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After getting married to Lan Zhan and going to live in Gusu to both help and horrify the Lan Clan on a regular basis (to be fair mostly it was Lan Qiren who was horrified) things had eventually settled into something of a routine of going on night hunts, training the Juniors (and by extension Jin Ling and Ouyang Zizhen since the four of them had apparently formed their own little hunting clan) and blatantly breaking all the rules of Gusu he could get away with.
He should have known better. It was always the times in his life where everything seemed settled and at peace that the universe took it upon itself to punch him in the guts. Why should now be any exception?
There was a rumor of something causing minor cultivators to disappear in the mountains beyond the Yiling burial mounds. It was an area even Wei Wuxian hadn’t spent time exploring. There were many rumors out of there when he lived in the Burial Mounds but the paths were too treacherous to travel by himself and there were too many things to do to make sure they were all able to be fed to indulge himself and take Wen Ning to go rooting around for arcane secrets. Not that he hadn’t considered it, he just knew if he snuck off and Wen Qing had caught him she would have made his life a living hell with her screeching and complaining.
Whatever the rumor spoke of might have been dormant in the past but whether it had woken up or it had just managed to slip whatever bonds holding it now it seemed it might be calling people to it to suffer what was probably a bad end. Farmers and travelers had started to go missing and no one was sure where they went beyond a general area.
As the seniors on the hunt Wei Wuxian and Lan Zhan were letting them take the lead. They would answer questions and help point them in the right direction if they were overlooking something but for the most part they were observers. Jin Ling had appointed himself in charge in such a familiarly pompous was it made We Wuxian roll his eyes so hard he had a headache after. And just like that pompous person Jin Ling sounded like he also spent a lot of time acting confident and all knowing…then made sure the others all had their opinions heard (with scoffing noises included) and feeling free to take their suggestions to get things done.
Honestly, sometimes it was just like Jiang Cheng was his father instead of his uncle.
Jingyi and Zizhen made faces behind Jin Ling’s back and mocked everything he said by making talking motions with their hands until Sizhui caught them and frowned at them to make them behave. It was a measure of how comfortable the Juniors had become with Lan Zhan that they’d apparently forgotten he was watching but once Wei Wuxian cleared his throat so Jingyi and Zizhen caught sight of them they all settled down and got to work.
“Look!” Jingyi pointed up the mountain from the path they were traveling on. Once they’d gone to the other side of the Burial Mounds it had all been uphill rugged territory and they had stopped to get a drink of water and catch their breath. “It looks like there was a landslide.”
Jin Ling jumped up several branches of a tall tree to get a better look and called down. “I think there’s a cave. We should check there.”
“That would make sense.” Wei Wuxian had tried but he couldn’t remember anything specific in the rumors about the area he’d heard. It had all just been vague ‘bad things’. “If it was something that was always active I would have heard about it. But if it was released by the landslide moving…of course it also might matter if the landslide was natural or something working on it from inside.”
“There is no way to tell from here.” Lan Zhan shared a look with Wei Wuxian before looking at the Juniors. “What is our path?”
To give Jin Ling a little credit he did wait until he got down from the tree with the others to respond. “We will investigate of course.”
“Everyone check your equipment.” Sizhui started his own checks to remind himself of what he and the others were carrying. They had just checked when they started up the mountain but the Lan way was to be over prepared. It tended to keep Jin Ling grounded and made sure that Zizhen didn’t get flustered when the action started. Once they were through with their checks and quick discussion about who should lead the way (Sizhui ended up in front after Jingyi reminded Jin Ling how he’d run face first into a bear last trip out and Sizhui diplomatically suggested he’d be able to cover them better with his bow if he wasn’t in front) they started up the mountain.
Going past the scree and rubble from the landslide wasn’t easy but they’d decided maneuvering through the air would be too obvious. Once they were nearing the cave Sizhui signaled he’d found something. “Hanguang Jun, Wei qianbei, there’s some sort of spell here.”
The Juniors moved to let Wei Wuxian and Lan Zhan through to see what they’d found. There were symbols etched into various rocks that had fallen from what was obviously a cave entrance. “Looks like the protections definitely broke in the landslide.” Wei Wuxian wasn’t getting any sense that what happened was anything other than natural. It had been an extra wet autumn followed by a winter of deep freezes that started early. It would have been easy for the forming ice to expand the cracks in the rocks and cause the fall. “Look for more as we go up.”
There were more broken rocks with symbols as they finished the climb. They were old and worn, obviously they’d been on the rocks for a long time. When they arrived at the mouth of the cavern they saw more protections set further in, still in one piece, and what seemed to be a series of either tunnels or caverns going back into the mountain. “If this is another Tortoise I’m leaving.” It was muttered under his breath but Lan Zhan obviously heard him because he graced him with a fond look before handing him one of the torches being passed out.
They started to move deeper into the mountain and every time they went through an entrance (or what could be considered an entrance since they were caves and there were no actual doors) there were more protections and wards placed on the rocks. Wei Wuxian was starting to get seriously intrigued. What on earth could they have in here that needed this many barriers?
FInally they came to a cavern that had a dead body sprawled by the exit. It lay there with a sword by its hand and it had been there long enough it was hard to tell what had happened to it at a glance. There was another exit to the cavern further in and when Jingyi held his torch up and looked in, Wei Wuxian could see what looked like a bundle of rags on the floor but knew that it wasn’t. “I think we’ve found some of our missing people. But why here?” The body on the floor didn’t look like much of a cultivator but the sword definitely looked like a well cared for weapon.
He left the body to Lan Zhan and the others to look at and went to join Jingyi to examine what he’d found. It was a body, older than the other, and once again laying right at the threshold of the exit. That was weird. Something about it nagged at his mind so he carefully stepped across the threshold and lifted the torch to see more.
There looked to be another tunnel and cavern beyond and what could look like another bundle of rags and twigs if you weren’t as familiar with what a desiccated skeleton could look like. Half of the burial mounds were dead bodies so Wei Wuxian knew immediately what it was. Another dead body right at the threshold…he turned quickly and looked at the doorway behind him. All of the protective symbols were destroyed and the thought that had been trying to form suddenly flashed into place in horrifying clarity.
“Shit!” He pushed past Jingyi to head back to the others and saw Jin Ling crouched by the body. He was reaching out to touch the sword! “Lan Zhan! Stop him!” Everything seemed to slow down to where he could see everything clearly but didn’t have time to do anything about the catastrophe about to happen.
Lan Zhan reached down and pushed Jin Ling away from the sword with a not too gentle shove to his shoulder but somehow as he did it his other sleeve caught the hilt and caused it to turn and touch his bare hand. Lan Zhan froze in place with the hilt pressed against the side of his hand then in a lightning fast twist he wrapped his fingers around the hilt and picked up the sword.
Wei Wuxian had sprinted across the cavern to reach Lan Zhan but he knew he’d been too late from the moment the sword had been taken up. Lan Zhan’s movements, always precise and exact, had changed as he straightened and held the sword up in front of him. Each movement was a struggle and bled from one thing into another instead of being a series of discrete parts of perfection that made a whole. But worst of all were his eyes. They shifted from the familiar to something that held a sharp slyness with a spark of something inhuman and dark in their depths. It was obvious from the stress in his body and the teeth bared in rage at what was going on that Lan Zhan was fighting what was happening.
A sharp tremor ran through Lan Zhan’s body and for a moment that cruel inhumane light receded, not gone but not in charge either. He still had the sword in his hand and gripped it so tightly there was blood leaking out between his fingers.
Wie Wuxian took a step forward waving the anxious Juniors away to keep them back. The danger was far from over. “Lan zhan?”
There was the barest of nods then Lan Zhan slowly turned his head to look at him as though he was fighting against a great weight and Wei Wuxian could see a fleeting look of terror before it was hidden by the struggle to maintain control.
“Wei Ying…” There was a sharp clatter as Bichen hit the floor of the cavern. “Stop me.”
Another of those sharp tremors ran through Lan Zhan and Wei Wuxian could see nothing of his husband left behind. Before he had a chance to react the thing steering Lan Zhan’s body slammed the hilt of the new sword into his chin, sending him flying back, and then he was too busy trying to make his brain work after he bounced off the wall behind him to do much else.
The four sets of hands trying to both pick him up off the floor and to shake him into saying something were definitely not helping. “Stop it!” Wei Wuxian started pushing the hands away from him impatiently then regretted it when they backed off so fast he almost fell down again.
“Wei qianbei, Hanguang Jun hit you! What happened? Why did he drop his sword? Should we stop him?” The questions were tumbling out of all of them before he could answer and he clapped his hands to get them to shut up and pay attention. Whatever that was that had hold of Lan Zhan was strong enough to completely overshadow him. They couldn’t let it out of the cave.
“Explanations later. Fix things now. Understand?” There were four sets of very anxious nods and Wei Ying pointed in the direction of the exit. “Lan Zhan can’t leave the cave. It’ll take him a little bit to break each set of barriers so I’ll tell you what we’re going to do as we catch up.”
***
When Wei Ying had told them his plan there had been some arguments but when he finally cut them off and demanded what they would like to suggest and they had nothing the Juniors had finally shut up and agreed to do what he said.
He wouldn’t have involved them at all but between the specific protections they’d been finding and the fact that only minor Cultivators had been disappearing had given him a good idea of what the sword was doing if not exactly what it was. Cultivators with a stronger Golden Core had stronger shields and protections so they didn’t hear the lure to come free the sword. Cultivators that didn’t have much talent would hear the call and be helpless to resist.
People without a Golden Core didn’t hear anything.
That meant that unfortunately the sword had no use for Wei Wuxian and he needed some Golden Cores to tempt the thing closer.
When they caught up with Lan Zhan there was only one set of wards left to keep the sword inside. The sword had used Lan Zhan’s core and spiritual energy to ram its way through the barriers but it looked like it was running out of steam.
“Sorry, are you having some trouble? Something I can help with?” Wei Wuxian leaned against the wall of the cavern as if he had nothing better to do and smirked as the thing steering Lan Zhan turned to look at him. It wasn’t using his husband well, Lan Zhan was sweating and his hair was starting to come loose from its ornate style. Seeing him like this felt like getting kicked in the chest by Apple but instead of showing it he flipped a lock of his own hair with one finger. “Looking a little tatty there. Is it harder than you thought to break the locks?”
“I’ve only one more to go.” It was an interesting experience to see Lan Zhan actually growl at him like a feral dog. Wei Wuxian couldn’t help making a face even as he signaled the others to do their thing.
The spiritual power lit up behind him like a firebomb as the four Juniors combined their energy together to make it seem like there was a much tastier treat than Lan Zhan there to be used. He hadn’t been sure that the thing could sense the power or if it just used whatever fell into its trap but when the flare went up the thing steering Lan Zhan looked past Wei Wuxian with a look of raw hunger and immediately moved away from the door to head deeper into the cave after the new power.
He didn’t notice or care that Wei Wuxian was following him. He just headed toward the new power with single minded determination. The Juniors were in the next chamber with their hands stacked on each other and the power glowing between them like a miniature sun. The thing steering Lan Zhan didn’t seem to care that it was coming from a group and not one person. He just strode forward intent on taking a new host so he could destroy the last lock on his prison.
He was so intent that he didn’t realize that they’d drawn new wards on the floor of the cavern and he walked right into the circle until Wei Wuxian cut his hand and slammed his bleeding palm onto the marks to activate them. The spell snapped up around Lan Zhan, a mix of normal Cultivator magic and his own brand of mysticism and solidified into the bars of a cage trapping him inside.
“How dare you!” The thing turned on Wei Wuxian and tried to reach him through the bars but they didn’t move. It summoned up raw energy from Lan Zhan and tried to force its way through but it had used too much already and it wasn’t very effective against the mix of magics.
Wei Wuxian stayed just out of reach. “You should know I’ll pretty much dare anything. You’re not going anywhere.”
The snarl faded from Lan Zhan’s face and his head bowed for a moment. “You and I, we can do this together.” He lifted his head and reached entreatingly out to Wei Wuxian. “Isn’t that how we do everything? Together. I know you don’t understand right now but he’s still here so you haven’t lost anything.”
It was so much easier than it should be to listen to the words even though he knew they were a lie. Wei Wuxian shook his head but he also took another step closer. “You’re not him. And if you stay where you are you’ll drain Lan Zhan away to nothing. You know I won’t let you do that.” But he took another step and put his hand around Lan Zhan’s arm where it reached out to him. “Let him go and then we’ll talk.”
The thing looked like it was considering it for a second but then it sighed. “You just have to be difficult don’t you?” He used the grip on his arm to pull Wei Wuxian closer and stabbed him through the midsection with the sword in one movement.
Wei Wuxian looked down at the sword stuck through him and let go to wrap his hands around the blade as if he was going to try to pull it out before he looked back up at the thing steering Lan Zhan and smirked.
“Gotcha.”
When they built the trap Sizhui had asked him why he wanted a cage and not solid walls. Wei Wuxian didn’t remember what bullshit answer he’d given him but it hadn’t been the truth. He knew he couldn’t force the sword out of Lan Zhan’s grip in a wrestling match and he couldn’t let any of the others near him so he had to come up with something completely unexpected.
“NO!” Hearing the rage in the thing’s voice knowing that it realized how Wei Wuxian had tricked him, put a savage grin on his face. Before the thing could recover and yank the sword back out of his guts, Wei Wuxian twisted and broke the hilt out of its grasp. The spin put him off balance and Wei Wuxian ended up stumbling to his knees and falling onto his hip. The pain exploded like a star in his midsection leaving him struggling to breathe. Slowly, the white hot waves of hurt receded until he was able to get his lungs working again. He hadn’t realized how his ears had been ringing until the panicked shouts of Jin Ling and Sizhui faded into the noise.
“Wei qianbei!”
There was a scrape of feet and cloth across the rock of the cave floor and he let go of the sword with one hand to gesture them back frantically. “Stop! You can’t get close!” Wei Wuxian always found sheer terror was a great method to clear one’s head and the idea of one of them touching the sword and being taken like Lan Zhan flooded him with enough adrenaline everything came back into sharp focus again. It wouldn’t last for very long but he planned to take advantage of it while it did. Lan Zhan was laying on the rough stone floor where he’d stood when the sword was pried out of his hands. The puppeteers strings were gone but did the puppet survive the cutting?
“Sizhui, we need Zewu Jun.” He hated to do it. Sizhui deserved to be here in case…well just in case. He could tell that their son was about to protest but Wei Wuxian shook his head sharply. “It has to be you. You can maneuver the sword the fastest and speed is everything right now.”
Sizhui cast an anguished look at the both of his fathers, one laying like a broken doll on the floor and the other sitting in a slowly spreading stain of blood before he nodded once and sprinted from the cave to reach the open air.
Jin Ling had been edging closer to Wei Wuxian, probably not even realizing what he was doing, but he was getting too close. “Jin Ling. Stop. Sit.” The sharp command shocked the boy and he dropped to the floor before he thought about it. The fact he obeyed it obviously annoyed Jin Ling but he could be as huffy as he wanted as long as he kept his distance.
“Jin Ling.” Wei Wuxian had to call his name twice before he would look at him. Gods spare him from sulky teenagers! Still, he couldn’t yell at him (even though he desperately wanted to) or the brat wouldn’t listen to him. “Jin Ling, you can’t touch the sword or come near me or it will do to you what it did to Lan Zhan. Do you understand?”
Jin Ling couldn’t seem to stop looking at the sword, or maybe it was just the blood making Wei Wuxian’s robes even darker and shiny wet. He looked for a long time before he finally nodded and looked up into Wei Wuxian’s face.
“Why isn’t it doing it to you?” There was a hint of ill concealed worry in Jin Ling’s voice.
He was so much like Jiang Cheng that Wei Wuxian immediately defaulted to joking and making light of things to irritate him out of his fear. “Well I guess because there’s not much it can do to corrupt a soulless, demonic cultivator like the Yiling Patriarch.”
It worked. Jin Ling sighed and crossed his arms. “You’re being ridiculous!”
“Jin Ling, I thought you knew me by now. I’m always ridiculous.” Wei Wuxian smiled but it felt like the expression was just a brittle shell he was wearing and it was gone quickly. Lan Zhan still hadn’t moved and he desperately wanted to go to his side to shake him back into consciousness but every time he loosened his fingers on the sword it started to slide out of the wound. He knew if he lost his grip on it the damn thing would go for one of the others with the strength it had left from Lan Zhan’s golden core.
Zizhen and Jingyi had come over and knelt down by Lan Zhan and he saw Zizhen holding his finger under his nose testing if he was breathing.
“Is he…” Wei Wuxian had to stop and clear his throat. “...Is Lan Zhan…?” He hated how shaky and vulnerable his voice sounded. If anyone asked he’d blame that on the pain.
Zizhen looked over his shoulder and smiled with a quick nod. “Hanguang Jun is breathing and his color is coming back. I think he must have used too much spiritual energy and he’s in shock. I mean I’m no expert but…I think he’ll be okay once he rests.”
It was suddenly a little easier to breathe hearing that. Zizhen was being modest, out of the four imps he was the most sensitive and his sense of someone’s injuries was usually reliable. Lan Zhan was going to be okay. The sense of shrieking worry subsided and he could deal with what he needed to now.
“Good. Make sure he’s warm and we’ll deal with the rest when we get him back to Gusu.” Wei Wuxian smiled again briefly then closed his eyes. “Don’t bother me. I have to concentrate, just let me rest a little.” It was going to seem like a thousand years until his brother in law got there. Everything hurt, he could feel the blood soaking his clothes and his heart was aching like an open wound but he couldn’t relax.
He felt more than heard Jin Ling retreat to go rejoin the others. There was quiet conversation going on where Jingyi, Zizhen and Jin Ling were but it wasn’t something he could listen to instead it was all just an unpleasant buzz in the back of his head.
Wei Wuxian knew when Xichen arrived. The sword gave almost a surprised twitch then tried to leap out of his grasp to go after the new, strong, Golden Core. It managed to cut deeper gashes into his fingers before he got a better grip on it. He opened his eyes to see the very concerned face of his brother in law in front of him. Xichen at least managed a tight smile when he saw Wei Wuxian looking at him. “I see you’re doing things your own way as usual.”
“I’d say I’m sorry but Lan Qiren keeps telling me not to lie or exaggerate so I won’t.” Wei Wuxian grinned but tasting the blood on the back of his tongue decided that had probably looked ghastly and murmured an apology. “We need containment. I’m not sure how long I can hold it.”
“I’m not sure how he’s holding it now.” Jingyi was elbowed by Zizhen after he said it but he didn’t look sorry for saying it. It was a good point.
Xichen ignored Jingyi and nodded. “Sizhui told me. I’m ready when you are.”
Wei Wuxian groaned. It was supposed to be theatrical but it mostly was just how much everything hurt right now. “Translation: this is going to hurt so brace yourself. Get it over with.”
“How well you know me.” Xichen backed up a step with a long box in his hands and nodded to Sizhui who stood slightly in front of him and called on his spiritual energy to entice the sword. This time when it tried to escape Wei Wuxian loosened his fingers and the sword pulled from him with a fresh gout of blood and leaped at Sizhui to take him as a new host. Quick as a striking heron, Xichen snapped open the box and caught the sword in it before snapping it shut and trapping it inside.
They busied themselves working on the spells and protections to keep the thing trapped inside and Wei Wuxian lay back on the floor of the cavern as he finally let the tortured muscles in his hands and arms relax. Everything seemed so cold even though the blood underneath him felt hot on his skin. It just felt good to lay there and not move. He was too tired to even shiver and all the sounds were starting to feel so far away.
All he needed was a little rest.
He’d be fine.
Just…a little…
***
Wei Wuxian was warm when he woke up. It meant he didn’t want to move, that might have also been the severe amounts of pain he was in too but he was going to choose his excuse and that was being warm.
Someday he was going to get over this habit of getting stabbed (and seriously what was with always getting it in the same place?) and feeling like he’d been run over by an entire army but today was obviously not the day.
He took stock of everything before he bothered to open his eyes. The sounds of water falling into a basin, the familiar smell of incense and the sound of wind rustling through the bamboo told him he was home in Gusu. He was lying on his side in he and Lan Zhan’s own bed with his hand stretched out like he was reaching for something. There were stiff bandages wrapped around his palm and the cuts underneath were itching which meant they were healing. And there was warmth against the tips of his fingers and that was finally what made him open his eyes.
Lan Zhan was sitting beside the bed with his head pillowed on his arm and sound asleep but in his sleep his other hand had reached out to make sure he was touching Wei Wuxian while they slept. The sight of it made him smile and his eyes drifted closed again.
Tomorrow there would be worries, reassuring Sizhui that they were fine and the mountain of problems that always seemed to show up on their doorstep. That was a tomorrow problem.
Wei Wuxian drifted back to sleep anchored by the warmth against his fingers.