Work Text:
It is tradition for a Jiang disciple’s Clarity Bell to be given by an inner family member or, in the absence of family, one’s sect leader. Jiang Fengmian had given Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng their bells, each different in their own way, each imbued with his spiritual power and blessings that they needed. For Jiang Cheng, confidence in the face of doubt. For Wei Wuxian, clarity in the midst of passion.
Wei Wuxian had stripped his bell from his waist and placed it in Jiang Cheng’s bloody palm the day of their duel. A severance, sharp and sudden.
Since taking over, Sect Leader Jiang has made and given many clarity bells for the disciples flocking to him like ducklings after the Sunshot Campaign. Carefully, using his own ever-growing powers, Jiang Cheng had cultivated a bell for each of them. For Jin Ling, too, in the absence of his mother, he made an ornament: a bell of the finest silver with a tone clear as Lotus Pier’s shallow water hung from a tassel of twined purple and gold, an homage to both Jiang and Jin.
The bell he’s just made is different. It is not for a disciple, or a nephew, but for Wei Wuxian. The richest of purple cord braids together with ink-black, intertwining the color that Wei Wuxian should have worn and the color he had chosen - jealously, though, absent any white - and the knots are sure, strong, and filled with power. When he holds it up it chimes clear, loud in the stillness of the summer night outside his window.
Jiang Cheng cannot look at Wei Wuxian when he gives it to him, and so he leaves it, wrapped in thin, smooth paper dyed a soft petal pink, waiting to be discovered in its place on the table in Wei Wuxian’s rooms.
He drops his sword when he sees Wei Wuxian, an infuriating bumble that his disciples will forget by sundown but he will always remember. Wei Wuxian is here, in the practice yard, like he belongs there (doesn’t he?) and he’s wearing what Jiang Cheng left for him: robes of deep indigo with seafoam green at the cuffs and hem, bright treasures against the expanse of night-dark fabric. Lotuses throughout, like his - their - home, their sect, their family. The bell hangs at his waist, chiming softly with each step, music to Jiang Cheng’s ears sweeter even than the lullabies that Wei Wuxian had once played to soothe him on his dizi.
He expected the pride - the delightful satisfaction of seeing Wei Wuxian with a Jiang bell and not a Lan jade pendant, the gratification that Wei Wuxian has not only come to visit but seems that he has come home - but he doesn’t expect the lust, the desire that threatens to knock him off his feet sure as a tidal wave. He feels sick with it, utterly unprepared and entirely powerless under the onslaught of need. Worse, he has no doubt that Wei Wuxian knows it.