Chapter Text
When Jiang Cheng opened his eyes, he already knew that something had gone very wrong.
Firstly, the smell of the air was light and sweet, as though it was lotus picking season, and Jiang Cheng was fairly certain that would not be coming for another month.
Secondly, he was not on the bed he had most certainly gone to sleep in last night. He would recognise this ceiling anywhere. This was the old room shared with Wei Wuxian - the room that had burned down with everything else in Lotus Pier many years ago.
And thirdly, when Jiang Cheng had finally found a mirror in one of the many drawers shared between him and Wei Wuxian, he found a pale, youthful face staring back at him.
“Jiang Cheng, why are you still here? Madam Yu is absolutely livid!” a voice called out as a familiar face burst into the room.
It took Jiang Cheng a second to place who it was. In the past few years, Jiang Cheng had started to associate the name ‘Wei Wuxian’ with the shorter and rounder visage of Mo Xuanyu. After all, Wei Wuxian’s body had perished decades ago. Jiang Cheng had thought he would never see that face again.
Yet here it was, impossibly, staring back at Jiang Cheng in all its glory.
“Jiang Cheng, what are you waiting for?” Wei Wuxian asked, reaching forward to pull Jiang Cheng up.
Wei Wuxian had always been the touchy sort with everyone (with the sole exceptions of Yu Ziyuan and Lan Qiren), and while Jiang Cheng was not quite a ‘physical touch’ kind of person, he had grown up tolerating and not shying away from Wei Wuxian’s touch. But that was the Jiang Cheng of many years ago, and the Jiang Cheng of the present had only one exception to the rule, and his name was Jin Ling.
So when Jiang Cheng flinched away, Wei Wuxian’s brow furrowed in great confusion.
“I’ll get up myself,” Jiang Cheng muttered gruffly, pushing himself to his feet.
There were only two possibilities right now. One, he had somehow travelled in time back into his past. Two, he was experiencing some vivid fever dream.
Clearly, this was some vivid fever dream.
“Where is A-Jie?” Jiang Cheng asked, tugging on the Sect Heir robes which he had not worn for decades by this point.
Wei Wuxian gave him a strange look. “Obviously taking etiquette lessons with Huang laoshi in her room- wait, Jiang Cheng, where are you going? The training grounds aren’t that way! Stop, Madam Yu is going to have all our heads-“
“Suit yourself,” Jiang Cheng said, striding forward down corridors which seemed familiar yet unfamiliar at the time. It was truly as though he were walking through a dream - this had to be a dream, no question.
“Jiang Cheng, don’t be ridiculous, don’t blame me if I rat you out to Madam Yu-“
“Do what you want, I don’t care,” Jiang Cheng told dream-Wei Wuxian, who was as persistent as Wei Wuxian used to be when he was still part of Yunmeng Jiang. The Wei Wuxian whom Jiang Cheng had foolishly believed would stay forever.
Dream-Wei Wuxian made some sort of noise of disbelief before he dashed off, presumably back to the dream-training fields.
Jiang Cheng did not care. He continued walking single-mindedly to his destination, his brisk footsteps quickening until he was almost breaking into a run.
“A-Jie!”
Jiang Cheng shoved the door open without knocking, surprising both his sister and her tutor who shrank back at the sudden intrusion.
“A-Cheng? What are you doing here- did something happen?” Jiang Yanli asked, slowly rising to her feet. Jiang Cheng had sometimes worried that the years had dulled the memory of his sister’s face, but he was relieved to see that she looked exactly as she should be, her wide and soft eyes adorning her features, which slightly favoured Jiang Fengmian. While Jiang Cheng had mostly inherited their mother’s looks and temperament, his sister had always looked more like their father.
“A-Jie,” Jiang Cheng said, breaking into a smile in spite of himself. “It’s been so long.”
She stared back at him in confusion. “What do you mean? You saw me at dinner last night,” she said, her eyebrows becoming slightly more pinched. “A-Cheng, are you alright? Shouldn’t you be at sword practice?”
“Jiang-gongzi, it is most improper to barge into your sister’s rooms without knocking,” a snide voice called out from the corner.
“A-Jie, can I… Can I have a hug?” Jiang Cheng asked, promptly ignoring the random woman’s words.
Jiang Yanli blinked. “Of course, but could we do this at a better time?” she asked, eyeing her tutor nervously.
“No, let’s do it now,” Jiang Cheng said, reaching forward to pull his sister in a tight embrace. He had to do it now - he did not know when he would be pulled out from this dream.
Even the scent of his sister seemed so real. It was like tugging on a long-forgotten memory - it had slipped Jiang Cheng’s mind that his sister used to wear sandalwood fragrances, but now that he smelt it, it all came back to him hitting him like a boulder. Yes, this was the aroma which always surrounded his sister-
“Jiang-gongzi, I will most certainly be reporting to Madam Yu about this disrespectful, imprudent behaviour-“
Jiang Cheng broke from the embrace to glare at his sister’s tutor, passive-aggression at the tip of his tongue, when he paused.
Huang-laoshi was exactly as she had been, the ostentatious hairpins that adorned a sallow, caked-up face, as well as an overly-detailed pinkish dress which his mother would never wear.
Jiang Cheng had not thought of this woman in many years, yet here she stood, every last detail perfect in a way he knew his mind would never be able to recreate.
“A-Cheng?” Jiang Yanli whispered, her voice going quiet the way it always did when she was concerned, “Did something happen?”
It was too perfect.
It was all too perfect.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng muttered, backing away.
Perhaps, he realised, this was not a dream after all.