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Xue Yang looks up when he hears the sound of Xingchen and Song Lan coming back from their night hunt. But it sounds off. It sounds wrong. Their footfalls are too heavy, too slow.
And then he understands. One of them is limping.
His heart swoops, his stomach dropping. It’s probably Xingchen. Shuanghua is very good at her job of detecting demonic spiritual energy but it was only a matter of time before Xingchen relied on her a little too heavily, before he forgot he was blind and did something that would get himself hurt—
It’s not Xingchen. He’s stooped over, Song Lan’s arm heavily slung across his shoulders, blood dripping from between Song Lan’s fingers, from the hem of his black robes, onto the stone floor. He’s breathing heavily, his hair undone from its usually severe topknot, hanging like a curtain over his face.
“What the fuck?” Xue Yang bolts up, grabbing Song Lan’s other arm and slinging it over his shoulders. Fuck the fucker’s heavy. He and Xingchen slowly drag him over to the hearth. The one he built, not long after he started living with them. They manage to lower him, Xingchen immediately reaching for the floor cushions and stacking them so Song Lan can recline back. He’s pale, so pale, blood still trickling between his fingers.
“What the fuck happened?” Xue Yang asks again, glancing up at Xingchen.
“The yaoguai.” Xingchen’s mouth flattens just as a-Qing stumbles out of her room, blinking into the fire. She takes one look at Song Lan, her eyes go wide, and then she bolts out the door. She returns a moment later with a bucket of fresh water from the well, pouring it into a pot and setting that on the hearth to boil. “Thank you,” Xingchen says, unerringly turning toward her. “Can you please prepare some fresh bandages?” A-Qing nods, still looking fucking terrified before she goes back into her own room and Xue Yang realizes she’s going to use her own underclothes—
“Little Blind!” Not the most accurate nickname anymore since they all know she can see. But it still pisses her off so— “Not those! We bought linens at the market last time, don’t you remember? They’re on the shelf—”
“Yeah, yeah.” She turns and bustles over to the small hutch that contains their meager medical supplies. Fresh bandages, and some dried herbs and medicine that Xingchen insists they keep around just in case. Xue Yang glances back over at Song Lan as Xingchen starts to peel his robes away, at how Song Lan’s face is pinched with how hard he’s trying not to make any sound when clearly even that little bit of movement is agony.
Whatever happened to him was bad.
“The yaoguai,” Xingchen says, like he can read Xue Yang’s mind. “It could shapeshift. We thought we’d killed it but just as we moved closer to check, Shuanghua told me it was still living and then it shifted—I was able to move back in time but Zichen—he—”
“It turned into a massive boar and gutted me,” Song Lan says, his voice low and guttural. He coughs, blood spilling from the corners of his mouth. “It fucking hurt.”
Xue Yang feels this wild urge to laugh and cry at the same time. But he doesn’t know what the fuck to do. He feels fucking useless. He’s had to patch up wounds before. Bad ones, but those were on him. Not on the fucking distant snow and cold frost. He’s never seen Song Lan hurt before, didn’t even really think he could be hurt. Not even when he first arrived in Yi Cheng and Xue Yang wanted to kill him himself.
He bolts up again, snatching the cloths and bottle of medicine from a-Qing’s hands. “Hey!” she protests but he just glares at her and her mouth snaps shut. Then she goes back into her room. Probably to sulk.
No, he can hear her. She’s crying. That’s just fucking great.
“A-Yang.” Xingchen’s voice is low and kind. “Can you help me?” Xue Yang sighs like he’s being put out but at least now he can do something. He turns back, pulling the pot off the fire, applying what little spiritual energy he has to cool it off. Then he tosses a couple of the cloths in it, wringing them out and handing them to Xingchen.
Then he gets a good look at the wound. It’s nasty and deep, enough that Xue Yang can glimpse the muscle underneath. And jagged, enough that Xingchen’s gonna have his work cut out for him stitching it together.
Xue Yang should do it. He should be the one to clean the wound, to sew it shut, to wrap it up. Because at least he can see what he’s doing. But he can’t bring himself to do it. He can’t even look at it without wanting to cry and throw up and scream at Song Lan for getting hurt to begin with—
“Why?” He turns to Song Lan before he can stop himself. “Why weren’t you more careful? Why didn’t you make sure it was dead before—” He whirls on Xingchen. “How could you let this happen?” His voice is getting high and hysterical but he can’t help it; it’s like a dam bursting, all these feelings spilling everywhere— “How could you let this happen to him? How could you let this happen to—” He cuts himself off, slapping his hands over his mouth. His face is hot and his cheeks are wet and his heart’s in his throat.
He can’t. He can’t. He can’t deal with this.
He turns and bolts out the door.
*****
“What the hell was that?” Song Lan asks, staring out the open doorway. He hisses as Xingchen dabs at one of the cuts, a mixture of blood and tepid water streaming down his skin, making him shudder. He hates how this feels, wants to snatch the cloth from Xingchen’s hand and do it himself, but he’s too weak.
Xue Yang’s right. Song Lan underestimated how strong the yaoguai was, was too easily fooled. He should’ve been more cautious, and now he’s paying for it. It’s bad, but Song Lan’s been injured before. His cultivation’s strong; he’ll recover quickly enough.
Xingchen smiles that smile of his as he dips the cloth back into the water, now pink with Song Lan’s blood. “I do believe that is Xue Yang caring about you,” he says as he wrings out the cloth. “He’s worried about you.”
Song Lan grunts, and it’s only partly because the medicine stings like a motherfucker when Xingchen pours it into the wound. “He sure has a strange way of showing it.”
Xingchen hums as he unwinds a length of strong silk thread, expertly threading it through the needle by feel. “Surprised, Zichen?” He feels along the ridge of one of the wounds, Song Lan holding his breath as the needle sinks through his skin. It hurts, but not really any worse than the rest of it. He forces himself to breathe slowly and deeply through the rest of the suturing, letting his mind sink into meditation.
But it doesn’t work.
“If he cares so much, as you claim, why did he just disappear like that?” he asks before he can stop himself.
“Some people express their worry in different ways,” Xingchen says, that smile creeping back over his face. “I suspect that a-Yang’s not used to caring about others, so he has difficulty communicating his concern about your wellbeing.”
“He’s sure able to show how much he cares about you, though,” Song Lan grumbles. He’s not jealous, truly. He and Xingchen have a history, far longer than the three years Xue Yang and Xingchen lived here with a-Qing. It was strong enough to withstand the storm when Song Lan arrived, when he saw who Xingchen was living with, when they finally sat down and talked—and fought—about how they parted ways the first time. It was the first and only time they truly fought.
It was also the first time they truly spoke to each other from the heart.
Since then, he and Xue Yang have more or less held a truce of sorts. They’ve been able to live under the same roof, to tolerate each other enough for Xingchen’s sake. It took a long time for Song Lan to trust Xue Yang. He couldn’t believe Xue Yang was there for anything but to destroy them, to extend whatever revenge he’d apparently started to the both of them.
But that never manifested.
Xue Yang clearly didn’t trust Song Lan any more than he did him, was just as clearly jealous of the bond Song Lan and Xingchen shared, despite his own relationship with Xingchen. But he never tried to undermine it, and Song Lan never held any delusion that it was for any reason other than not wanting to hurt Xingchen.
“Are you truly surprised?” Xingchen asks, gently, as he ties off the last suture. “I know that forgiveness has been difficult for you.” Song Lan snorts. Because that is an understatement. It was the single hardest thing he’s ever had to do in his life. But he did it, with meditation and introspection and many, many, many mantras.
For Xingchen. For himself, because he didn’t wish to live with a resentful heart for the rest of his life. And, now he’s able to admit it, at least to himself, for Xue Yang. Even though he never thought Xue Yang would care enough to appreciate it, let alone care—
But maybe Xingchen’s wrong. Because Xue Yang hasn’t returned. It was well into san geng when they returned but it has to be si geng by now, perhaps even wu geng. Song Lan’s sense of time isn’t the best, his head still muddled by blood loss. But if Xue Yang just stepped out to clear his head or whatever, he should’ve been back by now.
This isn’t the first time he’s walked out, but every other time it was because of some fight he’d started with one of them, usually a-Qing. It took Song Lan a long time to realize it was because Xue Yang cared about her, enough to walk away before he said or did something to truly hurt her feelings. Which makes it doubly troubling that he took off after making a-Qing cry.
A-Qing comes out now, sniffling loudly, her eyes red and swollen. “Is he going to be okay?” she asks Xingchen, glancing over at Song Lan.
Xingchen smiles in her direction. “He will,” he says. “His cultivation is high. He’ll recover well.”
“That’s…good.” She turns to the door, still open despite the chill it’s bringing in from outside. “I’m glad.”
And that’s when Song Lan realizes she wasn’t asking about him. Not really.
“I’m just gonna—” She heads for the door and Song Lan knows she’s going to go looking for Xue Yang. He opens his mouth to stop her because it’s late and that yaoguai is still out there. And might’ve followed the trail of Song Lan’s blood here. It can’t enter the coffin house itself; there are too many wards surrounding it. But if she were to go past them—
Xue Yang staggers through the door, his hair wild, dark blood streaked across his face and spattered over his robes. He’s still holding Jiangzai, the same dark blood dripping from both ends.
“You—” Song Lan starts. But he can’t finish. He feels what little blood is there drain from his face, his stomach going hollow.
“Killed the yaoguai,” Xue Yang finishes, with a feral grin. “You’re welcome.” He comes further inside, dropping something large and heavy in Song Lan’s lap.
It’s the yaoguai’s tusk.
“Thought you’d like a souvenir,” Xue Yang says, crouching down to splash Song Lan’s dirty water over his face. Song Lan suppresses a shudder. Then does shudder when Xue Yang dunks both ends of Jiangzai into it, shaking the bloody water over the floor. “Oh calm down, Zichen,” he scoffs. “I’ll clean it up as soon as I get myself cleaned up.” He wipes Jiangzai off with his robes, storing her back in his qiankun sleeve.
Then he turns to a-Qing. “Here.” He pulls out a couple of the candies Xingchen always buys for him (and sometimes Song Lan but Xue Yang doesn’t need to know that), thrusting them at her. As close to an apology as he’ll ever give.
A-Qing takes them. As close to an acceptance as she’ll ever give back.
Finally, he turns to Xingchen. “I didn’t forget about you,” he says with a wicked grin. Then he grabs the front of Xingchen’s robes, hauling him into a kiss that makes Song Lan blush and a-Qing squeal and run back to her room.
Xingchen’s face is flushed when Xue Yang releases him, pink under his pristine white bandages. He stumbles back a step before he recovers, smiling at Xue Yang before he turns back to Song Lan, his smile faltering. Song Lan reaches up and takes his hand, squeezing it. Then shuts his eyes, the exhaustion of everything catching up to him. He’s too tired to care about the state of the floors, about what Xue Yang and Xingchen will likely be doing once Xue Yang cleans up but before the high of the kill leaves him. He’s probably too tired for the sounds of what they’ll be doing to keep him awake.
Just before sleep overtakes him, he feels someone’s lips brush his, gentle as a down feather. He opens his eyes, expecting Xingchen—
It’s Xue Yang.
“Thank you,” Song Lan says, wrapping his hand around the yaoguai’s tusk. It contains no resentful energy anymore. It’s just ordinary ivory, warm and firm in his hand.
“Don’t mention it,” Xue Yang replies. Song Lan nods, his eyes already falling back shut.
Xingchen was right after all.