Chapter Text
The Burial Mounds don’t feel like a battlefield anymore.
It feels like a mausoleum.
Lan Wangji steps over what used to be a talisman flag. It’s half-burned, buried under the churned mud. His robes are soaked in sweat and ash. The air still tastes like fire, like blood, like something too old and too wrong to belong here.
He does not stop moving. He has not stopped since he caught sight of the boy.
A-Yuan had been curled up at the base of a tree, silent and still, arms wrapped tight around a filthy stuffed rabbit. His face had been streaked with soot, but uninjured. When he saw Lan Wangji, he didn’t cry. He only blinked, held out a small hand, and whispered, “Xian-gege is sleeping.”
Lan Wangji kneels in front of him picking him up. “Where?”
A-Yuan points.
There’s a crater near the center of the ruins. Wide, blackened, edges crumbling inward like the ground itself collapsed beneath the weight of something it couldn’t hold.
Lan Wangji does not speak again.
He stands and walks to the edge. His boots crunch over ash and bone. The center of the crater still smolders faintly. And at the very bottom, twisted and half-buried under rubble, is Wei Wuxian.
His body is so still Lan Wangji thinks it might be too late.
He drops to his knees, places A-Yuan down, and slides down the slope, ignoring the sting of the rocks as they scrape his legs through his robes. Wei Wuxian’s robes are in tatters, soaked with mud and blood. His face is pale. His chest doesn’t rise.
But then—
A shallow, wet breath rattles out of him.
Lan Wangji leans close. “Wei Ying.”
There’s no reaction at first.
Then, very faintly, a hoarse voice. “…You’re here.”
Lan Wangji closes his eyes for half a second. “You are alive.”
“Unfortunately.”
“You are injured.”
Wei Wuxian’s mouth twists into something that might be a smile. “Pretty sure I’m dying. So don’t get too excited.”
“You are not dying.”
Wei Wuxian coughs. Blood spatters the front of his robes. “You sure? Because this really fucking hurts.”
Lan Wangji reaches out, hands gentle and precise, and lifts him from the rubble. Wei Wuxian doesn’t fight him. His limbs dangle, half-dead weight. His head drops against Lan Wangji’s shoulder.
“Leave me here,” Wei Wuxian murmurs. “It’s fine. I did what I could. I’m done.”
“No.”
“You can take A-Yuan. He’s better off with you anyway.”
“No.”
Wei Wuxian’s voice sharpens slightly. “I don’t want to go back.”
“You will not die here.”
“Lan Zhan.”
His voice is quieter now. Raw.
“I’m tired.”
“I know.”
“I mean it. I’m tired in a way that sleep won’t fix. I don’t even know why you’re here.”
“You almost died,” Lan Wangji says, voice raw.
“Yeah. That was the idea.”
Lan Wangji lifts his head. His eyes are wet. “Do not say that.”
Wei Wuxian tries to laugh, but it scrapes out of him like gravel. “It’s fine. You’re here now, right? To drag me back to wherever the fuck is still standing.”
“I am here because I love you.”
Wei Wuxian freezes.
The silence is immediate. Heavy.
“What?” he says.
Lan Wangji doesn’t move. “I love you.”
Wei Wuxian’s eyes search his face like maybe he imagined it. “You—you what?”
“I love you,” Lan Wangji repeats. “I have for a long time. I told you once. You did not remember.”
Wei Wuxian blinks. “When the hell did you—?”
“Nightless City. Before the siege.”
“No,” Wei Wuxian says. His voice shakes. “No, you didn’t.”
“I did.”
“Lan Zhan,” he whispers. “That wasn’t real. That was—we were both—”
“It was real to me.”
Lan Wangji’s hand finds his. Their fingers curl together.
“I’m not worth loving,” Wei Wuxian says.
“You are.”
“I’m not the person you remember.”
“You are still you.”
Wei Wuxian turns his face away. “Don’t say that.”
“You are still Wei Ying.”
“No,” Wei Wuxian croaks. “Wei Ying died. He died screaming in a fire while everything he built turned to dust.”
“Then I will help rebuild.”
Wei Wuxian’s breath catches.
Lan Wangji doesn’t let go.
⸻
Lan Wangji adjusts his grip. One arm under Wei Wuxian’s knees, the other steady behind his back. Then he rises, holding him against his chest, and steps back up the slope of the crater with careful, deliberate footing.
Wei Wuxian groans. “Fuck. Put me down.”
“No.”
“Seriously. I’m gonna bleed all over you.”
“I do not care.”
“You’re being dramatic.”
“You are dying.”
“Exactly. Let me.”
Lan Wangji doesn’t stop walking.
At the edge of the crater, A-Yuan is still waiting, eyes wide. Lan Wangji crouches just long enough to speak softly to him. “Come. We are going home.”
The boy clutches his rabbit tighter and follows.
Lan Wangji summons Bichen. The sword rises beneath them in a shimmer of light. Wei Wuxian flinches as they lift into the sky.
“Shit,” he mutters. “This is a bad idea.”
“I do not make bad decisions.”
Wei Wuxian lets out a low laugh. It sounds more like a sob. “You picked me, didn’t you?”
Lan Wangji doesn’t reply.
The wind cuts across them as they fly, but Wei Wuxian barely reacts. His body is cold. His skin feels paper-thin under Lan Wangji’s hands. Every once in a while, he shivers violently.
Then he goes still.
Lan Wangji shifts his arms to keep him upright. “Stay awake.”
Wei Wuxian’s eyelids flutter. “Don’t want to.”
“You must.”
“Why?”
“Because if you fall asleep, you may not wake again.”
“Would that be so bad?”
Lan Wangji’s jaw tightens. “Yes.”
Wei Wuxian lets out a weak sigh and buries his face against Lan Wangji’s chest. “I’m not worth saving.”
“You are wrong.”
“I ruined everything. I destroyed the people who depended on me. I turned into someone I don’t even recognize. You weren’t there, Lan Zhan. You didn’t see what I did.”
“I saw enough.”
“Then you should have left me in that crater.”
“No.”
“You’re really fucking stubborn.”
“I am.”
“You’re gonna regret this.”
“I will not.”
They fly in silence after that.
Wei Wuxian’s breaths grow slower. His body sags heavier with each passing hour. Lan Wangji checks his pulse more than once. It is always faint, but present.
A-Yuan clings to the front of his robes, quiet.
The sky begins to shift from black to gray.
Cloud Recesses is still far away.
Lan Wangji sets them down just before dawn, deep in the quiet forest along the riverbank. He lays Wei Wuxian on a flat patch of moss. The ground is cold. The air smells like pine and smoke.
Wei Wuxian doesn’t open his eyes.
“Water,” he mutters.
Lan Wangji pulls his canteen free and lifts it to his lips. Wei Wuxian drinks a few mouthfuls, then coughs hard enough to choke.
Lan Wangji supports his shoulders. “Slowly.”
Wei Wuxian breathes in through his nose, breath shuddering. “You should knock me out. Put me under a talisman seal. I’m a fucking mess.”
“You are not a threat.”
“No. Just pathetic.”
Lan Wangji brushes his hair back from his forehead. “You are not.”
Wei Wuxian opens his eyes just enough to squint up at him. “You love me?”
“I do.”
“Still?”
Lan Wangji nods. “Always.”
Wei Wuxian’s lips twitch like he might laugh. Instead he says, “You’re out of your damn mind.”
“Perhaps.”
A-Yuan places the rabbit against his chest. Wei Wuxian doesn’t respond to the touch. He just lies there, staring up at the dark canopy of trees like he’s somewhere far away.
Lan Wangji watches him closely.
Hours pass.
When the sun finally crests the trees, Wei Wuxian speaks again.
“Do you think it was worth it?”
Lan Wangji glances up from where he’s adding more fuel to the fire. “What?”
“All of it. The seal. The ghosts. The sacrifices. Wen Ning. The Wens I tried to protect. The way it ended.”
Lan Wangji does not answer right away.
“I tried so hard,” Wei Wuxian whispers. “I thought if I gave enough of myself, it would mean something. I thought maybe if I made myself the villain, they’d stop hurting people who couldn’t fight back.”
He closes his eyes.
“I don’t think it meant anything at all.”
Lan Wangji speaks softly. “You saved many lives.”
“And destroyed my own in the process.”
“You are still alive.”
“Not really.”
Lan Wangji reaches over and takes his wrist. His fingers press to the fragile pulse beneath the skin. “You are still here.”
Wei Wuxian doesn’t pull away.
The silence stretches long between them.
Finally, he says, “If I go with you… what then?”
“You will rest. Heal. You will be safe.”
“And after?”
Lan Wangji looks at him. “Whatever you want.”
Wei Wuxian’s eyes flick to his. “Even if I want nothing?”
“Then I will stay with you. Until that changes.”
There’s no answer to that.
Wei Wuxian doesn’t speak again for the rest of the day.
⸻
That night, the temperature drops.
Lan Wangji wraps Wei Wuxian in his outer robe. Wei Wuxian doesn’t protest. He just stares at the fire. A-Yuan sleeps with his head in Lan Wangji’s lap, little fingers curled around the rabbit’s worn ear.
At one point, Wei Wuxian whispers, “I’m scared I’ll wake up and still be there.”
Lan Wangji looks up. “Where?”
“In that crater.”
“You are not.”
“I feel like I never left.”
Lan Wangji watches him for a long time. Then he leans forward and presses their foreheads together, gently.
“You are here.”
Wei Wuxian’s hands curl in the fabric of Lan Wangji’s robes. “If I forget, will you remind me?”
“Yes.”
Wei Wuxian breathes out. Shaky. Quiet.
He closes his eyes.
And this time, he sleeps.