Chapter Text
Quite apart from any effect it might have had on his cultivation, Mu Qing considered drinking to be beneath him. Thus, he was not drunk. Nevertheless the knowledge that at this moment, somewhere out there in the night, Xie Lian and Crimson Rain Seeking Flower were consummating their marriage was something he rather wished he did not have to face sober.
The wedding party itself had been ostentatious beyond belief. Musicians, dancers and so on. He had lost count of the number of courses served, especially since he didn’t eat a bite: he was well aware of the kind of things that went on in ghost kitchens.
During the obligatory toasts he had recalled some light anecdotes about Xie Lian’s ineptitude in dressing himself as a young man, contrasting with his current tendency to eat things off the floor, and perhaps implied that Crimson Rain would have his work cut out for him as a husband. He’d thought it was funny; some people seemed concerned about him damaging diplomatic relations between the heavens and the ghost realm, but he was—at last—secure that Xie Lian would put in a good word for him and prevent Hua Cheng from retaliating.
They needn’t have worried, since Mei Nianqing’s speech that night was ten times more inappropriate than anyone else’s. He would have enjoyed it if he didn’t still begrudge the man for helping make his adolescent years hell.
Lounging at the edge of a pavilion in his garden, he gazed idly at the reflection of the moon in his pond, surrounded by clouds of glossy leaves and lotus flowerbuds. One silver lining of rebuilding the Heavenly Capital had been getting to redo his palace inside and out, and he was quite happy with how the garden was coming along. (You could hardly even tell which part of it statues had had sex in anymore.)
Honestly, everything had turned out as well as could possibly be expected. Even this wedding—as much as it was obvious that Hua Cheng was a rogue and a maniac, there was no denying any more how happy he made Xie Lian and how much more of a predictable element Xie Lian made him for everyone else, so…
His ears caught a distant, familiar clack of boots on roof tiles. The reflection of the moon wavered and broke up in the wind as Feng Xin snubbed the nicely laid out paths through the scenic landscaping in favour of vaulting directly to his destination. He sailed over the railing and landed beside Mu Qing with a creak of the wooden floorboards.
“Why are you just standing in the darkness? This is why people gossip about you,” Feng Xin said loudly, planting a golden ball of light into the air above them. This was a thoughtful gesture since it made it so much easier for him to see the look of disgust Mu Qing gave him. “What?”
Mu Qing rolled his eyes and dropped it, not wanting to revive any of the three different arguments that sprang to mind. “Did you finally come to terms with His Highness leaving the nest?”
Feng Xin had cried like Xie Lian was his own daughter for a great deal of the wedding, and he was still red-eyed now. His face screwed up again at Mu Qing’s words. “No, of course not! Everything’s changed more in the past two years than the eight hundred before that! I’m too old to deal with this shit. In fact, you’re the weird one for being so calm about it.”
“I don’t see what there is to be upset about.”
“Not upset, just—you know. We spent all that time not knowing what happened to him and trying to get over it. Which we were shit at,” he added, scratching at his head like talking about it had instantly given him a headache. Mu Qing glared in an attempt to make him change the topic faster. “And then he came back and we found out the answers but nothing went back to how it was before. Instead it all changed for good. You know?” He raked his fingernails against his scalp some more, disarraying his hair from its topknot, then sighed and began re-doing it into a ponytail.
“There there,” Mu Qing said. His gaze strayed to the soft strands of hair that fell around Feng Xin’s face and neck, and he turned his back to look at the cloudy surface of the water once more. It must be hard to go through life with a rock for a brain and no further ambitions than waiting for your master to return.
The fact he hadn’t said the last part out loud was another change of the past two years. They had gotten a lot more friendly with each other now that most of the stuff they truly fought about had been forgiven (forgotten?) by Xie Lian.
“Anyway, since the banquet food was sketchy as fuck I got us something better to eat.” Coming up next to Mu Qing, Feng Xin pulled a presentation box from his sleeve and placed it on the railing between them. He opened the lid to reveal twelve jewel-like objects nestled in individual spaces in the paper lining.
The dubious expression that appeared on his face made it clear that he had no clue what they were or why a grown man would eat them. He must have just asked a member of heavenly staff what kind of things Mu Qing liked. Now that was friendly of him. And premeditated.
“Try one,” Mu Qing encouraged, pushing the box towards him.
Feng Xin put one in his mouth, chewed, and promptly began hacking and coughing. Smoke snorted from his nostrils as he shook his fist. “You fucker! What is this, a nut full of perfume?”
Mu Qing smirked. “It’s incense smoke. You’re not meant to chew on it.” All food in the heavens came from worshippers’ offerings, and conversely, all worshippers’ offerings became food. Even things like incense. Plucking another one from the box, he cracked it between his teeth like a melon seed, releasing a wisp of fine smoke. He inhaled, enjoying the expensive smell, then blew the cloud of smoke in Feng Xin’s face, which rather mollified him.
“You think you’re so special with your pretentious smoke candy,” he grumbled.
“Well, you got it for me. What’s that about?” Mu Qing failed to keep the note of suspicion out of his voice. Whatever came next, it was going to be awkward.
“Right.” Feng Xin cleared his throat, the furrow between his brows darkening in concentration. “So. Bunch of stuff happened. I met Jian Lan and the kid, which was crazy. Really made me think. And I found out you risked your reputation to protect them.”
“I didn’t do that for you.”
“Well, you did it, so thanks. Then there was that giant flying statue of His Highness… Everything went batshit in the Heavenly Realm. You tried to save my life or something. Then I saved your life. Big river of lava. You finally got over yourself, made up with His Highness and he forgave you for ditching us. I… also forgave you for that.”
“Indeed.”
“Everything’s been solved. We’re even. So, do you think… Could we…” He scrubbed his fingernails against his scalp again, then jabbed his finger in Mu Qing’s face. “You and I both know we’re compatible! Let’s get back together again, but in a good way this time and not a fucked up way!”
What Feng Xin had just done was the equivalent of shooting a healthy man in the face three times, then holding his hand and demanding him to live. At the time when Mu Qing prompted Feng Xin to make his speech, he had guessed what it would be about, and if asked, would have liked nothing better than to rekindle their prior relationship in a good and not fucked up way. He had now been thoroughly reminded of why that was bullshit.
“Gosh, what a generous person you are,” he said. “Forgiving me and offering to take me back. Because obviously I must want that so badly. No thanks.”
“I fucking knew you would be like this! No, I didn’t mean it that way, which would be obvious if you got your head out of–”
“I don’t care how you meant it,” he said, advancing on Feng Xin. He grabbed the finger that had been pointing at him, bending it backwards till Feng Xin’s jaw tightened from the pain. “You’re insane. You forgave me? What about me forgiving you for all the things you put me through?”
Feng Xin wrested his hand free, settling into a fighting stance so Mu Qing couldn’t get at him again. “Well, I’m sorry for being unfair to you when I was a dumb seventeen-year-old, but I’ve changed since then,” he said dismissively. “All right, and pretty recently as well. But I actually know what I did wrong now.”
“So what?” Mu Qing replied, taking his own stance. “You always say I’m too confusing, so let me make this clear for you. From your perspective, you ruined our chance at friendship back then with your suspicions. But from my perspective, you ruined my entire mortal life. For years. I had to grow up with you breathing down my neck, looking for things to accuse me of.”
The words came out of him so fluently and quickly that they almost felt rehearsed. He realised he’d been waiting for a chance to say this for a long, long, time. “And the worst thing of all,” he went on, “is that you ruined my relationship with Xie Lian. I couldn’t trust him because he always took your side in the end. I couldn’t be his friend because you didn’t let me. There is nothing you can do to make me forgive you for that.” He enunciated it clearly. The syllables dropped from his tongue in perfect order.
Feng Xin barely let him finish before he started shouting. “Holy shit! Why are you like this? Can you ever speak up about your issues normally, instead of waiting for the perfect moment to wave them in everyone else’s faces to make you seem so much fucking better than them?”
“Do you think I’ve never tried? People like you don’t believe me! I may as well get a kick out of explaining myself, because I’m not getting anything else from it!”
“Even if all that stuff you said was true”—there it was! Feng Xin was just so reliable—“then what? After everything, you hate me so much that you’re just giving up on me forever? That’s it?”
“Yes,” Mu Qing said without a second’s hesitation.
Feng Xin’s face contorted with rage. “Well I—I just said I don’t hold all those grudges against you anymore so all I can say is, you have a rancid fucking personality, all your suffering is shit you brought upon yourself, and I absolutely fucking hate you!”
“Wow, I feel just the same way! Could you please get out of my palace now. Or do I have to make you?”
Mu Qing could feel the blood rushing to his head, the old righteous anger filling him up and heating him to the core; but the fight never came. Instead Feng Xin turned and strode out of the pavilion, taking a few seconds’ run-up before leaping over the wall of the palace in a single bound. He overshot: there was the characteristic crash of a martial god connecting with a piece of architecture somewhere in the distance.
Feng Xin had taken his ball of light with him, so for a few seconds Mu Qing stood in the pitch darkness laughing to himself. Then he realised that it was all quite serious, and needed to sit down for a bit.