Work Text:
“So we have reached an agreement?” Lan Xichen said calmly, watching the clan leader of Xuzhou closely, the leader of a small clan to the north of Gusu who had recently been struggling with an outbreak of water ghouls appearing in their rivers and had come to him to request assistance in clearing them out. “Gusu Lan will send a delegation to help clear out the rivers and you will in return make certain that we are informed of any such outbreaks in the future much sooner?”
“Yes,” the other clan leader, Peng Yaoche of Xuzhou, agreed, his face craggy and severe with age. “I will send one of my sons to come meet with your disciples so that we may clear up this unpleasantness quickly.”
He rose to his feet, Peng Yaoche following in his stead. “Please, allow me to walk you to the gates,” he said smoothly as he considered how to answer the other man. “It has been a long meeting indeed, and I would hate to keep you away from home any longer.”
Peng Yaoche nodded and bowed, easily accepting the gentle reminder that he was a guest in their home. It truly was drawing close to sunset as well. Even if he set out very soon, his chances of making it home before nightfall were slim.
At this time of day, the Cloud Recesses were more active than usual. Several small groups of cultivators were planning to set out on night hunts across Gusu, and he suspected that his brother and Wei Wuxian were rounding up their group of junior disciples to take them out for a more extended hunt, they had mentioned doing so earlier when he had seen them.
Hopefully he would have a chance to send them off before they left. It was a ritual he was fast coming to love when they were able to indulge in it, sending his brother and brother-in-law off into the world with someone waiting for them to come home.
Peng Yaoche nodded gratefully, a smile crossing his severe face. “Many thanks to you indeed, Lan-zongzhu. Truly you are still as upright as your reputation suggests.”
Lan Xichen felt the barb land home even so, despite the clear intent to be a compliment. While he had put much thought and work into looking sincerely at himself and the things that he had turned away from, to have it thrown in his face that his reputation had proven to be hollow at best, and easily used by others to hide their more malicious intent beneath his naivety.
The ones who he had hurt most that still lived did not blame him, and refused to do so. But the guilt that sat like a stone in his stomach was hard to erase and harder to ignore now.
He did not want it to become easy again. The guilt was a hard-won lesson and one he would carry for as many years as it took for the mistakes of the past to never be repeated again.
He would never so easily let his eyes stay closed to what lay before them.
It was easy for him to keep the smile on his face, even though it no longer felt as genuine as it had a few moments before. “Gusu Lan always strives to live in accordance with our honored ancestors' teachings. It is our duty and our pleasure as a family to live up to those ideals.”
Peng Yaoche nodded along, his face twisted in some weird sense of pity. “Then it must be very hard on all of you to have to put up with Wei Ying, but then I suppose it's hard to deny family their wishes, no matter how unpleasant they may be.”
The sharp shift in tone and attitude caught him completely off guard; it felt as though all the warmth in his blood had drained away, leaving him with only ice in his veins. “What is it that we have to put up with?” he asked, the words not even feeling like they belonged to him. “I fear I don't understand what you mean.”
Peng Yaoche seemed only mildly confused. His severe face was not suited to confusion, not when it was saying such cruel words and expecting Lan Xichen to agree with them. “Why, your brother's decision to stand with a murderer and a villain, someone who refused to apologize and repent for his actions. But then, I have known many men who would do foolish things if they liked their bedwarmer enough. And of course we must stand with our brothers, no matter their choices, is that not so, Lan-zongzhu?”
Another smile creased his face at that. A genuine one. That somehow made the words he spoke so blithely even worse.
He... he genuinely thought then that Lan Xichen would agree with such words? That he thought so little of his brother? So little of Wei Wuxian?
Lan Xichen could not return it. Would not return it. The ice in his veins was slowly melting, but not from warmth. Bile coiled in his throat and stomach, so much was the sheer revulsion in his body at such cruel words for his brothers and the insult to Lan Xichen himself.
He was well aware of his own failings and errors. But this one was not his; it was Peng Yaoche's alone.
“Spare some consideration,” he bit out sharply, trying to keep his voice low enough that no one else would overhear the disgusting things that Peng Yaoche felt the inexplicable need to say in the Cloud Recesses. “Do you pretend that Gusu Lan is so weakened and corrupted to fall to the slander of one of our own?”
Peng Yaoche's face slackened in horror, but he was not quick to take his words back. “Lan-zongzhu, do your rules and motto not profess to maintain elegance in principles?” he protested, as if the fault were on Lan Xichen for being incensed by his anger. As if the fault lay in him not being enough like his venerated ancestors.
He wanted to laugh in the other man's face. His ancestors would have been more shamed if he had chosen to not stand for Wei Wuxian, there was no telling how angry they were at all that the Lan Clan had fallen to in the past when they hid behind their reputation and motto to avoid intervening. Peng Yaoche's words were only continued proof that the fault did not lie with Wei Wuxian, but everyone who refused to look at their own actions and strive to be better than their failings.
“Tell me,” he began, trying to summon a calm he did not feel. “Just how righteous would I be if I did not speak for my family when they are wrongly insulted by outsiders. How would my principles stand if I did not recognize a man who is better than all of us and treat him with respect instead of the disdain you seem to bear for a man you have never met.”
Peng Yaoche opened his mouth, but Lan Xichen cut him off. “Retract your words, now. Retract them and I will not be forced to break our agreement since it is clear that your sense of honor does not exist and thus Gusu Lan cannot trust you to uphold your end of our bargain.”
The clan leader's face twisted unpleasantly. It was clear that Lan Xichen had struck back where he was weakest. “I would have never expected the Yiling Laozu to have such...adamant allies despite all he has done,” he muttered. “I can see that I have misunderstood the men in which I have come to treat with.”
Lan Xichen swallowed angrily, words tangled in his throat. His fingers itched for something; the hilt of a sword or the cool jade of Liebing. Anything that would make the point clean to Peng Yaoche as to what lines he had crossed.
He genuinely wasn't sure what he would have said or done next had Wei Wuxian not appeared from thin air at the perfect moment, sweeping in between them in a flurry of white robes. “Ah, Peng-zongzhu, this one offers his most sincere apologies for the interruption,” he said so smoothly his voice might have been oil. “I promise I will only be a moment, I have something I must ask for Lan-zongzhu's assistance in resolving.”
Lan Xichen held the breath he had taken in his lungs as Peng Yaoche's nostrils flared, his disgust clear on his face at being addressed by the man he had just been casually insulting to his Clan Leader as though it were a respectable thing to do. If this... this man had the temerity to continue spewing his bile in front of Wei Wuxian...
Tense moments passed in which he didn't dare breathe until he knew just what Peng Yaoche was going to do. He did not have Shuoyue on hand, but certainly he had the physical strength alone to act if he made any sort of untoward moves...
The tension was only broken by Peng Yaoche's terse nod. “No need to apologize, I have a long flight home. Lan-zongzhu, if our arrangement still holds, I will send my son over on the morrow?”
Wei Wuxian smiled brightly and stepped out of their way so that Lan Xichen could return his polite bow, drawing on every instinct of manners ground into him over the last four decades. “Yes, of course,” he said, struggling to keep the anger in his voice buried rather than unleash it in Wei Wuxian's presence again. “Our arrangement shall hold. In the meantime, I have things I must discuss with my brother-in-law ,” he managed with gritted teeth.
Wei Wuxian stayed patiently at his side until the other Clan Leader had left entirely, face placid and calm until Lan Xichen was certain that Peng Yaoche would not be returning any time soon. Then his polite mask broke into a wide grin. “Well that worked well,” he said with a smile, shifting like he was about to nudge Lan Xichen with his shoulder before changing his mind. “It looked like Xichen-ge was in need of rescuing.”
The air left his lungs in a rush, the heated anger cooling with it. “Wuxian,” he started and had to take another breath before he could find the rest of the words. “Your interruption was well timed indeed.”
Wei Wuxian wrinkled his nose at him before smiling warmly again. “If I'm actually interrupting you now, the thing I had isn't pressing at all. I just needed an excuse to come over and talk to you. ”
Lan Xichen shook his head. “There is no need for you to run, my time is currently unoccupied.”
Privately, he was hoping that Wei Wuxian might have had some need of him, something that he could do to make up for such cruel words being hurled at him in his own home, even if he hadn't necessarily overheard them.
His position and treatment in the Cloud Recesses was stable now; the dissenters were well aware both that Wei Wuxian had earned their clan leader's favor and that he was no longer allowing them to actively cause him any trouble, but there was a tension that had yet to truly fade between Wei Wuxian and those who had opposed him from the start.
He had hoped that his clan standing openly with Wei Wuxian would prevent others from thinking so casually that they could dismiss him in the same way they had under Jiang-zongzhu's leadership.
It was painfully sobering to realize that it was not enough. That other people would casually assume that rather than it being a show of solidarity, that he had simply bowed his head in deference to his brother's whims rather than thinking for himself and concluding that Wei Wuxian was a person he wanted to have in his home and in his life, as a brother. As his brother, freely chosen knowing exactly who he was.
A man so much better than the cruel words around him had ever given him credit for.
Wei Wuxian cleared his throat softly, making him startle. “Actually, do you have a few minutes then?” he said, arms loosely crossed and head tilted to the side. “It seems like maybe we do have something to talk about after all.”
Lan Xichen forced a smile on his face. “Of course,” he said, hoping the words sounded genuine and not wooden with the anger and shame and disappointment curdling in his veins. “Shall we adjourn to the hanshi?”
On their way there, Wei Wuxian kept up a steady stream of conversation that was only mostly one-sided, talking about the Lan juniors that he was going to take out night-hunting again soon and adventures that had happened with Wangji that made him light up at the very mention.
The clear delight on his face any time he mentioned Wangji, and the fondness apparent in his voice went a long way towards soothing the discontent in his soul. How could he have ever been so foolish to think that Wei Wuxian had no regards for his brother when it was so clear just how mutual their adoration for each other was. They both lit up as if the sun itself emanated from them when speaking of the other.
That was a wound that he would still carry for some time, the hurts he had given the two of them by unwarranted assumptions. But they had both, in their own time and ways, told him to stop, because what good was dwelling in the past when they could only change the present. He could understand their point; the past was filled with swords, daggers and guilt, but the only path he could take was forward.
“Anyway, I think you won't have any more troubles near the Lanling border for a while, unless there are more young couples pretending to be kidnapped by monsters so they can elope,” Wei Wuxian laughed, neatly toeing off his shoes as they stepped into the hanshi. “I'm not sure who was more pleased by the outcome, the couple or Lan Zhan. He was smirking the entire way back; so proud of himself for the whole thing.”
Lan Xichen couldn't help smiling at the audible warmth in his voice. “That is good to know,” he said sincerely. “Though I do believe that Wangji would prefer more of his night hunts have that sort of ending to them.”
Wei Wuxian shrugged and smiled. “You know Lan Zhan, he's Hanguang-jun. He'll do anything, go anywhere, no matter what.”
He could not disagree with that. However he suspected that at least some of Wangji's delight with the mission itself had to do with his own marriage and seeing others choosing their happiness over other's plans as well.
The pillow that Peng Yaoche had been using for his stiff leg was still at the table in the middle of the hanshi. He didn't have time to apologize for the mess before Wei Wuxian proceeded to sit down entirely improperly, but comfortably at the table, resting his foot on the very same pillow.
Whether Wei Wuxian knew or not what he was doing by that gesture, he couldn't say. But it amused him all the same.
Once the kettle was hanging over the low fire, Lan Xichen busied himself with finding the oolong tea that Wei Wuxian had once expressed a preference before after failing to conceal his winces through one afternoon at the taste of his tea. He knew that Wei Wuxian had asked to come with him for some reason, and he suspected it rather had to do with the anger still simmering in his stomach. His ready smile and light words had calmed him further, but also brought a sobering thought to mind.
If Wei Wuxian was close enough to see his anger, then he had to have been close enough to overhear what Peng Yaoche was saying. There was no way he couldn't have heard the baseless slander and insults to his name and reputation at the time. Yet while he was aware that Wei Wuxian could hide his thoughts as well as he or Wangji could, it seemed as though he truly was unaffected at all, but only worried about Xichen himself.
Still, he turned the question over and over in his mind until he had it polished to the root of what he wanted to say, putting all of his focus into preparing their tea. All the while, Wei Wuxian waited for him patiently, slumped over comfortably with his chin propped in his hand.
He closed his eyes and let out a deep breath; added the hot water into the pot and set it to steep. When he looked back at Wei Wuxian, his brother-in-law had a knowing smile on his face.
It was not the first time as though he'd felt pinned like a butterfly on a needle under that gaze. Yet he had never felt it turned on him in anything other than kindness. It was that very fact that made him bold enough to ask a question that he suspected had many answers and painful experience behind it.
“Wuxian,” he began, keeping his voice iron steady. “You overheard what Peng-zongzhu was saying before, did you not?”
That smile never budged. “And if I did?”
He almost couldn't help but smile at the reaction. He should have been prepared for Wei Wuxian to be kind, but not let him down easy when it came to questions such as this. His brother-in-law was quite cunning that way. Since that day months ago, many of their conversations had come around to Lan Xichen giving voice to the words in his heart, but with thought and care placed in them.
Some of them had been easy to say. Some of them had been much harder. Every time he had spoken them, a tiny shard of ice in his heart melted and healed over.
Which was how he could not quite understand how Wei Wuxian was so unaffected by such cruel words said with such casual arrogance and dismissal.
“How does it not touch you?” he asked, watching him intensely. “How is it that you can hear those in the jianghu- in your own home - say the most awful things and never bat an eye for yourself?”
Wei Wuxian's smile widened, the corners of them crinkling in delight. It did nothing to settle the discontent in his heart.
“You speak about going on night hunts out over the jianghu with Wangji, yet you never mention anything but the good,” he continued, unable to stop once he had started. “I have heard from Wangji and your juniors that others still have the temerity to say vile things to your face. Yet you only ever speak up in defense of those around you. Even today... you did not intervene on your own behalf, but on mine. Why do you not speak against them? So many of us have said so many cruel things to you, and done worse, yet you look at us and forgive us for all of it.”
How can you not hate the world that so consistently refuses to care for you the way you deserve? The thought sprang unbidden to his mind, but he bit it back down. Some things did not deserve voice, no matter that they came to mind. He did not want to think such things, even if it were selfish to wonder why Wei Wuxian could so consistently be kind when he was one of the ones who had benefited most from it.
“Ah, Xichen-ge, it's really very simple,” Wei Wuxian answered him when it became apparent that he had said all he meant to in the moment. “Why should I spend my days worrying about what people think about me? I don't have enough time in the day to consider inconsequential opinions of those who spout nonsense. Now if they're spouting nonsense about Lan Zhan, that's one thing, but even then it's often not worth it. They can say what they have to say, but I have no reason to listen to them.”
His voice was light, along with the words he spoke. But Lan Xichen couldn't help remembering when he had spoken up against others and argued passionately and how often his words were ignored, dismissed or turned against him for daring to say what the rest of them refused to look at. A lesson hard learned indeed. Why argue against the voices of the masses when they will never listen to that which they do not understand.
Wei Wuxian had discovered how far they could go if angered enough, why would he ever want to invite that again? Even though he now had Wangji, Lan Xichen and the visible might of Gusu Lan on his side, who was to say that he was in any way willing to test it again when the consequences had been so dire the first time?
“It does help to have a place to go now,” Wei Wuxian said more softly. “I have done some things in the past that I wouldn't do again. I have killed a lot of people, Xichen-ge,” he said with a somber smile. “I don't expect people to forgive that. I haven't forgiven them myself, even if I won't take them to task. But the jianghu is wide and I have a home where I don't have to hear such things said by those around me. Peng-zongzhu and his kind may still enter from time to time, but they will leave too. After all, they know where they aren't wanted, right?” he said with a soft laugh.
Lan Xichen let out an unbidden laugh of his own. Peng Yaoche had certainly been eager to flee when he learned that his assumptions had been mistaken.
“It is forbidden to speak ill of those who share your home, is it not?” Wei Wuxian teased gently. “But then I have no reason to hold onto the things that others think of me. Not when it only weighs down my heart.”
Lan Xichen let out a sigh, looking at Wei Wuxian intently. There was no lie in his eyes, no hidden shadow, only open smiles. “Was Xichen-ge truly so worried about this one?” he asked with a smirk, tilting his head to one side and looking up at him. “He's no one of consequence, why would I let his words in when I can listen to my brother-in-law instead?”
With that, he could no longer protest, Wei Wuxian had effectively talked him down. Something about the earnestness of his words set his mind at ease, though Lan Xichen privately knew that he would not forgive Peng Yaoche his words so easily.
But he could easily hold grudges on Wei Wuxian's behalf now, rather than against him. Perhaps he could easily forget the things that others said, but as long as Lan Xichen lived, he would not so easily forget them himself, nor forgive them as easily.
He smiled at his brother-in-law, at Wei Wuxian, the Yiling Laozu and former scourge of the jianghu, who understood people so well, yet had never let that harden his heart to the world. He was so immeasurably kind despite all that had happened in his life, but it was an active choice to be so.
What a guiding light he had been to so many in the world, and hopefully would be to so many more. Perhaps in the long run, the jianghu truly would become a better person from his teachings, even if there were those that would not always listen. As long as there were people like the Lan juniors and Jin-zongzhu in the world, he could believe that they might just perhaps learn to be better than the mistakes of their past.
“I think I still have many things to learn from you, Wuxian,” he said, feeling lighter in his own heart now. “I thank you.”
Wei Wuxian made a face at him. “Enough of that,” he protested playfully. “You'll have me teaching you how to flatter people so they will do whatever you want at this rate. And if you learn it, then Lan Zhan will learn it and I will never get the upper hand on him again.”
Lan Xichen couldn't help but smile at the thought. He reached over to the teapot, now nicely steeped and ready to drink, and poured for both of them. “Oh,” he paused as he handed over a cup to his brother-in-law. “Are you withholding vital secrets from my brother, Wuxian?”
Wei Wuxian widened his eyes in an innocent expression, as though he were one of their rabbits caught creeping beyond the borders of their meadows in search of Wangji again. “I would never do anything of the sort! But you do have to admit that Lan Zhan is frighteningly good at getting his way with just that little look in his eyes already as it is...”