, if too much of the yang.
Three on the back: two in flight, one unable to molt his breeding plumage in time.
Only Taizi Dianxia could cultivate flawlessly.
For Mu Qing there was much desire to purge.
He decides to add a few more ducks on the front to throw off suspicion.
It’s not a wedding garment! It’s not proper yuanyang, blissful and harmonious on the lotus pond.
More ducks! More work! Cultivation. Martial training.
Cleaning up. Mending.
Threading needles by moonlight.
When Dianxia ascended, Mu Qing brought his sewing to Middle Court.
There was little time for it, though he needed neither moonlight nor candles.
He could sew in the dark, eyes used to shadow, heart to blindness.
But there was little reason to want to give Feng Xin anything.
It stayed unfinished because he shared quarters with Feng Xin.
Because he undid his early work, finding it uneven.
It was unfinished when he chose the box that would be its coffin and buried it in time for their descent.
At the time he had no intention to ever touch it again.
After his ascension Mu Qing retrieved his wasted gift, the labor of years. Still unfinished, still unwanted.
Some nights he would take it out and add a golden rivulet, undo a stitch on the duck that still wore his eclipse plumage,
though he was the only one in the heavens.
Feng Xin ascends.
In a rage, Mu Qing lays out his work. Frantic, he unstitches hems and seams, folds precisely measured ages ago.
Then he finishes the embroidery, which for years had needed only his final touch, and calmly sews the robe back together,
now to the new god’s size.
That idiot still doesn’t deserve it.
Mu Qing just wants to be rid of it. Molt the confused attraction, the decades of pining. Purge it from himself!
But each time he touches the robe he remembers that it is made of sleepless nights and waking dreams:
Xianle craft, rare and true.
A god is banished for an ungodly crime, using the Brocade Immortal against clansman and peer.
A bad joke, a cruel joke. A perfect way to be rid of a curse!
On Feng Xin’s next birthday, with heaven’s air still thick with scandal, an ornate chest arrives from Xuan Zhen Palace.
“What’s in it?”
“A vintage robe.”
“What? Why give me fucking clothes?”
“A courtesy. It’s of Xianle make and was given to me. But you’re the only fool who still wears Xianle fashion.”
“Is it cursed?”
“One way to find out, ungrateful bastard! Throw it out, I don’t care.”
Feng Xin had opened the box, seen the folded garment. He does not touch it, nor risk any of his officials to do so.
Typical of Mu Qing to act so shady.
It could not possibly be that same dread object, the Brocade Immortal, but who knew what curses Mu Qing wove into his gifts?
Many are the distractions, the precious artifacts retrieved over the years, and still lost.
Now and then Feng Xin considers the rarities he had pawned that he once again possessed.
Alongside them is the gift (likely cursed) — was it really Xianle craft? How had it survived?
Many are the distractions, worst of which is the third ascension of Xie Lian. Feng Xin’s palace collapses! Again.
He allows his officials to stow some treasured items in a temple down in the Mortal Realm for the meantime.
One brings along the box: is it a treasured item, sir?
When Feng Xin sees Xie Lian’s ribbon he thinks: well that’s a cursed object.
When he fetches Hong Jing from among his treasures his eyes pause over the gift.
It will be the second mission, shoulder to shoulder with that rascal.
Could it be cursed?
Isn’t all Xianle silk?
Feng Xin recalls the summer wishes of the youngest girls, offering up their first prayer at his temple.
Long before they ask for husbands or sons, they pray to thread their needles well.
They should be praying to Xuan Zhen, Feng Xin thinks as he watches Mu Qing mending Ruoye.
For many gods it has been ages since last they viewed the Silver River from below.
But Feng Xin has seen it many times. Xie Lian has seen it many times.
Mu Qing does not raise his head from his task, “I’ve already seen it, 800 years ago.”
Feng Xin’s brows furrow deeper.
“There’s a festival at this time,” Feng Xin tries again.
“A lovers’ festival for the likes of Xie Lian and his San Lang, with their red string,” Mu Qing sneers,
“their bridge of silver butterflies, their year of being parted.”
“…and crafts? Weaving. You…”
Prickly silence.
Feng Xin laughs at Xie Lian’s embroidery, those petalled beans that couldn’t pass for flowers. This is what is left of Xianle craft?!
Then he wonders whether the stitches had been preserved on those robes in that box, he had only seen the one sleeve, folded on top.
Pink lotus.
He wants to ask Mu Qing about the robes: who had found it, what magic made it so durable… what it looked like.
Feng Xin realizes how stupid this all is, since the robe is with him, has been with him for more than a century.
Only now there is no reason to believe it is cursed.
“It’s the third time you’ve asked,” Mu Qing rolls his eyes, “What is it about this stupid festival, that you keep bringing it up?”
“Prayers,” Feng Xin is prepared, “I need help with prayers.”
“Oh?”
“About threading needles. I never understood…”
“Of course."
“You’ll go?”
“I won’t risk a fourth attempt, for fear of ill luck.” Mu Qing scoffs, “We won’t need to show ourselves at this festival, will we?”
“Not at all,” Feng Xin will be happy if they could stay to view the stars, “You can come as you are.”
“Ha! You can dress better.”
A deputy stands outside, just in case, but Feng Xin is alone when he finally lifts the robe from its antique case.
It is a perfectly normal box, no traps or spells.
The garment is heavier than it looks, but unfolds like wings on a bird to reveal its array of colors.
The colors have aged little. He can tell it has not seen use, this summer tunic.
No lining obscures the embroidery, so immaculate that the figures can be viewed in reverse.
Not a knot out of place on deep red fabric.
He finds the ducks.
Three on the front, three on the back.
But what surprises Feng Xin is how it is cut perfectly to fit him, the perfect length to complement his vestments if he skipped the armor.
The sleeves falling precisely at his wrist if he took off his bracers. Not a tunic to fight in, for sure. A quiver would ruin the fine needlework.
The tunic is already on before the idea that it could be cursed revisits him.
He shrugs it off: the thought, not the tunic.
Mu Qing would not do that.
Another thought is more terrifying: it occurs to Feng Xin, with the certainty of dawn, that Mu Qing had sewn this himself.
Feng Xin had seen Mu Qing mending a robe of this color, but without embroidery, long ago.
Feng Xin had caught a glimpse of this leaf on this sleeve, on Mu Qing’s lap before it was hurriedly covered.
Mending.
Mu Qing was always mending, even in Middle Court.
Only ever mending...
On the 7th day of the 7th month, more than 7 centuries after its completion,
it take less than a second for Mu Qing to recognize the robes on Feng Xin’s back.
Feng Xin has finished the distance shortening array, but his companion refuses to step in.
“You didn’t throw that away?”
Feng Xin wears it over robes of darkest blue, the red settling like a warm mist over cold lake water.
“No. I didn’t throw it away. I like it.”
“Why?” Mu Qing whines.
Feng Xin gives it a thought. He needs a quick one, true and on the fly.
“The ducks are cute,” he huffs.
“The one low on my back, especially.” He twists around to show it, as if Mu Qing couldn’t guess which duck it was.
“The rest are fancy drakes, but that one’s gray and sloppy. I like- ”
“Why didn’t you throw it away?”
“…You made it, didn’t you? I’ve never seen you wear it.”
“It’s not my size,” Mu Qing scowls. They may be the same height, but it is cut for Feng Xin’s broader frame. “Not…”
“For Dianxia?”
“Fool! Why do you think I gave it to you?”
“I thought it was cursed.”
Mu Qing is pink as the lotus flower, “It was. While it was with me.”
“Do you really not know what those young girls want when they pray to thread needles well?”
“It’s a contest, they want to win.”
“You can string a bow but not a single correct sentiment. Let’s just…go.”
With the moon they arrive to oversee the race to thread seven needles.
Xuan Zhen speeds not only the fingers of girls who prayed. Feng Xin is the only one who sees him.
There is a winner still, and perhaps not the hands that offered prayers,
but none leave the festival having failed to cross a few needles’ eyes.
“There. Are we done here?”
“No.”
One river reflects the other. Twice the lovers meet over its expanse.
“We’ve always been on the same side,” Mu Qing murmurs, “it’s not our story.”
“You just don’t want to be likened to the weaver girl…or a girl duck.”
“Shut up.”
“But the reeds are here, the lotuses there.”
Feng Xin takes off the robe as they sit at the riverbank. “I’m not the gray, sloppy one am I? Who is whom? Why six?”
“You’re dumb,” Mu Qing kicks at some reeds.
“The three up front are all colorful, too, but only one of them is flying. Who is whom?”
“Feng Xin, I hate you.”
He begins to drape it around Mu Qing’s shoulders, back-side-front.
Mu Qing is flinching and flushed, arms flailing underneath, “If you w-wish to give it back— thi-this isn’t the way!”
“Isn’t it?” Feng Xin crosses the hems over Mu Qing’s back, wrapping him fully in an embrace.
The night is humid, the stars hang low.
Feng Xin wraps Mu Qing in his winged gift and descends with him onto the soggy banks of a river.
“Unromantic,” Mu Qing sniffs between kisses.
“Picky duck,” Feng Xin huffs unruffled.
They no longer mind the heavens, they see it everyday.
