Work Text:
Qi Yan guided the servant waiting below the sliding door. The West was best for her excursion—its closure of greenery, bamboo, and forest stretching far beyond the gates and deep within. All of Wei Palace’s western surroundings were largely unattended and lightly guarded for this reason. Qi Yan knew—had it not been for the two burning men’s ‘escape’—it was perfectly secretive. Trees curved and hid the gates, black-brushed trees and leaves all whistling in the wind. The midnight sky gave no light to Qi Yan’s eyes, nor did the trees offer moonlight’s leeway. Qian Tong’s lantern guided the way out silently. - The sliding door shattered closed behind her. -
Qi Yan sat drowning in her thoughts within the carriage, covering and smuggling the earlier discovery with weighted blankets, hiding the foul smell and haunting moans she would likely never forget. She could not vomit without her dignity, nor rage at the second princes of the Wei Kingdom without full understanding. Qi Yan, in her discomfort, loosened her jaw, reverting to her unrevealing face and posture—as a frog sat in her stomach.
She distracted herself, naturally, with Jingnu.
The carriage rolled past uncut weeds, overgrown trees, and shrinking paths. They rode out of the palace’s western small chamber on a winter night. Jingnu obviously cared little for it. Had she done it on purpose? Ordering the surrounding home of Qi Yan’s adulterated child and her mother to be abandoned by any gardener? To blend with nature, to disappear quietly? A punishment from mother nature for the infidelity against the kindest of souls—against her, Jingnu?
Qi Yan sneered. The gods had done nothing but strip her of happiness—yet laundered her enemy in pain just the same. What justice do the gods of the Wei Kingdom, and the gods of her people alike, serve? None. A life of struggle and disaster awaits every class now, as Qi Yan’s sister is mentally disabled, King Rang has lost his wife and dies slowly, and Jingnu has been motherless since she was a girl. Everyone on Earth suffers by the hands of gods. Qi Yan, just a human, does good in Jun Province—providing safety against the floods that wiped out homes, families, and crops. Yet, homeless kneel struggling and cold for months, praying to gods that never replied.
So what, Qi Yan asks despite herself, what is it that gets these people to their feet each day?
Qi Yan does not practice any belief in gods. Her lifestyle demands action by her own hands. She must pull herself out of the dark, tangy tar—not by a sacrificed lamb for a newborn’s health, but by her own shaking hand that paints every stroke of literacy, every day, for the sake of the evil she manifests. A sacrificed lamb, not for the god who rules as a hypocrite of their own creation, but for a family of six now starving after serving that meal to faith and thoughts.
Qi Yan thinks, keeping it only to herself: the gods are false hopes that only crutch harsh times—they never bandage them. They cannot hold an injury and heal it, like Ding Yu’s gentle and precise sting. They cannot organize arson and burn cities, like Qi Yan’s own harsh and wild flames.
Reality is of hurt and comfort. The only faith Qi Yan can afford to abide.
Jingnu’s temperament truly has no bounds. The same temperament that forces her to stand when kneeling. Forced. Out of pure pettiness, she had done it—possibly. Anger, probably.
A soft hand rounded and caressed her face. Warm, from cheek to ear, against the cold. Moving dots of warmth on her forehead. Jingnu. They’d done this a hundred times—thousands, if you count Qi Yan’s dreams and fantasies. Lingering hands on her chest while she carved the slow years away. Or her scarred cheek. Or cradling her hand while wishing for her safety… wishing for Qi Yan to live until she’s old.
Jingnu was Qi Yan’s disbelief.
The hammer that clinked a rotten heart into a beating red with a single nail—until Qi Yan herself wasn’t sure when the river had begun.
Back when Qi Yan and Jingnu were newlyweds, Qi Yan’s plans were the same as her teachers': to use Jingnu to become powerful, important, then murder the Wei Kingdom—with her wife’s blood on her sword. So she bent to Jingnu’s every word and fostered her every smile, gave every motivation to kind, curious eyes that screamed of love. Qi Yan had told Ding Yu five years ago that it was all a ruse—a power play. It would all work in the end.
But she herself knew completely that it was—as the white pearl is beautiful—a lie.
How could Jingnu care for Qi Yan as she loves the sword in her own stomach?
How would she react to the blood on Qi Yan's filthy hands of betrayal?
Qi Yan swims in that tar pool—lies, fictions, hopes of Jingnu thinking of her—in the rocking carriage, eyes on invisible trees.
Jingnu is a lullaby. A harness. Her eyes, a white fluorescent pearl on velvet.
No guilt can be found in her bright, intelligent, kind eyes.
Only in Qi Yan’s own. (Guilty for the murder she will commit. For the hurt she will cause—has caused.)
Three years without Jingnu—banished by Jingnu’s lullaby, her warmth— Is three years of bitterness, and mostly, reflection.
Qi Yan realized her fictions of bitterness—imagination and fake scenarios of Jingnu’s hate for that child and its mother—come from the red river (Qi Yan’s love).
She wishes for Jingnu’s jealousy, possessiveness, love.She can claw at any sign of hate as much as she can at a smile from Jingnu.
(The decree that split them apart sits in a chest at the Qi estate.)
Qi Yan wouldn’t dare string these thoughts and feelings into words, but she could say:
In three years, Qi Yan missed her.
Jingnu changed. Mature, responsible, independent. Busy. (Now she does not force her to stand in courtesy.)
Qi Yan stayed indifferent, sickeningly respectful, and sly. (In economics and arson. In betraying Jingnu, that is.)
Jingnu gave colour to Qi Yan’s heart, and she naively hopes to return the favour.
(Do the impossible once more, Jingnu. Forgive me.)
Qi Yan could never pay back what she has already done.
What she will do.
forgivemeforgivemeforgivemeforgivemeforgivemeforgiveme.
“Sorry,” she mouthed to her fingertips.
“Sorry. Sorry. I’m sorry…”
“Nangong Jingnu.”