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They’ve made a mockery of Mu Qing’s palace, this much he knows. The pavilions and the pillars are all painted in the same generic brick red that outlines Nan Yang’s palace, but the way the palace is laid out makes it abundantly clear: all paths converging into a considered tapestry of elegance and efficiency - even here, he has a good vantage point of the front hall where Mu Qing always makes him wait, the training grounds, and the gardens. It’s an exaggeration to call them the gardens now - the strip of land overgrown with wild grass and moss, the stone lanterns no longer a polished speckled grey.
It used to be… artful. Everything about Mu Qing’s palace was - a delicate swatch of indigo, tactful trims of gold, lined with pleasing flowers. The arrangement always reminded him of a shui-mo painting, washed in hues of pale greens and blues, sensibly hinting at the general’s taste.
That’s not right; Feng Xin never paid attention to Mu Qing’s palace. It’s only on reflection, on comparison, that he remembers these details he once took for granted.
(He's not used to thinking of himself as ungrateful, but he's also never been known for the measure of his gratitude. That was Mu Qing's... thing. That was what people called Mu Qing. That was how people knew Mu Qing; how Feng Xin knew him.)
It’s not right, that there’s Nan Yang’s emblem on the flag hanging in the front hall. It’s not right that the deputies training on the grounds are all clothed in Nan Yang’s colours. It’s not right.
But it is.
The feeling of unease creeps up on him.
General? Chen Guoren asks, confused. They were in the middle of talking about maintaining the palace walls. Chen Guoren had asked if they were going to revisit the training schedules.
Feng Xin asks, I need to know if the Lightning Master will also be petitioning for the San He cultivation lands.
That’s not right. That’s not what Feng Xin wants to ask. He feels it ripple along the sides of his torso. But Chen Guoren continues speaking. It makes sense, and it also doesn’t; Feng Xin doesn’t remember what they were talking about.
They’ve walked to the inner parts of the palace now. It’s all- the dull paste of reds and golds. There are long, overgrown grass and weeds surrounding the grounds. Feng Xin feels like throwing up. None of this is what Mu Qing would have wanted, much less condoned.
San Jiang is precious, but it’s also close to the Earth Master’s territory, so everyone’s trying to get first dibs, Chen Guoren explains.
He goes on at length about San Jiang and its surrounding lands, as well as the mines at Cang Kun. All of it flits in and out of Feng Xin’s ears like the buzzing of flies.
Maybe it’s not just Chen Guoren. Maybe it’s- he can- the tremors, the grey billowing silence in his ears. He swallows.
San Jiang? Feng Xin asks. Weren’t they talking about San He?
It’s not the right question. It’s not what he wants to ask.
Chen Guoren says, We were always talking about San Jiang, General.
Have you forgotten?
They’re no longer walking along the hallways now. They’re in Feng Xin’s study. It’s decorated exactly the way Feng Xin’s current study is - the low desk on the side, the strewn scrolls on the floor, Feng Shen hanging on the wall. There’s a half-melted candle on the brass holder, the one that Mu Qing gifted him for his birthday (he honestly doesn’t remember the dates, but Mu Qing does) two years ago-
But the door of this room isn’t facing south. It’s facing north. This isn’t his room.
What are you talking about, General?
It’s - his room doesn’t have high ceilings like this one. His room opens out to face his own training quarters. That’s a brass holder from Mu Qing.
Mu Qing? You mean General Xuan Zhen?
Yes.
Chen Guoren’s face crumbles. It’s Tao Yue who speaks instead. Tao Yue, Mu Qing’s second-in-command.
General Xuan Zhen has been dead for the past hundred and three years, General Nan Yang.
That’s not- that can’t be true. Mu Qing isn’t dead. (But it is.) He needs to conjure up Mu Qing - he’ll be bursting in through the doors any time, swishing with his robes, yelling at Feng Xin for desecrating his private halls.
General Xuan Zhen perished in Mount Tonglu, in the battle against Jun Wu.
Tao Yue isn’t there anymore. It’s just him, gazing down the field of flames. The rocks under his feet are hot. The red of his robes appear a muddied brown in this scorching light. There are hands reaching out from the lava, all of them charred and indistinguishable.
One of them is Mu Qing’s. He squints, waving at the impenetrable smoke. There are faces now, a mixture of Yong An and Xian Le’s soldiers lost in their final screams of anguish. He sweeps his gaze across them. He thinks he sees his men. They shouldn’t be like this. They shouldn’t be trapped like this.
He doesn’t-
He doesn’t see Mu Qing. He needs a clue, a hint, maybe he can parse them by looking at their eyes - that’s the only part of a person that can never be altered. Mu Qing has. Mu Qing.
What does Mu Qing look like?
That’s stupid. He knows what Mu Qing looks like. He’s spent the greater part of eight centuries bemoaning that smug, arrogant turn of Mu Qing’s mouth. He can tell Mu Qing from his shadow.
So why is it that his brain turns up a distorted amalgamation of Hua Cheng’s eyes, Jian Lan’s lips, and Xie Lian’s nose? Why is it that the harder he tries to remember, the more Mu Qing fades into a stranger’s face?
Tao Yue is behind him. A hundred and three years, General. People forget.
Don’t call me General, Feng Xin yells. I’m not your general. His voice carries no weight in this world.
Tao Yue doesn’t flinch.
His hands are bleeding. The skin of his left palm has been completely brutalised, raw and red. He knows what happened.
“I was too slow,” Feng Xin gasps, blinking.
Sweat is dripping down his brows, sliding into his eyes. It’s cold, but it doesn’t sting his eyes. He can’t see past the shaky fog of what must be his hands in front of him. There’s a swathe of something weighing down on his legs. He tries to kick them aside. The length of his thighs are sluggish with sleep. Slow. Too slow. He needs to- he has to- to move, to save Mu Qing. To reach out again and hold-
“Feng Xin,” comes Mu Qing’s voice, addled and distant with sleep. “Feng Xin, what’s wrong-”
“I was slow,” Feng Xin coughs up, hoarse and drowsy. “Too slow.”
He needs to- he feels around for something, for Feng Shen, even though Feng Shen is securely hung up on the wall, and there’s nothing but feathered pillows and silk linings and the delicate canopy falling over the bed, veiling them from intruders.
He blinks. He swivels uncertainly in place, fist tight against the bed. Mu Qing is sitting up, he can feel him shift, displacing his weight on the bed. Feng Xin wants to look. Feng Xin can’t. Not if he’ll turn his head and be met with the shroud of Mount Tonglu’s malefic smoke and vapours. Not if his mind won’t remember what Mu Qing looks like anymore, shredded into apathy by time.
“Feng Xin,” Mu Qing’s voice is sharper now, steely as it cuts through the noxious plumes of his mind. “Feng Xin, breathe.”
He tries. It’s a little clearer now; he can see the tips of his foot, even if he can’t quite feel them right now - calves still numb and heavy. He needs to move.
Mu Qing is holding him down by the shoulders. It’s a good, warm weight. There’s a loud, wheezing gasp, and Feng Xin startles when he realises it’s coming from him - mouth gaping and slack, the tautness of his lungs weak and exhausted with the effort of keeping him sane.
Mu Qing counts, each number clear like a bell. He can do this. He breathes, hands coming up to rest on Mu Qing’s. Of course he’s cold. Feng Xin snorts a little messed-up laugh, and has to pant to recover his breathing.
“Eight,” comes in Mu Qing’s vaguely disapproving tone. “Nine.”
He shuts his eyes, tries to blink away the curtain of cold sweat and hot tears. His next breath is premature, and the large, useless bulk of his body shudders through his exhalation. It spurns him to absurd, wounded noises; a heaving animal grasping at straws. Too slow, wading through livid profusion.
“You’re doing well,” Mu Qing says, and he sounds like he means it. “Twelve.”
“I’m fine,” Feng Xin tries to cough, feeling around for something else to anchor himself to, trying to get up.
He finds Mu Qing’s hand. It’s slender but firm, and it doesn’t give even as Feng Xin presses against it. Mu Qing grips the underside of his elbow.
“Stop flailing,” Mu Qing tsks, “Fourteen.”
And then, almost insulted, almost annoyed, almost, maybe, barely hurt: “Can’t you- can’t you just trust me?”
It stills the fight out of Feng Xin, and the incandescent blue flame stinging the walls of his chest flicker into something smaller. Still cold and keen, still a measure of fear skittling against his ribs. But he can observe it, keep it within view - he swallows, throat so dry it hurts.
Mu Qing continues counting for him. He follows after it like the abrasive yank of a rope on a swinging bridge.
“I-” he doesn’t know what to say to Mu Qing. “Of course I trust you.”
He doesn’t look at Mu Qing. Not yet, he can’t. Liar. It rings in his ears, but then Mu Qing counts again, sniffing delicately.
“Twenty-two,” Mu Qing says.
Feng Xin hiccups.
“Twenty-nine.”
It doesn’t let up. He thumps his chest four quick times in succession, eager to be rid of this silly, embarrassing -
Mu Qing closes a hand around his fist. He’s still awfully cold, but Feng Xin is warm enough for the both of them. Feng Xin hiccups anyway. Mu Qing continues counting.
“Thirty-seven.” A beat. “Are you going to look at me?”
“Of course I-” Feng Xin squeezes his eyes shut. He hiccups. “I- I will.”
“Okay,” Mu Qing says, like that is enough. “Thirty-eight.”
Feng Xin’s eyes are still shut. They’re still holding onto each other, so he focuses on that instead. Mu Qing’s finger tapping in regular intervals against his elbow. The thumb against his closed fist. He can hear the wind outside, and something rattling in the roof.
“Fourty-two.”
It smells like white tea and jasmine. It smells like Mu Qing. It smells like their bed, now.
“Fifty-one.”
He can’t resist. This must be real. When they get to sixty, when they-
“Fifty-five.”
He steels himself. He remembers what Mu Qing looked- looks like. The haughty line of his nose, his high cheekbones, the startled look in his eyes when Feng Xin asked him to stay the night. The curtain of his dark, silky hair falling over his shoulders, spilling onto Feng Xin’s pillow. He hadn’t prepared a second pillow, too absorbed by the way Mu Qing’s fingers wrapped around his teacup at dinner.
“Sixty.”
Feng Xin opens his eyes. The darkness is- his heart lurches to his throat, thumping so loudly it might burst through the bottom of his stomach. And then the stars disperse, dotted shadows coming into view. There’s a stripe of moonlight across the drawers. He catches sight of Mu Qing’s hands.
“Sixty-two.”
He looks up, and it hurts. It hurts so much. Mu Qing’s gaze is on Feng Xin’s fist. The tilt of his head, the line of light on his nose bridge; porcelain and ethereal, like it might break if- if
Mu Qing’s eyes flash up to meet his, heated. He has to close his eyes. Someone is howling in the background. Someone is gutting his throat and chest and he wants to throw up.
Mu Qing’s grip claws into him. “Feng Xin, what’s-”
He can see Mu Qing. He can see Mu Qing, and it burns. When he opens his eyes again he can hardly tell - shapes and shadows and subtle movements all blurred by tears. Feng Xin falls forward, cheek impaled upon the bony frame of Mu Qing’s shoulder. It’s hardly comfortable, but like this he can hear something other than the smother of his own gasps. Mu Qing is murmuring something.
“Let it out,” Mu Qing says. “Come on, breathe.”
Feng Xin tries. He really does. He needs to make Mu Qing understand what happened. He needs to - he tries to explain, tripping over Chen Guoren and Tao Yue’s words, the way they refused to listen, and how he couldn’t even say Mu Qing’s name.
“It’s just a dream,” Mu Qing says, but then Feng Xin is jerking so violently, fists yanking at Mu Qing’s thin sleeping robes.
“It wasn’t-”
“It is!” Mu Qing doubles down, grabbing around Feng Xin’s neck. It’s hot and sticky, and Mu Qing’s cold hands do something to alleviate that. “Feng Xin. You’re awake now.”
“You don’t understand- haaah, I, I was, and you weren’t, and the palace-” Feng Xin shakes his head, nosing against wet silk. “I- I took it all, your palace, and I desecrated it- and, and you, she said you were dead. That you died in the- you died in the lava, when Jun Wu-”
Mu Qing stiffens at that. Feng Xin sobs harder, “You died, and nobody remembered, nobody cared, and I forgot-!”
The flurry of his words collapse into a low, pained whine. Mu Qing gathers the rest of his hair and holds it up, his other hand holding onto the scruff of Feng Xin’s neck. It helps. He exhales noisily, choking on his own spit.
“I was too slow, and you died.”
“I’m not dead, Feng Xin.”
“I-”
“No. Listen,” Mu Qing digs his claws into Feng Xin’s nape. “I’m here. I’m alive. Listen. You hear my heart beating? I’m alive. You weren’t too slow.”
He forces everything to a rigid halt, packing every unrestrained shiver and folding it on itself. He hears it. Shallow, but clear.
“You hear it?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Because even if I died - I’m not dead - I’d rise from my grave if you dared usurp my palace.”
“I wouldn’t, I won’t-”
“I know you won’t. You’re too good for that.”
A lump forms in his throat. Mu Qing wouldn't do that to him either, if he died. He knows now. “You can take all my palaces, Mu Qing.”
“Hmph. That’s more trouble than it’s worth,” Mu Qing whispers, and it’s not unkind. It’s just Mu Qing.
They sit like that, Feng Xin wrapping his arms around Mu Qing’s waist, face smushed against the damp expanse of Mu Qing’s chest. He can hear his heart.
“You saved me,” Mu Qing says finally. “Back then, when I- I thought I was done for.”
Feng Xin doesn’t respond, only tensing his hold on Mu Qing.
“You saved me,” Mu Qing repeats, pressing his lips to Feng Xin’s ear. “I’m glad I’m alive, Feng Xin. Thank you.”
Feng Xin whimpers, shuts his eyes and listens to the quiet pattering of Mu Qing’s breath. His heart. Oh, his heart.
Thank you for being alive. Thank you for not dying. Thank you for being here, with me. Beside me. Thank you for holding me. I don’t know what I would do without you. I’ve forgotten what it’s like to live without you. Thank you for not letting me forget.
Thank you for saving me too.