Archive of Our Own

* * *

Beidou returns when Ningguang is preparing to leave.

Preparing is an understatement, she supposes. Beidou should have arrived a whole three hours earlier, but a fierce headwind stood between the Alcor and Liyue Harbour. Now she runs into a silent Jade Chamber, its lights dimmed, with three bags by the door and the lady herself seated on an ornate chair, whorls of smoke curling around her silvery hair. Ningguang lifts her head, eyelashes fluttering as her sharp gaze pierces through Beidou’s chest like a spear, pinning her to the wall. The Captain’s throat bobs, and Ningguang’s eyes follow the motion.

“You’re back,” Ningguang finally breathes, a tendril of smoke caressing Beidou’s cheek. You’re late.

“My star,” Beidou replies, crossing the room and pressing her lips to Ningguang’s hand. I'm sorry.

The Tianquan smiles, equal parts cold and wistful, thoughts left hanging in the still air. Beidou knows what she's thinking about. She reserves this smile only for her, and only when her mind rests on them. More often than not, duty runs away from them. They chase it with every fiber of their being, like an owner leashing an unruly pet, sparing time enough only for the faintest of touches and briefest of words.

Their soulmarks do no more than irreversibly bind their fates, and Ningguang has always faithfully carved out time for them. Beidou tries, but the stars seem to mock her every attempt. Fate has a cruel sense of humour, for it would declare them two souls entwined as one, yet snatch away the moments they have together as swiftly and quietly as a master thief in the night.

Damn the storm. The storm ruined it all. If not for the fierce winds that relentlessly hammered the Alcor’s sails for three days and three nights, they could have spent a quiet day together, before the Tianquan leaves for Mondstadt.

Beidou lifts Ningguang into a crushing hug, one filled with all the love she had stored in her heart during this yearlong voyage. Ningguang returns it silently, pipe crumbling into dust, fingers digging into her back.

To have only a few precious minutes with her soulmate before duty snatches her away— Beidou closes her eye, her grip tightening. She inhales the scent of glaze lilies, holding her breath as long as she can, keeping her lover’s fragrance deep in her chest. She runs her hands down the length of Ningguang’s back, tracing the curve of her spine, committing every piece of her to memory.

She almost wishes Ningguang didn’t need to visit Mondstadt. Can’t the Tianquan of the Liyue Qixing send someone else for diplomacy? Ganyu, perhaps? The general secretary does handle diplomatic relations with Inazuma, doesn’t she?

With another deep breath, Beidou swallows her thoughts. She has asked this once, twice, countless times, and Ningguang’s answer never changes. Just a knowing smile. A smile that both dazzles and vexes Beidou, the one she flashes at businessmen and merchants, the one that doesn’t reach her eyes.

Beidou nuzzles Ningguang’s cheek when she says, “I’m back for a few months this time. I’ll be here when you return.”

“Oh? Perhaps I can count on you to keep the Jade Chamber clean for me?”

“Don’t you have servants for that?!”

A smirk tugs at the corners of Ningguang’s lips. “Just our bedroom, then?”

“Fine.” Beidou shakes her head. “But I’m not sleeping there.”

“Why not?”

She sighs, burrowing her head into Ningguang’s silky hair. “Your bed… it’s just too big for one person, you know?”

The Tianquan lets out a low chuckle. “It is far more comfortable than your wooden plank of a bed, Beidou.”

“Fine,” Beidou huffs, “But plank or bed, it doesn’t matter when you’re not there, Ning.”

Ningguang’s smile is gentle, her movements slow and steady when she twirls a lock of Beidou’s hair around her finger. “It’s only a week, my Captain. You leave for months at a time.”

“Yeah, but I don’t have half of Teyvat’s world powers out to get my ass for a piece of Liyue, y’know?”

“The sea could still claim you.”

“That’s not the same.” Something drifts languidly between them, long and iridescent, like a mooring rope reaching for the dock. “It’s not the same as…” Beidou chokes on the rest of her words, shaking her head.

Once. Once is enough. When the Abyss Herald punched a blade through Ningguang’s chest— it has been a year since then, but Beidou’s hands still grow cold and clammy at the thought. She’s spent the year atoning for her mistake, and finally, her soulmate’s walls have fallen. Ningguang’s small smiles, her words— they carry all the honesty of a glaze lily blooming in song.

They are just as truthful even now, when Ningguang lowers her gaze and lifts a hand to her chest. The wound has long healed, save for a faded patch where the blade first kissed her skin.

Beidou pulls her into another tight, warm hug. “Just… come back safe, okay?”

“You know I will, Beidou.”

She pulls away, rubbing Ningguang’s hands gently, before crossing back to the door and picking up the three bags with ease. “I’ll walk you out.”

The Tianquan beams, pushing open the door and stepping out into the cool night. The moon hangs low over the Jade Chamber, clothed in star-scattered clouds. Beidou lifts her head to stare at empty, crisp darkness rolling into the distance, falling through the sky to the sea. Ningguang stands in the middle of the open plaza, her shoulders squared and her head held high, peering down at the dazzling hues of Liyue Harbour far below. Like a goddess surveying her land, Beidou thinks, always waiting, always watching.

Beidou joins her in the plaza. “You sure you don’t need me to go with you?”

Ningguang scoffs, taking a drag of the pipe she summons out of nowhere. “You worry too much, Beidou. If I worried half as much when you leave the harbour, I’d ground your entire fleet.”

Beidou’s chuckle rolls from her throat in thick waves. “Ever the dramatic one, aren’t you?”

“Dramatization does a fine job of hammering its point into a particularly thick skull.”

“Very funny.” Together, they walk to the plaustrite elevator. “After you, my lady.”

Ningguang flashes her a smile. The gentle one, the one that fills Beidou’s chest with a giddy, heady warmth. “Thank you, my Captain.”

* * *

The burning sensation first hits Beidou when she weaves through the crowd in Feiyun Slope, heading up to the Jade Chamber.

She had been counting the passing of days by the movements of her soulmark. The tattoo had unfurled itself into a fenghuang when Ningguang left, soaring across her body and roosting on the windmills of Mondstadt. She’d drawn relief from it, knowing that the Tianquan had reached her destination safely.

When the fenghuang took off again, Beidou knew the wait was coming to an end. She’d busied herself with preparations to receive the soulmate she so loved. She’d planned nothing grand— only her favourite limp cabbage soup and an early night, perhaps with a good massage. Ningguang was never one for fancy dinners; besides, such a trip would leave her exhausted.

Exhausted? Is that why her legs are burning? A simple stroll along Feiyun Slope can’t possibly wear her out, unless—

There’s a strange stillness hanging in the air, Beidou thinks, and every head she passes turns to stare at her, a shadow of fear rippling through bystanders. The crowd begins to part for her, as though she is no longer the renowned Captain of the Crux, but some kind of… inhuman… creature. She frowns, touching her face, her neck. Nothing feels wrong, although the fire in her legs has spread to her arms, and her chest, and her neck.

A fever? No, fevers do not feel like this, like she’s just shoved her limbs into a furnace in the name of fun to the point that she can barely feel them through the pain. Beidou stumbles at the foot of the steps to Yujing Terrace, her legs suddenly losing all strength for a fleeting second. Her eye widens.

“Beidou!” Ganyu’s voice drifts into her ear, and she looks up to see the half-adeptus next to her. Even Ganyu recoils, her pink eyes widening. “Beidou…”

“What’s… what’s going on?” she asks wearily, pushing herself up on her knees. “Why is everyone…” Staring at me?

“Your… your neck. Your… oh, Archons… it’s… I think it’s your soulmark…”

My—

Ganyu rummages around in her dress, pulling out a pocket mirror. Beidou all but snatches it from her, flipping it open.

No.

Inky black tendrils crawl up her neck, reaching for her chin, tinting her lips black. Her ruby eye, its sheen dulled, whites clouding into the darkest night. The hand that holds the mirror, fingers now as black as coal. For a fleeting moment, fire explodes through her veins— and vanishes as quickly as it had come, plucking a scream out of her throat.

Ningguang.

The pocket mirror falls from her hand and shatters.

* * *

I don’t really understand what I saw.

Darkness crawls at the edges of Ningguang’s vision. Wooden beams, a ceiling fan, a bespectacled green-haired man with a red-eyed snake leaning over her. She can’t feel her legs. She can’t feel her hands. But she can feel the fire in each ragged breath she takes, rushing into her lungs and blazing down her veins.

It was a… it was a wolf of pure darkness, and yet… it was not.

“You’ll kill yourself,” the snake speaks, its forked tongue flicking out when it raises its head. Ningguang would think it strange, if she didn’t feel like a soul trapped in a husk on fire. Shades of green dance across her black-tinted vision. “Do it in stages, Baizhu.”

It was something dead, that bled black mist.

The man turns away wearily, speaking to someone Ningguang cannot see. “I can’t purge the corrosion, but I can stay its progression.”

I watched it sink its teeth into me, watched its blackness sink into my veins.

“Two weeks… maybe more.” The man turns back, dabbing at her arm with a cloth. She hisses at the stinging pain, watching the cloth come away stained in black. “I can keep her stable… until the leylines purge the corrosion in her.”

I think, truth be told, I was going to die.

A sigh escapes the man’s lips as he turns towards the other person, who mumbles something Ningguang cannot hear. “The Vigilant Yaksha…? We must thank him for saving her, then…”

But Beidou—

Fire clogs her throat. She gags on smoke and foul mist, thrashing wildly and straining for air. But her lungs are filled with unholy smoke, full to bursting, and yet she finds there is no air, that she can’t breathe— until she feels the pressure of a mask on her face, cool air slicing a path through the thick mist like a finely-honed blade all the way into her lungs. Shakily, she draws a weak breath, her lips tingling from the touch of Anemo.

Beidou, I need…

The pressure on her face lifts, the Anemo mask quietly set on the bedside table. She sighs, her vision starting to blur.

Beidou, please…

The man watches her, his brows furrowed, as her heavy eyelids finally close.

…I need you.

* * *

Silvergrass grows on the road to Wangshu Inn.

Beidou sees the wispy heads of the aquatic plant sway in the gentle breeze on both sides of the stone road, its silvery fields occasionally pierced by a head of purple belonging to its cousin, the horsetail. The inn itself is an unmissable landmark, precariously perched on the only tree standing tall in the fertile alluvial plain of Dihua Marsh.

She does not enjoy the sights of Liyue very often. Her memories are filled with the sound of waves lapping against the Alcor’s hull, of stunning waterfalls, aquabuses and the vicious storm that had protected Inazuma for the past year. It occurs to her, then, that Liyue has… changed. For better or for worse, the land she calls home has inexplicably changed, and she has not stayed long enough to understand it again. Beidou doesn’t even stay long enough to memorise the new wrinkles on her soulmate’s face when she smiles, or trace the curve of her lips, or rummage through discarded calligraphy scrolls to see her name painted in broad, loving strokes amidst sweeping waves and sunny skies.

These thoughts consume her until she walks into the reception counter of Wangshu Inn and stubs her toe. “Ow!” Beidou hops back, clutching her foot. Her hood almost falls off her head, but she catches it with her other hand, sinking into a chair.

Verr Goldet looks up at her, her brows raised. “Ah, Captain…”

“I–I’m fine.” Beidou tugs her hood a little lower. Her soulmark has gone out of control since that moment, its dark tendrils spiraling all over her flesh, unsightly black worms crawling up to her cheeks. She has spent the better half of the day completely swathed in cloth up to her nose, if only to avoid rumours of a disease. “Verr, Ningguang, is she…”

The innkeeper beckons to her, leading her up the stairs. Beidou follows, her grip on the hood tightening till her knuckles turn white.

“Her entourage ran into rifthounds on the way back,” Verr Goldet explains, “They appeared out of nowhere. Reinforcements were on the way, but the hounds just obliterated her guards…”

Rifthounds are a rarity, even for one as well-traveled as Beidou. She briefly wonders if these are stragglers locked out of the Chasm when the Seven-Star Array was performed. How many more of these foul creatures are still wandering loose in Liyue’s wilderness, having escaped the sealing that nearly took Ningguang’s life?

“The Vigilant Yaksha, he was nearby, thank Morax. He rescued her.”

“An adeptus brought her here?” Beidou echoes, “Not that I’m ungrateful, but… don’t they usually leave mortals alone?”

Verr gives her a rather cryptic smile. “Let’s just say… the Liyue Qixing is very well-acquainted with this particular Yaksha’s duties, and he ours.”

Another of the Qixing’s secrets, then. There’s so much about Ningguang’s duties that Beidou does not know. There’s so much about her Beidou doesn’t know, if she’s entirely honest. Though they have put the past behind them, Ningguang remains guarded in many ways. She shields her heart like a glaze lily, refusing to bloom until the sweetest of songs are sung for her, and only her.

If only Beidou had understood, then, what it cost Ningguang to take the risk, to confess. Perhaps then, their hearts would not be broken so.

But her thoughts screech to a halt when Verr Goldet opens a door at the top of the inn. The first thing Beidou notices is Baizhu, sitting in the dimly-lit interior of the modest bedroom and holding a limp, blackened hand.

“Ningguang,” she whispers, crossing the room in three quick strides— but as she draws closer, a surge of fire bursts through her legs. She falls to her knees with a gasp, her hood slipping off to reveal black tendrils twisting up her cheeks into her eye.

“Captain!” Baizhu hurries over to her, shaking his head at Verr, who stops at the doorway. He presses a hand to Beidou’s legs, and she feels the soothing balm of Dendro wash over her calves. Gradually, sensation returns to her numb legs— a tingle at first, followed by pins and needles— and finally, she rolls over onto her butt, groaning and wriggling her toes.

Baizhu coughs, the white snake coiled around his neck raising its head in slight concern. He pointedly ignores it. “Can you walk?”

“Y–yeah. Thanks…” Beidou staggers back to her feet. “I… I don’t know what…”

“I’ll explain.” Baizhu helps her into a chair by Ningguang’s bedside. Beidou simply stares at her as a bottomless pit of horror opens up in her stomach. Bile rises in her throat; she swallows it down. Hard.

Ningguang lies motionless on the bed, her half-open eyes fixed blankly on the ceiling. Her hands, all the way up to her elbows, are tinged black and are far too still for Beidou’s comfort. The darkness on her limbs snakes all across her torso and bleeds into her lips and eyes like gangrene. With each slow breath she exhales, a dark mist spills out from her nose and black lips, dissipating into the air. And her eyes— Beidou can barely glimpse her beautiful wine-red eyes beneath a murky blackness clouding them.

Beidou doesn’t realise she’s clawing at her own arms, at the burning sensation under her own blackened skin, until Baizhu offers her a numbing poultice. She rubs it over her tingling skin gratefully.

“I did not realise your soulmark would react so severely,” Baizhu begins wearily, and she looks down at her hands. Her veins, every last one of them, are tinged inky black. Even her lips and eye, she knows, are losing their shine, just as Ningguang’s has.

“Verr said… rifthounds,” Beidou manages weakly.

Baizhu nods. “They are highly corrosive beings. Everything they touch… their bodies are affected by this dark energy. This” — he gestures at the blackness — “is the effect of their corrosion. A rifthound bit into her, and the corrosion spread unchecked through her body.” He points at the bandages on her left arm.

She understands what the tendrils on her own skin mean now. It is her soulmark’s reaction to the corrosion spreading through Ningguang’s body. “There’s… no antidote?”

“None. This isn’t a poison. Wangshu Inn, however, is built on a tree that several leylines pass through. It is our hope that the latent fresh energy here will purge the corrosion within her over time.”

“But… it hurts,” she mumbles, “It didn’t before, when Ningguang was…”

The doctor refuses to meet her gaze. “Overflow,” Baizhu replies softly, “There’s only so much pain she can take. To preserve her sanity, the rest of the pain…”

It flows through her connection to you.

Beidou stares at Ningguang, at the way her black lips part ever so slightly, as though some part of her struggles to give a voice to her pain. If her own soulmark burns, then the pain Ningguang is in must be tenfold. Using the burning sensation in her own limbs as a guide, Beidou silently rubs the numbing poultice over Ningguang’s arms and legs. She hears the faintest sigh escape her lover’s lips, and watches her stained eyes flutter shut.

“Is there nothing we can do?” Beidou asks, using the back of her hand to wipe the cold sweat off Ningguang’s forehead.

“We keep her as comfortable as we can.” Baizhu begins labelling bottles on the table. “With time… she will purge the corrosion on her own.”

Beidou only nods, her mind as empty as her heart.

“I’ll be outside.” Baizhu knowingly gathers his medical bag and leaves.

Beidou slumps over the bed when she hears the door shut with a soft click, staring at the unconscious woman quietly. Her thoughts are like the whorls of black mist Ningguang exhales, weaving cobwebs in her lungs and crushing her ribs.

She lifts her head. The window by the bedside is dim enough that it shows her own reflection, and it horrifies her. Veins run through the face that stares back at her, tinged in inky black, colouring her eye and lips, snaking down her neck. Her arms, a reflection of the corrosion slowly sapping Ningguang’s strength, turning her into a listless husk on the bed.

Complacency is an insidious parasite, Beidou thinks, it wriggles its way like a worm into their lives when she least expects it, when they’ve finally found a rhythm for their dance. It burrows into flesh and bone, and there— it breeds. One year ago she had sworn she would fight death again and again for the sin of being Ningguang’s one and only, but duty called, and their lives simply… went on.

Like a river flowing steadily from the fresh peaks to the sea, unbothered, unhindered.

If only Ningguang wasn’t her soulmate. All Beidou brings her is heartache.

She stirs then, as if some part of her heard the Captain’s thoughts, and Beidou hurriedly rests a hand on her forehead. She’s still uncomfortably warm. Wordlessly, Beidou limps over to the attached bathroom. Now that she is here, close to Ningguang, her own legs are feeling strangely heavy, as if they’re made of iron. It’s as though the soulmark itself is constricting around her limbs, refusing to let her move. Beidou fights it anyway, gritting her teeth and filling a basin with cold water before stumbling back to Ningguang’s side. She dips a cloth in the cool water, laying it on her forehead.

Ningguang’s long eyelashes flutter.

“Ning, my star?”

Her head turns, almost painfully slowly, and Beidou gently strokes her hand. Not a single finger twitches, and she wonders if there’s a connection between the heaviness of her limbs and Ningguang’s immobility. “Beidou…?” Ningguang rasps, her voice hoarser than sandpaper.

Beidou could almost weep from simply hearing her speak. “Shh, my heart… you’re at Wangshu Inn. It’s fine, you’re alright,” she blabbers, “I’m here now, okay?”

I’m not leaving you.

Ningguang merely nods, her body utterly motionless. It occurs to Beidou that she does not feel her touch on her arms; she barely seems aware that Beidou is holding her hand. Quietly, Beidou shifts her hand to cradle Ningguang’s cheek instead. Her inky-black eyes flutter open again, drawing comfort from her touch. She draws a weak breath, and more black mist spills from her lips.

Beidou adjusts the cushions behind her, propping her head up to ease the pressure. Ningguang tries to speak again, but the Captain taps her lips lightly. “Save your strength, bǎobèi.”

As always, the stubborn woman refuses. “Your… soulmark,” she whispers, craning her neck slightly towards her. “Our…”

Beidou gazes at her reflection in the dim window again, at her inky black veins and black lips. She only nods, tearfully cradling Ningguang’s cheeks, staring at her cloudy eyes. The burning sensation in her own limbs is barely noticeable — a bad case of pins and needles — almost as if Ningguang, now awake, is consciously holding the pain within herself. “I came here… as fast as I could, Ning,” Beidou whispers, “As soon as my soulmark became… this.”

A ghost of a smile tugs at the corners of Ningguang’s lips. “This… this is what you feared, isn’t it?”

Her breath is a ball of emotion wedged firmly in her throat. Yes, she wants to say, this is why she’d tried to run away, tried to deny that they were soul-bound, tried to defy the very will of the stars above. At least, that was what she’d thought.

Now, a year later— “Not anymore.” Beidou presses a kiss to her forehead, to the crease between her brows. They are only human, after all. When death claims its inevitable victory over them both, Beidou would rather have lived a life loving Ningguang than watching her die alone. “Through thick and thin, remember?”

We love as soulmates should.

Ningguang’s eyes brighten, just a little, amidst the murky cloud of black. “Still… I’m sorry,” she whispers, “The hounds, they…”

“I know. I heard from Verr.” Beidou strokes her hair gently. “I just wish I can do more, Ning…”

She shakes her head. “Just… having you here… is enough.”

Beidou chooses to keep her silence, answering only with a smile. “And I’ll be here as long as you need me, okay?”

Like before, like always.

She watches Ningguang slip into a quiet, restful sleep.

* * *

Ningguang wakes to the sweet fragrance of lotus seed and bird egg soup.

She stares at the wooden beams above her head, tendrils of darkness still hovering at the edges of her vision. That, and… at least the fiery pain in her arms and legs has ebbed into a dull burning sensation, the sort one might get if they rubbed Jueyun Chilli into their eyes.

Ningguang tries to remember. But her grasp on the situation after the rifthound sank its teeth into her flesh is tenuous at best, and she recalls only fragments: a man with a fierce mask, the wooden ceiling of Wangshu Inn, the soothing balm of Dendro, the touch of her soulmate—

“Ning? You’re awake?”

She turns, stiffly, at the familiar voice. Low and gruff, yet filled with warmth and life, it must be— “Bei… Beidou…?”

The Captain comes into her line of vision, a broad smile on her face. Even through the tendrils of darkness wriggling in her eyes, Ningguang still recognises the relief, softening Beidou’s sun-weathered features.

“How are you feeling?” Beidou sets the egg dish on the bedside table.

“Been… better.” It takes all her willpower not to roll her eyes.

Her soulmate chuckles and settles by the bedside, taking her blackened hand. Ningguang looks at their intertwined hands blankly. She should feel something. She should feel Beidou’s warm palm in hers, should feel her calloused fingertips brushing against her skin. She should be able to close her fingers around Beidou’s hand, feel the roughness of her hand in hers, and yet…

Nothing. She feels nothing.

“Ning?”

Nothing.

She can’t move at all.

Her stomach lurches violently; she groans at the wave of nausea that crashes into her senses. Darkness creeps into her line of sight and she almost wants to scream at it, to say no, no— don’t take more away— but all that emerges from her throat is a strangled moan and a gurgle that twists her gut.

A strong hand slips under her head and back, propping her up. “Hey,” Beidou murmurs, her voice calm and low, “Here…”

Ningguang stares, through blurred inky blackness, at an empty bowl before her mouth. She leans into it as her gut churns and her stomach lurches again, expelling what little food she’d eaten into the bowl in a slimy mess. Beidou remains still, patiently rubbing circles on her back, while she dry heaves helplessly into the bowl several more times before sighing and sinking back against the cushions.

Wordlessly, Beidou dabs at her mouth with a cloth. Hot tears prick Ningguang’s eyes. She has never felt this… trapped before. In a body that can’t move, staring at her soulmate with dying eyes.

“It’s temporary,” Beidou murmurs, resting a hand on her cheek. Ningguang leans into her touch silently. “Okay? I spoke to Baizhu about it. The corrosion is paralysing you… but it’ll be fine once it’s gone. You’ll regain your strength.”

The words fall flat, like paper slapping a wall. Ningguang only nods, wondering where her heart has gone. It’s dark both within and without.

“Ning… do you want to eat?”

She lifts her head, staring at Beidou. Her lover, her soulmate, her beloved, who greets her with a warm, brave smile that belies the fear in her ruby eye. Ningguang sees her corrosion reflected back at her through Beidou’s soulmark, a creeping mass of darkness consuming her bronze skin and devouring the light in her eye.

Ningguang shakes her head.

“Okay.” Beidou’s smile is strained. “Do you need anything?”

Yes, she thinks, she’d love to lie on her side and ease the pressure on her back. But it’s so stupid, so simple a request—

“Hey.”

Beidou lifts a thumb, catching a tear falling from Ningguang’s eyes. “It’s temporary, okay?”

It’s not forever.

“Tell me what you need,” she says, soft and gentle as she strokes her hair. “I’m here.”

Beidou is so warm. So calm, so attentive. It fills her heart with warmth; sends a tingle of sensation down to her numb limbs. If she focuses on Beidou hard enough, she almost feels as though she can wriggle her toes.

“I’m just… a little sore,” Ningguang finally mumbles, looking away. “My back…”

Beidou flashes her a smile, the one she reserves only for her, the one filled with genuine delight and adoration. Even now, her joy does not dim. The Captain’s strong arms fold around her, gently rolling her to lie on her side. “Better?” she asks.

Ningguang sighs contentedly. “Thank you…”

Beidou tucks her fringe behind her ear and plants a kiss there ever so delicately. “If you need anything, just ask, okay?”

“Mmm.”

“No shame, got it?”

“Mm…” Her eyes flutter shut.

Beidou lets out a low chuckle, a rumble that draws a smile on Ningguang’s lips. “Alright, I’ll shut up now. Have a good rest, bǎobèi.”

* * *

At the very top of Wangshu Inn, there is a balcony, where you can see the stars wheel overhead and bask in the soft light of the moon. And if you look towards the east, you can see the dazzling golden hues of Liyue Harbour, and the gentle golden light of the Jade Chamber hovering high above.

It is these sights that Beidou drinks in as she leans on the balcony railings, left with only her thoughts for company. Baizhu comes by every day to treat Ningguang, though Beidou isn’t sure what exactly he does. She does, however, feel the dull fire in her arms and legs fade to a tingle when he works his magic. That feeds her hope.

Ningguang is more lucid when Baizhu leaves, though she soon slips back into delirium, black mist spilling from her mouth. After that one moment of clarity, she has only slipped further into the corrosion’s hold, barely able to hold a conversation. The corrosion is a parasite, eating away at her body and soul, leaving her a withered husk of her former self.

But it’s temporary, Beidou reminds herself with a deep breath, it will not last. The leylines converge in Wangshu Inn, and Ningguang can — she must — purge the corrosion over time.

At least they are safe here. At least rifthounds won’t pursue them. Beidou can devote herself to caring for her, knowing that this place is owned by the Qixing’s very own. Despite that, she can’t simply relax and absorb the breathtaking beauty of Dihua Marsh. No, her good eye is darting about, watching for danger; her shoulders tense; her sword arm ready to draw her blade. The cold and cruel moonlight caresses her cheeks in a mocking display of the tenderness she yearns for, that has been denied to her.

The Captain clasps her hands behind her back, focusing her energy on wearing down the wooden floorboards of the balcony in her furious pacing. She counts twenty laps before she hears an unnatural whoosh to her left. Beidou spins on her heel with a growl, hand flying to the hilt of her sword. “Who—”

“—are you?” the stranger utters in the same breath as she does.

She freezes, sizing up the odd figure before her. He’s a short little thing, his teal hair tousled by the wind, a green tattoo tracing the veins of one arm like a snake, down to a gloved hand. Beidou could easily crush him based on physique alone, but something about those golden, avian eyes stops her.

This is no human. Those eyes— they are that of an illuminated beast.

“You first,” Beidou demands, pointing her claymore at him. Adeptus or no, she will let no harm befall Ningguang here.

The stranger ignores her, looking her up and down. “You are Beidou. Slayer of Haishan.”

Her sword wavers. “You… know me?”

He nods. “You are one of the rare few I know by name. A human who has proven their power in defeating a god.”

“Who the fuck are—”

“Beidou?” a cheery voice calls.

Both adeptus and Captain turn to see Chef Mao standing at the doorway with a plate of almond tofu in hand. His grin slowly fades when he sees Beidou’s claymore still pointed at the stranger’s throat. “Morax’s shriveled balls! Put that away, Beidou!”

“He’s a guest?” she asks, reluctantly sheathing her sword.

“A guest? An esteemed guest, more like!” Chef Mao exclaims. Beidou has the feeling he’d wave his hands wildly about if he wasn’t preoccupied with this plate of tofu. “This is the Vigilant Yaksha, the Conqueror of Demons!” He turns to the yaksha and bows, holding out the almond tofu. “Please accept this offering as an apology on behalf of Captain Beidou, sir.”

“Oh,” Beidou says uselessly while the yaksha reluctantly accepts the tofu. “So you’re the Yaksha Ningguang talks about? I wasn’t expecting someone so scraw—”

“The tofu’s good, I hope?!” Chef Mao pipes up loudly.

The yaksha grunts and nods, swallowing the tofu in a single gulp. “Wait. The current Tianquan told you about me?” he echoes incredulously. It shouldn’t be possible, but the air between them turns frigid.

Beidou gulps audibly. Chef Mao slinks away with the empty plate, refusing to be collateral damage in their squabble. “N–nah,” the Captain stammers with an awkward wave of her hand, “You must’ve misheard.”

The adeptus gives her a long, circumspect look. She cannot help but feel foolish, standing in absolute stillness on a wooden balcony, like a statue carved specifically to offend the gods.

“Hmph.” He turns, hopping onto the railing with otherworldly grace.

“Hey— w–ait!”

The yaksha does not turn, but he inclines his head ever so slightly.

“I heard… from Verr.” The words tumble out of her mouth in a heady rush. “Ningguang, she… you saved her.” She swallows thickly. “Thank you, Vigilant Yaksha.”

The tension hangs between them, strung like a taut rope. A second wave of foolishness washes over Beidou; she stands still once again, almost like a statue waiting for divine punishment.

“...Xiao.”

“S–sorry?”

“You can call me Xiao.” He turns, his golden eyes piercing through hers like a spear thrown from Celestia. “And it is a small matter. Rex Lapis would not want to leave Liyue without a leader in these trying times.”

She steels herself. “Whatever your motives are, you saved my soulmate. So I mean it… you do have my thanks. Even if a mortal’s gratitude doesn’t mean much to an adeptus.”

To her surprise, Xiao almost recoils from her remark. He turns away, staring at some distant point she can’t see. “...She fought well,” he murmurs, “the current Tianquan. When I killed the last one, she called you by name.”

A cold slab of ice slides down the length of her spine.

“‘It’s not your fault.’ That’s what she said.”

Beidou lifts her hands when a sudden gust of wind rips across the balcony. When the wind dies, she looks up, and finds herself alone in the moon’s cold embrace.

* * *

Beidou enters the bedroom to find Ningguang sitting up in bed, propped up by cushions, with Baizhu by her side.

It brings a smile to her face, to see clarity in her soulmate’s black-kissed eyes, even if her body still lies limp on the bed. “Beidou,” Ningguang greets softly.

“Bǎobèi.” Beidou crosses the room, cups her cheeks in both hands and plants a kiss on her forehead. “How are you feeling, my love?”

“I’m…” A pause. “It… it doesn’t hurt too much.” Ningguang looks down at the sheets, where her arms lie by her side. “But I still can’t… feel anything.”

Beidou pulls her closer and looks at Baizhu.

“She still needs time,” the doctor explains calmly, “I’m afraid the corrosion is still running its course, but the good news is that her condition is improving.”

His hands— they are just as black as Ningguang’s limbs, as dark as the Abyss she hears about so very often, as dark as the holes torn in the fabric of reality through which the rifthounds emerge. Beidou’s eye narrows. Baizhu discreetly tucks his hands behind his back, shaking his head ever so slightly. Don’t ask.

“You think we can bring her home?”

The doctor smiles wanly. “I wouldn’t recommend travelling, Captain. The corrosion still runs strong within her… it’s best not to strain her body.”

“Alright.” She buries her face in Ningguang’s hair as Baizhu excuses himself. “The inn’s nice,” Beidou explains when she spots Ningguang’s questioning look, “But it’s not your home, Ning.”

“Home… isn’t a place, Beidou,” Ningguang sighs, “Home is… where you are.”

Her cheeks— they explode in a rush of heat, like pyro barrels igniting one after another. Uncontrollable warmth spreads through her face all the way to the tip of her ears. “Y–you— don’t sweet talk me!”

Her soulmate laughs, a clear tinkling sound— that quickly erodes into pained gasps and wheezes when the black mist wells up from within, spilling out of her nose and mouth. Beidou has seen this enough times that she no longer flails; she immediately pushes her back onto the bed, pulls open the first drawer and whips out the Anemo mask, placing it firmly against Ningguang’s nose and mouth. The corrosion, it pours from within her in bursts, eroding her body from within, even as she clings desperately to life.

“Shh, breathe,” Beidou whispers, tears pricking the corner of her good eye.

Ningguang struggles helplessly underneath her, desperately gasping for air, tears sliding out of her tightly closed eyes. Beidou’s own chest constricts; her own breaths come in wheezes, so short that her head spins, and she isn’t sure how much of it is her own fear and how much is a spillover from Ningguang’s suffering.

But the episode, like all others, eventually passes. The corroded mist fades, receding back into her body. She sags against the pillows; Beidou gently rubs the tension out of her shoulders. The mist will now flow inwards, Beidou knows, it will now burn her from within. She heads to the bathroom, filling a bowl with cold water, and returns, pressing a hand to Ningguang’s forehead.

Hot.

“Oh, my light…” Beidou bites back a sob, laying a cool cloth over her forehead. It hurts. It hurts, but she would rather be here than anywhere else. She ran away once, and she will not run again. Even if Ningguang fades away, even if she loses this battle— Beidou wants to be there, all the way, till her very last breath. “I’m here, my soulmate. I will be here. Through thick and thin.” Her voice breaks, as it had one year ago, when she swore this to Ningguang as she lay dying from a gaping hole in her chest. “In sickness and in health…”

The light in Ningguang's ink-stained eyes fades.

—Till death do us part.

* * *

In the suffocating heat of fever, the dreams come.

Ningguang walks through the snow-capped mountains of Dragonspine, the cold biting viciously at her ankles, yet it does not soothe the raging fire consuming her body. She dips her head under the warm waters of Yaoguang Shoal, the sun shining upon her face, yet the iciness does not cease its furious gnawing on her bones.

The water drains away, and she is falling, falling, falling— rifthounds slicing open the fabric of reality and snapping at her limbs, their fiery talons digging into her flesh, and that horrible, burning furnace ripping through her body while she screams and screams and screams—

“Ningguang!” Her name, drenched in cold horror.

Beidou.

She opens her eyes to darkness crawling around the edges of her vision, to the stinging rawness of her throat, to the film of cold sweat still clinging to her feverish skin. She shivers, teeth chattering, and Beidou’s arms tighten around her clammy body.

Then the fire returns. Crawling up her hands and legs, licking away at her torso. She buries into Beidou with a whimper, silently begging for it to stop, for her to be able to move again, to feel something in her limbs other than the undying black fire that burns in the rifthounds’ eyes.

Beidou tenses, a small groan escaping through gritted teeth. Ningguang lifts her head to see a grimace on her soulmate’s face, as if Beidou, too, feels the fire racing through her veins.

She opens her mouth to ask, but Beidou’s jaw clenches in determination. She stiffly tips to the side, managing to grab a weak hold of two numbing poultices, and drags them onto the bed, almost as though she can barely feel her own hands. Wordlessly, Beidou rubs them gently onto Ningguang’s arms and legs. She knows exactly where it burns the most. Her fingers, her toes, her palms, her calves, her wrists. She works the poultice into her skin, rubbing it up her shoulders and thighs, relaxing as much as Ningguang does.

When the fiery pain ebbs to a dull tingle, Beidou discreetly smears the remaining poultice along the black tendrils snaking across her own limbs.

“You…” Ningguang whispers, “Your… soulmark…”

The Captain’s gaze is sad. Broken, even. Ningguang wishes she could erase her memory of this, of seeing Beidou so hollow. “I have… some idea of the pain you’ve been in, my heart.” Beidou puts the empty poultices aside, leaning close to her. “It’s too much for you, for anyone, to bear.”

Hot tears prick Ningguang’s eyes. Beidou’s voice is so earnest— she can only believe that Beidou knows, intimately, the flames of agony conjured by the corrosion in her body— and perhaps more. “I’m…” I’m sorry.

“Shhh.” Beidou’s arms wrap around her once more, gentle yet firm. “It’s not your fault, too, you know? If we want to blame someone… we blame the gods.”

Ningguang lets out a low chuckle. “You would make an enemy of… Rex Lapis?”

“He’s dead, ain’t he?”

“To the masses… yes.”

Beidou shrugs. “As good as dead to me, then.”

“You’re savage.”

“You’re the savage one. Beating up bleedin’ rifthounds like you trash businessmen.” Beidou grins, tapping her nose lightly and chuckling when she scrunches up her face in response. “I’m proud of you, Ning. It’ll be over soon.”

Ningguang throws her a questioning look.

“My soulmark.” Beidou’s grin widens. “I think it's receding. Your corrosion, it’s wearing off.”

Ningguang isn’t sure whether it’s the conviction in Beidou’s voice, or her own imagination hard at work, but she can almost feel a faint tingle in her fingers now. She can even wriggle a few toes if she concentrates hard enough.

“It is wearing off, isn’t it?” Beidou’s brow furrows.

“Perhaps.”

“Perhaps?!”

“I’d prefer not to speculate,” Ningguang replies mildly, “Hope can be… cruel.”

Two fingers slide under her chin, tilting her head up. Ningguang reluctantly lets her gaze wander over Beidou’s features, tracing the dark veins snaking across her chin. She’s right, though: those damned black veins seem just a little paler, weaker, as if its hold on the Captain is fading.

“Hope is all we have.”

Beidou leans in and kisses her.

* * *

Beidou soon loses track of the days. The budding blossoms of spring soon give way to the suffocating heat of summer, but her spirits do not lift.

She remains a haggard shell of herself, poultice in hand, watching her soulmate rest. But when she raises her head to the dim window and gazes at her own reflection, she sees more and more of a human staring back at her. The inky blackness of her eye and lips fade. The black tendrils creeping up her cheeks recede. The tingling heaviness in her limbs, the fire that rages through them— all of these begin to ebb away, absorbed by the leylines and carried deep into the land.

Black mist still holds Ningguang in a chokehold, still ravages her lungs and burns her limbs. But its raging fits are few and far between, and the darkness in her beautiful eyes begins to dissipate. Beidou recognises the moment Ningguang can clearly see again— on the third week, when she opens her clouded eyes and winces at the light.

On a rainy evening, Beidou sets aside the bowl of cabbage soup and lays a hand on hers. Underneath her palm, Ningguang’s fingers twitch.

She looks at her soulmate and smiles.

* * *

Beidou does not know exactly when it happens— but she stares at her own reflection in the dim window on a sweltering night and finds no trace of blackness in her eye. She checks her neck, her hands, her legs. Colour floods her arms and legs, inky black tendrils shriveling back towards her belly, where the core of her soulmark lies.

She whirls around to see Ningguang gingerly pushing herself up in bed for the first time in a month. Her frail arms soon give way; she collapses onto the pillow with a grunt.

Beidou clutches Ningguang tightly and weeps tears of joy.

* * *

Hand in hand, they walk together.

Beidou takes a step backward, and Ningguang takes one shaky step forward. Step by step. One foot in front of another. She leans on Beidou heavily, hissing with each painful step across the wooden floorboards of the bedroom. She has not walked in a month, but now— now, the corrosion has receded enough that she can feel her toes once more.

“You’re doing well, my heart,” Beidou coos, “So, so well. One more step?”

Ningguang scowls, and Beidou adores the way her wine-red eyes narrow as she glares daggers at her soulmate. Her grin widens when Ningguang grits her teeth and takes one more wobbly step before she collapses. Beidou catches her with an arm around the waist, acutely aware of the feel of her body pressed against hers. A warm pressure. Soft landscapes of hills, valleys. Her warm breath caressing Beidou’s shoulder. The tension in her muscles, unraveling with each frustrated sigh.

Beidou pulls back, gazes deep into Ningguang’s wine-red eyes, and kisses her.

* * *

A moon cycle passes, and almond tofu makes Beidou sick.

That silky smooth texture, the way it wobbles when she carries it back to Ningguang’s bedroom, that sickeningly fresh aroma of almonds— she’s had enough. She’s been eating this for weeks now. “I can’t wait till you can eat other things,” Beidou complains as she sets the plate down on the bedside table.

Ningguang looks at her, amusement twinkling in her eyes. She shrugs and continues squeezing a little stress ball in her hand. The blackness has all but faded, the corrosion merely tinting her fingertips and toenails. Beidou glances at her own reflection in the window, and silently thanks the stars above that her soulmark, too, has returned to its rightful place on her belly, even if it is still a swirling mass of darkness.

“How are you feeling, my heart?”

Ningguang slowly squeezes the ball as tightly as she can. Her fingers barely manage to make a dent in the ball’s foamy body, and she sighs. “I suppose I am better.”

“You couldn’t even hold a ball last week,” Beidou points out, “This” — she lays a hand on the ball, their fingers touching — “is already a feat.”

The other woman flushes, heat rising in her cheeks. “I might do better if the ball was shaped like your head.”

Beidou recoils in mock horror. “Archons! You’d squish me?!”

“With affection.”

“There’s nothing affectionate about crushing my head.”

“It’s not your head. Just an accurate replica.”

Beidou snatches the ball from Ningguang’s hand, rummaging in the drawers with a scowl and pulling out a quill and inkwell. She draws two shaky lines and a clumsy bracket on the ball, adding a terribly skewed outline of an eyepatch and hastily colouring it in. When the ink dries, she plonks the ball back into Ningguang’s hand. “There.”

The Tianquan raises a brow. “Is this supposed to be… your face?”

“It’s got an eyepatch, an eye, and a mouth. Close enough.”

“This is terrible.” Ningguang squeezes the ball viciously, taking special care to dent the line that represents Beidou’s eye.

“Damn…” The pirate shakes her head. “Remind me not to piss you off again?”

Ningguang beams, her gaze wandering over Beidou’s face and flicking down towards her neck and shoulders. Beidou feels the heat rise in her cheeks. “Your soulmark,” Ningguang murmurs, “It’s…”

“Yeah.” Beidou sits by the bedside, taking her hand. “Your corrosion… it’s fading. I watch it recede everyday.” She pats her hand gently. “You’ll be ordering me around soon, Ning, like always. Not that I’m looking forward to it.”

“I compensate you adequately for that, do I not?” Ningguang gives the ball another vicious squeeze with her free hand.

Beidou shudders, just a little. “Of–of course, my lady! You do, you do…”

The Tianquan huffs, though her eyes brighten in joy.

Beidou pushes her back on the bed and snuggles closer, cradling Ningguang’s head in her bosom, legs entwined as one. Their bodies press together, and all the fear and pain and tears are nothing but distant memories of a passing storm.

“I’ve dreamed of this day for weeks,” Beidou murmurs, tears pricking the corner of her eye, “The day you’d look at me and smile again…”

She feels Ningguang’s fingers, tangling into her hair, pulling her even closer.

“I love you,” Beidou breathes, her voice trembling just as it had a year ago when she looked at a woman broken by rejection. “I love you, bǎobèi.”

This time, Ningguang’s answer is swift and gentle, decisive and warm. “I love you too, my heart.”

* * *

Sitting up in bed, Ningguang reaches out to run a finger across the windowsill. This very window that she could never open, that Beidou had often stared at ever since she came here. Ningguang closes her fingers around the handle and twists it, pushing the window open just a crack.

A blanket of heat and stupor, the hallmark of summer, lazily wafts into the room. She wrinkles her nose and shuts the window. It makes her head spin, to think that such a simple act had been beyond her just several weeks ago. How blurred the memories are, when all that ties them together is an endless darkness mired in flame.

She swings her two legs off the bed, pressing her feet firmly to the floor before standing. Her muscles groan at the strain, but they hold. Ningguang limps over to a full-length mirror, lifting her shirt instinctively— and then remembers that her soulmark isn’t there anymore.

No, after this… incident, it has shifted, snaking up her chest to her neck. A lóng, its long serpentine form stretching upwards and curling around the side of her left ear, tail resting neatly on her earlobe. A threat and a declaration all at once, that she belongs to the Uncrowned Dragon Lord of the ocean.

She slips on a tunic and opens the door.

Beidou perks up at the sight of her. The Captain’s soulmark, too, has changed, answering the lóng’s call. A red fènghuáng not unlike Ningguang’s tattoo flies across her collarbone, its beautiful tails possessively curled around her ear, its tips resting on her earlobe. A promise and an announcement all at once, that Beidou belongs to the Tianquan of the Liyue Qixing. Her cheeks redden at the thought.

“I’m hot, eh?” Beidou chuckles.

“Yes, you are. And so am I. It’s summer.” Ningguang quickly averts her gaze.

The Captain guffaws, taking her hand. Together, they slowly descend the stairs, Ningguang focusing on her weak feet while Beidou supports her weight. She cannot yet walk far or long, nor can she climb stairs with ease, but Baizhu has assured them both that a full recovery is only a matter of time.

As soon as they step out of Wangshu Inn, Beidou slips a hand behind her knees and sweeps her off her feet. Several merchants simply stare, and one drops his fork into a plate of almond tofu.

“Beidou!”

“You’re not wearing shoes,” Beidou remarks.

“It’s just a short walk to the carriage!”

“Still a walk.”

“I can walk! Put me down!”

“Hah! You ain’t walking anywhere till I see you scold a businessman out of your office, Ning.” Beidou prances over to the carriage, opens the door and dumps her inside like a fragile package. While Ningguang sulks on her seat, the Captain hops on next to her and gives the coachman a thumbs up.

The carriage begins to move, wheels rolling over bumpy stone, doors rattling like an old man’s knees. Liyue stands in the distance like a towering mirage, shimmering and shifting in the heat. Beidou yawns, leaning back with a contented smile. The fènghuáng on her neck all but glows, graceful and free.

Ningguang quietly rests her head on Beidou’s shoulder and falls asleep.

—FIN.