Work Text:
You watch as the pink-haired Foxian in front of you stirs his ramen pot, his movements graceful and practiced. Jiaoqiu ladles the broth into a deep bowl, then collects some cold rice noodles from another bowl to the side. He stirs the noodles into the bowl gently, letting the broth heat up and cook the noodles, then slides the bowl of noodles across the counter to you.
"Just as you usually enjoy it, m'lady." He bows, smiling charmingly at you as he does.
"Thank you, Jiao," you say, pulling the bowl towards yourself. The steam of the broth wafts up to you, hot and heavy, giving you a taste of what’s to come. Just as you raise a clump of noodles to your lips with your chopsticks, someone slides into the seat besides yours. Someone dangerously familiar.
"Well, well, well. Look who we have here!"
"If it isn't Sampo Koski," you say, lowering your chopsticks.
"The one and only! You know it, baby." Sampo grins. "And don't you look absolutely ravishing today, miss." He picks your hand up and kisses the back of it, earning himself a giggle from you. "How has this beautiful lady been?"
You shrug, giving him the usual answer. Fine, good, nothing much has happened in your life. And Sampo isn't the type you'd share juicy gossip with anyway. He’s prone to selling that kind of information off if it suits him.
"I didn't expect to see you here in the Xianzhou," you say.
"My business takes me places. You know how it is." He winks.
Just as you’re about to mention how thick he’s laying it on, a loud crack startles you both. Jiaoqiu has slapped his hand fan on the counter.
"And will you be ordering, sir?"
"Oh, yes, of course. You wouldn't catch old Sampo Koski loitering around, bringing bad business."
The two men grin at each other, charming smiles all around, although you can feel a charge in the air. Their smiles are a little colder than you've seen them before.
"I'll have what she's having," Sampo says, pointing to you.
"Oh, be careful Sampo," you say, "his noodles are really spicy."
"Oh don't you worry your pretty little head," Sampo chuckles. "I'm a man, I can handle a little spice."
"And besides," he continues, leaning in and whispering, "this guy doesn't scare me one bit. He might be all bark but I doubt he's got a lot of bite, even in his food."
The two of you chuckle, but you watch Jiaoqiu's ears flick in annoyance. Sampo’s digging himself a deep hole.
In fact, one could call it a grave.
"Here you go, sir," Jiaoqiu says, passing a bowl of noodles to Sampo. "Please enjoy as much as you can."
"We'll take a bite together then," Sampo says to you, as the two of you raise your noodles from your bowls. "Three, two, one."
You slurp up your noodles, and let out a small moan. Heavenly. You expected nothing less from Jiaoqiu, of course, but the taste of his noodles never got boring. It’s rich, sweet, and deep, with a tingle of spice, as you always prefer. Jiaoqiu only kept his noodle stall open for a few hours a day but you made sure to mark the times and get yourself a helping whenever you felt like it. You smile up at him.
"Amazing as always, Jiao."
"You flatter me too much," Jiaoqiu says, fanning himself.
You hear sudden coughing at your side, and you turn to find Sampo hacking away, his face red.
"Sampo! Are you okay?" you ask.
"I-I'm fine, miss," he wheezes. "It's just a little...spicy is all."
"Oh—" you turn to look at Jiaoqiu, who’s hiding the lower half of his face behind his handfan, watching Sampo flounder with slitted pupils. You look back at Sampo, making no remark.
"This—" Sampo coughs again, "—this is a lot of spice."
"Only as much as hers," Jiaoqiu says, gesturing to your own bowl. "You asked for what she had and I gave it to you."
You slurp up your own noodles, and Sampo watches as you swallow with no reaction.
"If you're as much of a man as you claim to be, I think you should be able to handle what she's eating with no problem," Jiaoqiu continues.
"I can, yeah. This is nothing." Sampo grins at you, although you can see his eyebrows furrowing together. You only nod at him, then glance at Jiaoqiu as if to say how could you? Jiaoqiu only winks at you as Sampo musters up the courage to take another bite.
The rest of lunch you enjoy in silence, as Sampo is too busy wrestling with the spice he was given to make any further conversation, and Jiaoqiu isn't one for small talk. To Sampo's credit, he manages to finish the bowl, and by the end of it he looks as though he’s been through war. The two of you leave the stall together as Jiaoqiu closes up, and you notice Sampo giving the Foxian a dirty look.
△ △ △
It was only a few days later you found yourself in Aurum Alley, perusing the wares. A flash of soft pink catches your eye, and you turn to find Jiaoqiu wandering towards you, fan in hand.
"Fancy seeing you here," he purrs.
"Jiaoqiu? I thought you'd be managing your stall," you say. It isn’t yet the time for him to close.
"I would be, yes." Jiaoqiu flaps his handfan rapidly in front of his face, a sign of irritation.
"Apparently my supplier for the peppers I use in my cooking ran into a bit of an issue. They made a… ‘bad trade.’ All of their peppers are inedible. Therefore, I have nothing to make my noodles with."
"I see," you muse. The situation he described rings a bell, yet you can’t place your finger on it. "That's unfortunate."
"They'll have a new shipment by the next week. I trust they won't make the same mistake again." Jiaoqiu stares off into the distance, anger bubbling under his lidded gaze. But the show of annoyance is shrugged off almost as fast as it came, and he turns to you with his trademark smile.
"Anyway, I won't bother you with unpleasant details." He offers his elbow to you. "Shall we take a stroll?"
You hook your arm in it, smiling at him.
"Where are you going?" A voice comes from behind you, and both of you turn to find Sampo standing as though he'd been there the whole time, hands behind his back.
"Sampo!" you exclaim. Out of the corner of your eye you notice Jiaoqiu flatten his ears.
"Sorry if I scared you," Sampo smiles apologetically. "I was just too excited to see you."
"And look!" He brandishes a bouquet of flowers from behind his back, handing them to you. "I got these for you~"
"Oh, you shouldn't have," you say, taking them. Behind you, Jiaoqiu's tail thrashes from side to side.
"Oh, but who could resist giving such a lovely lady as yourself equally lovely flowers?" Sampo bows, then straightens.
"I see your companion has yet to give you anything.” Sampo turns towards Jiaoqiu. "Not very thoughtful of you, I must say.”
"I was about to take her on a stroll when you so rudely interrupted us." Jiaoqiu glares—glares—at Sampo.
"Really? That reminds me, aren't you supposed to be managing your stall right about now? Run into any... mishaps?" Sampo leans in, a challenging look in his eyes that is at odds with his placid expression.
"It's none of your business." The way Jiaoqiu waves his fan makes you worried he might break his wrist.
Sampo puts his arms up in mock surrender, then turns to you.
“Well, since I got you the flowers, you wanna go out on a walk with me?”
“I asked her first! And she accepted,” Jiaoqiu protests.
“But clearly I have more merit behind my offer,” Sampo argues.
“How about the two of you go out on a walk with me,” you say, getting in between them.
The two men look slightly miserable as they walk you down Aurum Alley. Of course, they don’t want to both be walking you but they can’t say no to your face, so here you all are. Being sandwiched between two attractive men, however, you can’t complain.
“Oh!” you gasp, breaking away from them to look at a food stall. “I’m really craving some skewers right now.”
“Consider them bought,” Jiaoqiu smiles. As he moves forward, Sampo stands in his way.
“I’ll buy you two,” Sampo offers you.
“I’ll buy you as much as you want, m’lady,” Jiaoqiu says, but it feels like he isn’t talking to you directly. The two of them are locked in a death stare with each other.
“Err… you can buy them for me Jiaoqiu,” you say. “I’ll make good on your offer later, Sampo.”
Jiaoqiu smirks at Sampo as he moves past him, but thankfully Sampo seems placated enough by your words to let him pass. You keep a laugh to yourself. Out of all the things, you didn’t think you’d ever have to stop Sampo from spending money on you.
Jiaoqiu comes back with the skewers, and you eat them quietly, savoring their sweet taste. The three of you keep walking down Aurum Alley, with you trying to keep the peace between the two men at your sides. They’re proving to be a lot more trouble than you had bargained for.
As the three of you come to the end of Aurum Alley, Jiaoqiu produces a small box from his pocket.
“You know, I don’t want us to continue on bad terms, Mr. Sampo. Accept this as a peace offering from me.”
Sampo raises an eyebrow at him, scrutinizing the box in his hands. Carefully, he decides to open it.
“You don’t trust me? I’m heartbroken,” Jiaoqiu puts a hand over his heart in mock shock.
“I’m sure you can forgive me for my suspicion,” Sampo says, pulling a small bottle out of the box.
“It’s only perfume. A gentleman of your caliber must be interested in such things.”
“Of course,” Sampo says, pocketing the bottle. “I appreciate your act of goodwill. Consider our slate cleaned.”
They smile at each other, and you’re certain that they’re now amicable.
△ △ △
The next day, however, you hear a knock on your door. You open it to find Sampo. You aren’t sure how he knows where you live, but your immediate concern is less on what he knows and more on how his eyes are red and tearing, and the expression on his face of deep anger.
“Where is that fox?” he asks.
You shake your head, letting him through. He splashes water on his face, and on his neck.
“What happened to you?” you ask.
“It’s that damn ‘perfume’ he gave me. Or rather, pepper spray.” He splashes water on his face again. “Peace offering, my ass.”
You move your hand up to your face in shock. After a lot of washing and rubbing, he removes enough of the spray, and stands up. You hand him a towel to dry off with.
“Now, darling, if you’d be so kind to tell me where he lives.”
“I honestly have no clue,” you say, and you’re speaking the truth. You only ever see Jiaoqiu either at his stall, or throughout the Xianzhou. With him being unable to sell ramen for the next few days, you don’t know of a place where you’d be able to find him reliably.
“That’s okay, I’ll find him myself. You wouldn’t want to watch us anyway. It’s going to get real nasty.”
Sampo smiles at you, and then walks out of the house, the door clicking shut behind him. You groan, putting a palm on your forehead.
△ △ △
For the next few days, neither man interacts with you. Whenever one gets close enough, the other would immediately sabotage him, leaving you to witness a fight out of the corner of your eye. For two non-confrontational men, it surprises you. You didn’t expect them to behave this way.
Regardless, you go on about your day, ignoring them. You aren’t one for ungentlemanly behavior.
One day, you receive a knock at your door. You open it to find both Sampo and Jiaoqiu standing behind it.
“Miss, we need you to decide,” Sampo says.
“Which one of us would you go out with?” Jiaoqiu finishes.
You look between them.
“Well, you see—” you start.
“The young lady is already spoken for tonight,” a deep voice rumbles behind them.
Sampo and Jiaoqiu turn around to find Jing Yuan. Immediately they straighten.
“Oh, I see.” Jiaoqiu says, fixing a peaceful smile on his face and bowing. “My apologies, general.” Sampo, not to be outdone, bows as well.
When the two stand back up, the general nods to each of them, smiling politely.
You observe all three men with deceptively gentle smiles on their faces, and realize that you have a very strong type. With a sigh, you step out the door and take the general’s hand, and the two of you walk into the night.