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He wakes up with a sense of unfamiliar urgency, a dread and bitter sweetness wholly foreign turning his stomach, his eyes frantic in their search for a threat find nothing but sunshine and the serene meadow, where he fell asleep against a tree while gathering herbs. His heart calms down but settles into a grief he doesn’t know how to comprehend. He had a dream, but for the life of him, he couldn’t say what it had been about. The sudden urge to play a tune grips him so unexpectedly, he is playing a song he never heard on a slightly poisonous leaf before he can stop himself.
It doesn’t sound right. He stops.
Something is missing.
This should be a duet.
He arrives home at the clinic at the foot of Huoyun mountain, still in a strange kind of daze. He barely registers Xiao Hong greeting him where she is packing the medicine packages for their regulars, as he sets down his herb basket and sorts through the gathered plants on autopilot. His hands feel wrong.
A sense of deep, terrifying wrongness in his body and surroundings fills him. Something fundamental to his soul. This reality that had been perfectly fine before, feels somehow shifted.
“Master…”, he is startled out of his daze by his apprentices voice, Xiao Hong looking at him with concern plainly written on her pretty, round face. He shakes himself out of it and forces a smile.
“Did something happen while I was away?”, he asks, ignoring her concern and ignoring the dreadful worm winding itself through his lungs. She shakes her head, still watching him like a hawk, but he just walks further into the house, putting away his empty basket and going to wash his hands.
“Xiao Yin from the fortress came by because of a cut on his arm, but I could fix him up without a problem.” Xiao Hong answers his question, cautiously following him. “Master, did something happen to you? You were gone for quite a while.”
He shakes his head, still smiling for her. “No, I just fell asleep while gathering herbs. You know me, got to seize this beautiful spring weather.”
He’s still strung up with energy. He knows whatever he starts now, will fail and he doesn’t have the will to suffer through that.
“I’m going back out, I need some more tea from the market.”, he says absentmindedly, already grabbing his money pouch and turning back to the door.
“Should I come with?”
“No, it’s alright. It’s just a quick errant. Miss Su is coming by later, please receive her while I’m out.”, he throws towards his apprentice and can finally breathe a little easier as he steps back out into the sun.
The way from the outskirts into the town takes about an incense sticks time and finally this seems to be able to settle these foreign emotions in his stomach into a more comfortable place. They are still there, pressing against him like prickly fabric winding around his innards, but he can ignore them for a while. The bustle of the market pushing them back even further.
He’s wandering through the stalls, strangely craving sour fish soup, even though it never tastes right to him. He’s always eating it with an expectation that never hits like it should. With a snort, he turns away from the food stalls and makes his way to the craftmen’s section. Passing ceramic stalls and cloth sellers, he stops abruptly at a stall he has never stopped at before. The worm in his lungs suddenly squeezing so tight it robs his breath.
He's holding the beautifully crafted pipa before he knows he even moved, pressing at strings with fingers that should have matching callouses. The foreign melody sounds out again, clearer than before and still missing another part. Parts? He has no idea of music and still he plays this unfamiliar instrument as if he has played it for years and knows it is missing accompaniment. A qin maybe and drums… a flute...
He sucks in a breath and almost drops the pipa, it’s only saved by the sellers quick hands and concerned gaze.
“Liu-daifu, I didn’t know you could play. Are you alright?” Liu Yan is pressing his hands to his head, pain throbbing inside his skull like a hammer inside a bell.
“I’m alright, I’m alright.”, he presses out, but firm hands still guide him to the next seat inside the house behind the stall and press him down on it.
“I would call for a doctor, but you’re our only doctor in town.” The young man tries to joke and he finally recognizes him as the son of Ning-daren, who is one of their regulars. “Should I call for Hong-guniang?”
Liu Yan shakes his head, wincing as it makes his pain even worse. “No, it’ll pass in a minute. Thank you.” He manages to say, more a rasp, than actual speech. The young man nods, doubt clearly written on his face, but he is called away by a customer and leaves Liu Yan to sit by himself, head still in his hands.
It’s loud.
People are talking, haggling, praising, insulting. Kids are complaining, laughing, screaming. It’s loud.
And then:
“A’Li! Come! Let’s play!”, a child calls for another and his gaze shoots through the open door, across the busy streets to two girls running after each other. The fog in his head lifts. Muddy water becoming a clear mountain spring.
“A’Li…”, his voice is soft around the syllables, the tone different from the girl’s call, but as familiar as his own name. “A’Li…”, he sighs the name, his heart swelling with so many emotions it seems to burst with them. Guilt and hate and confusion, desperation and longing, happiness and joy and content, and everything is threaded with love, love, love.
He bursts out laughing, hysterical and mad. He laughs and laughs and laughs, until he is exhausted and can’t laugh anymore.
What is wrong with him? Something is so wrong. Missing.
He wipes away the tears on his cheeks, taking a shuddering breath and looks up into the concerned face of Ning-daren’s son. How embarrassing.
“Hong-guniang is going to be here soon, Liu-daifu.”, the instrument maker is reassuring him softly and he just nods, exhausted and hollow. A cup of tea is pressed into his hand and he slurs a thanks before taking a sip.
A’Li wouldn’t like it, crosses his mind and he has no idea where that thought comes from. Tears gather again and he quickly blinks them away. One emotional breakdown a day has to suffice.
His tea cup has been re-filled two more times by the time Xiao Hong comes in and looks him over with shocked concern. He must look horrifying. He puts on a smile for her and slowly gets up, slightly dizzy. She quickly reaches for him to steady him.
“It’s fine, I’m fine.”, he says, still smiling.
“You are not fine.”, she disagrees vehemently and his smile grows into something a little bit more honest. His little firecracker apprentice. He gently pushes her hands of his arms and rightens himself. A little bit of Qi circulation and the dizziness is gone. He thanks Xiao Ning for his hospitality and help and turns to leave.
“Wait, Liu-daifu. Here, take this with you.” Xiao Ning calls after him and he turns around just to be confronted with that pipa again. He doesn’t know what his face is doing, but it seems to be doing something, because the other two are now exchanging concerned looks with each other. He doesn’t even think of being polite, the longing in his chest too large to be contained. He gently grasps the instrument and folds it into his arms, strings protesting slightly. He bows his head.
“Thank you, Xiao Ning.”, he smiles again, honest and like a glimpse of sunshine reflected on water. “I will repay you the next time I come into town.”, he reassures towards a dazed young man, who blinks after a moment, mouth forming ‘Xiao Ning’ while his cheeks grow warm. Then opening in protest as the realization of words sets in, but by then their town healer and his apprentice are already halfway down the street.
-+-
It is late in the night, Xiao Hong long asleep, when Liu Yan goes out into the backyard of his clinic, sitting down on a bench there, pipa at his side and gaze up towards the crescent moon. It’s waning.
He’s still full with these foreign emotions, this strange, unknown knowledge. But it’s more settled now, something manageable, if barely. He takes the pipa with curious hands, fingers automatically finding their position, as if it’s not only the second time he’s holding such an instrument properly. And then he plays.
Tune after tune, none of them familiar to him until that moment. All of them missing one to three other instruments to sound complete. He recognizes that feeling now. It’s the same he has every time he tries another restaurant’s sour fish soup and leaves disappointed despite the good tasting meal.
His fingers halt, as a twig cracks in the night and his gaze falls onto the line of trees leading up the mountain, the bushes underneath barely distinguishable in the low light of the crescent moon. Another sound, leaves rustling, and out steps a small, white fox.
Liu Yan’s gaze is caught and the small creature comes closer, all the way until he steps into the paved courtyard with its drying racks of herbs.
Then it takes another step and where a fox stood, a tall, regal man stands, white hair in a gleaming crown, eyes gold and cheekbones that invited to be kissed softly.
Liu Yan is in front of the man, reaching for him, grasping at his arms and soft, fluttering robes before he registers, he’s even moved.
“A’Li.”, he rasps, tears of unimaginable joy falling from his eyes. Long, warm fingers brush away his tears, gold eyes curling into a smile. He laughs and leans into the touch.
“A’Yan.”, falls from the fox demon’s lips, as if he has spoken these syllables a thousand times before. “You remember?”
Liu Yan laughs, a burst of disbelief and relief and joy so fierce it makes his fingers go numb. He nods and shakes his head.
“It’s like a dream I can’t recall, every time I try to grasp it, it overwhelms me.”, he leans down, closer to that wonderful, familiar face that he’s seeing for the first time. “You’re really here?”
A slow nod and a brighter smile. “I really am.”
“You play the flute.”
“I do.”
“And you don’t like most tea, just one specific sort.”
“Yes.”
“I hurt you. I did. And I died.”
“It didn’t happen.”
“Because you changed it.” Liu Yan has gently grasped the smaller man’s face, their faces are now so close, they are breathing the same air. He can see a certain kind of fear in those golden eyes, familiar from that forgotten dream. He presses a soft kiss to the corner of them. One and two, then leans his head against the others.
“I love you.”, he says like a statement, neither a question, nor a confession, just a fact known to all. Which is so against everything he remembers of his whole life so far. There has always been something missing, a part of him that just didn’t click, a hole inside his heart that was reaching for something that never came. “You love me too.”
“I do.”, lips smile, almost against his. They are both shivering, tiny tremors all along their limbs and bodies.
“There are two others, aren’t there?”, he asks and knows the answer. “Xiao Fu and Fang-shixiong.”, the last name is like a wound tearing itself open in his chest, but it is quickly soothed by A’Li’s presence.
He embraces the other man, pressing close, nuzzling down into the junction of his neck and shoulder.
“A’Li.”, he mumbles into the silky hair, lips brushing soft skin, causing a more distinct shudder in the fox demon. Strong arms settle around him, pressing him closer still. “Don’t let me go again.”
“I won’t.”, is whispered into his hair, warm lips press against his ear.
“Promise me?” A bite to the tip of his ear.
“I promise.”
-+-
The End.