Work Text:
Shen Qingqiu jolts upright with all the pain of a lightning strike—Yue Qi.
The lone unbidden thought devastates any waking musing, all of which are consumed by the shrill scream of a child shoved toward unspeakable pain. Shen Qingqiu seizes control of himself to spite his churning guts. Its eerie pitch distracts him from fully grasping the truth: he must be hallucinating.
It does not stop.
With much effort, Shen Qingqiu seizes control of his pitiless body, forcing himself to his feet to approach the sound and dispel these false sensations. Were it real, a supposition he is doubtlessly granting much undue credit, no one on Qian Cao would dare invoke such pain without anesthetic prepared. Moreover, they would presumably have enough sense to take any uncouth experiments far away from the peak lord’s ward. No shade of evening would disguise their cruel indulgence from an immortal master’s keen senses.
His heavy legs drag him to the room beside his own, ears still ringing from the scream and not entirely dulled enough to endure the healer’s distant insistence on assurance without harsher flashes of irritation crawling up through his stomach. The room is unsealed. Or, rather, its privacy talismans have been unceremoniously ripped from where Shen Qingqiu presses the door open, with its shreds curling hopelessly as they burn upon the floor. The keening at once rushes through his irascible guard and he recoils at the overwhelming waves of sobs wracking through this—head disciple, it must be.
Were that not cause enough to be sick, Mu Qingfang is situated at the young girl’s side, hands pressed just below the neckline to her bare, chaste chest.
Before Shen Qingqiu can muster any words, the healer turns to check the entrance with muted panic straining their features—in doing so, allows moonlight to reveal the weeping disciple to be significantly more marred than mere candlelight would share on her brown features. Scars mark the course of her meridians, burning through skin with a faint blackened glow as qi surges through the broken veins from a heart supported only by Mu Qingfang’s skillful hand.
Worse still, that face twisting as it wails is unmistakable even under the plethora of scars.
Shen Qingqiu steps away. Another. Mu Qingfang pleads something which passes him by entirely.
This pathetic thing who never once dared to shed a genuine tear before anyone, whose pitiful eyes would nonetheless cast this same glassy, distant gaze upon his feverish form until he slept, tinged with red after dawn broke—who concealed the weak shudders sent through a body that could no longer cry like any other, as if the thing laid across his lap did not feel each dry heave in his own restlessness. Shen Jiu let him keep face, annoyed as he was, because there was nothing Yue Qi would not relent upon his request. And it was unnecessary to force this conversation after the fever died. No matter how indignant he was, no matter his heart’s fretful shouts of betrayal, Shen Jiu knew this stupid, soft-hearted boy would think any inquiry to be concern, and then conflate it to be comfort.
But he was not Yue Qi. Nothing so tender could come from his cut lips and broken teeth that only tasted blood in every winter passed. The only person who could ever comfort Qi-ge was himself, in the end.
That was reality.
That was a past life.
Those children have long been dead.
On some level, Shen Qingqiu retains the sense to mark the room with renewed privacy talismans, which do not burn the instant he sets them down despite his qi trembling in what must be anger. In response to the presence of its energy, Yue Qi’s tremors start anew and he screeches in agony. The shrill sound sears the air and does not cease.
Its torturous echo should be trapped behind the door, rotting away with the boy long dead. Yet, as he stumbles away, it is all he hears.
Shen Qingqiu steals his sword and returns to the bamboo house.
It is empty.
His heart is still screaming.
⊱ ── { 𖥔 } ── ⊰
As the honored Healer of Cang Qiong, Mu Qingfang has arranged an urgent peak lord meeting with Yue Qingyuan’s careful signature on each letter.
The two of them have yet to be seen, despite this.
The room is quietly perturbed from the written warning that the sect leader is currently indisposed. It naturally implies Shen Qingqiu as Acting Sect Leader in his stead, a fact which has sent much leering his direction with each lord’s entry. That is, if he is to be acknowledged at all.
There are many hushed whispers, and Shen Qingqiu finds himself particularly irked by the low, insulted tones in which Qi Qingqi converses with the heads of the Spirit Beast and Alchemy Peaks—none of whom harbor any shame in speculating the damage of Yue Qingyuan’s apparent qi deviation, nor do the latter two conceal their accusing glances shot his direction. Glares to be dismissed, if only Dai Qingren weren’t a step from rising to march to his side. Qi Qingqi grabs her sleeve to hold her place. Seemingly the sole person who possesses enough sense to admonish them for such disrespect.
Similarly boorish, Liu Qingge has arrived at last. The brute dips into his seat with folded arms as though his martial siblings must be flattered he deigned to spend a shichen with them at all.
Still, his indignant silence was preferable to Shang Qinghua’s rustling papers. As a result of his own poor scheduling gone awry, the An Ding Peak Lord is all but flailing amidst the onslaught of work. Beside him, Wei Qingwei, the blustering man, is deriving an awful lot of enjoyment from peering over his shoulder and unhelpfully skimming ahead of Shang Qinghua’s brush to offer advice or his own calculations with varying accuracy.
Flicking his fan open, Shen Qingqiu absently tightens his grasp on its handle as they await answers. The knowledge of Sect Leader Yue’s condition hardly suffices as an upper hand.
Truly unfortunate.
The gasps falling through the hall are the only warnings Shen Qingqiu receives to steel himself. He leisurely shifts his attention to the final arrivals:
In the light, the scars littering young Yue Qingyuan’s tan, slender face are unavoidable even past the bangs he’s arranged. Bowed low, but abrasions clearly trail from his cheeks down his throat until it coalesces into the atrophic lines hidden beneath these unsuitably noble dark robes. Mu Qingfang holds his shoulder with the subtle swirl of qi surrounding them, emanating a pointed presence until the hall ebbs into obedient silence. The healer continues monitoring his meridians even as they approach the head of the table.
These days spent on private treatment have turned up worthless, Shen Qingqiu silently sneers, eyes snapping up to Mu Qingfang’s frown only to fall back to the disgusting sight of the boy at their side. The pathways remain as stark and inflamed as that first evening he witnessed him. It could be said he has indeed grown far from the shadow of Yue Qi, the corpse in memory, but this form of Yue Qingyuan is still haunted by traces of malnourishment. Shadows fall where they should not, implying hollowed cheeks and deadened eyes on a teenager too old to call it pitiful anymore. A sickening vindication twists in Shen Qingqiu’s gut.
When Yue Qingyuan takes his seat, his head rises to examine the architecture of this hall, flitting about without intention. The only marker against his proposed listlessness are those too-thin hands which remain firmly around the renowned Xuan Su. It alone recants his current pathetic status.
Shen Qingqiu’s mouth twitches behind his fan, but he dares not make any movement to draw attention.
“I am Yue Qi,” the sect leader lies, without even the dignity of looking at them as he does so.
Another unsettled ripple overtakes the hall.
“Please do not mistake this lowly one for Yue Jingyi, nor Yue Qingyuan.”
Shen Qingqiu’s fist idly tightens on his lap. What is his aim, shedding both courtesy names?
Qi Qingqi slowly raises her voice, offering the question on everyone's tongues—even Mu Qingfang, judging by their expression. “Might this shimei inquire as to why ‘Yue Qi’ disassociates himself from his title?”
With a smile devoid of anything, Yue Qingyuan stares into the distance and answers simply, “I am dead.”
Shen Qingqiu’s blood chills. Sharpening an icy look, he shoots his attention toward Mu Qingfang. The healer gives a worthless sigh and raises their hand to still the disquieted rumble rushing through their martial siblings.
“Zhangmen-shixiong, please look at them,” they request gently. Yue Qi lets his face return to its empty slate, his gaze fallen. Supervising the rest, Mu Qingfang attempts to explain, “Currently, we are attempting to discern which memories Yue-shixiong retains. The information he holds is inconsistent with his physical age at this time, thus it is this humble one’s hope to procure a familiar anchor while they perform treatment.”
To keep a patient from self-detonating, an anchor is not unusual for nonsexual thorough qi exchanges, or for beginning healers who have yet to comprehend what it means to balance another’s qi in tandem with their own for transfer. As healers grow more experienced, the practice becomes nothing but a redundant and unnecessary risk for all involved in the matter. For someone of Mu Qingfang's calibre to request an anchor…
…will Yue Qi self-detonate?
“If you recognize no one, that is alright,” Mu Qingfang mutters lowly, “this shiban will assess the candidates with the greatest spiritual energy. Shixiong may choose from them.”
Shen Qingqiu impatiently discards the pinching at his nerves, leveling out his expression as Yue Qi’s eyes slowly scrape away from the sheath of his sword to pour over each peak lord with the same impassive scrutiny.
None of their martial siblings are at all accustomed to a Yue-shixiong who is not so openly amiable when dampened by wariness foremost. How shameless they are, shirking away from their beloved sect leader’s true vision. Cowards, each and every of them, abjuring their worthless little loyalty the moment their fragile egos are not catered to. Yue Qingyuan has truly spoiled them beyond measure.
When Yue Qi’s eyes finally pull to Shen Qingqiu, the scornful insults wilt away in an instant.
That dull, hazy look of his slowly regains its luster. Not nearly as radiant as it once was, this witless hope, but nonetheless dangerous: to think he recognizes someone. Summoning every ounce of will within, Shen Qingqiu stubbornly does not let his gaze stray. Instead, he levies a detached, acrid glare from behind his fan.
Unfortunately, the fool takes this as an invite.
Before Mu Qingfang may reach for him, Yue Qi stands and glides along the floor with enviable grace for a boy clutching death, until he stops at his side. The warmer smile that curls his lips is indubitably with the realization Shen Qingqiu is situated as the sect leader’s right hand—entirely oblivious to how he had clawed his way up Qing Jing alone.
“Xiao… Shen Jiu,” he whispers breathlessly. “Shen Jiu.”
The man says nothing. His serrated tongue will not heed him, for fear it will cut itself.
“I’m happy,” the words are distant, with an ignoble sincerity. “Here, one of us made it out alive.”
It was tempting to sneer how wrong he was. To laugh in Yue Qi’s hopeful face and detail the gruesome irony lost on him in this fragile state. Seize his naive offering and rend it bit by bit until their fellow peak lords truly understood the only person for whom Yue Qi wasted his bleeding heart on before Cang Qiong taught him to cauterize the damn thing.
And yet, it somehow feels as if his own being is wrung dry instead. Gratingly, he spits: “Zhangmen-shixiong is very much alive. His martial siblings will gladly attest to that.”
“They do not matter to me,” he says easily, gaze locked on Shen Qingqiu’s alone.
None of them will voice their protest and disrupt this, but their cruel eyes are incessant daggers—how can Yue Qi, with his sensitive temperament, feign to be unaffected? Shen Qingqiu’s eyes flicker over the scars engraved in Yue Qi’s skin, swallowing down the instinctive ire.
Were the peak lords’ own skin on the line, they would have abandoned him to this fate without a word. Such is the world.
So why should Shen Qingqiu suffer blame?
In these bastards’ eyes, fault lies entirely with him: the sect leader’s singular chip on his shoulder, latched onto him as a bloody leech. Condemned to suffocate on the false partiality used to keep him under control, that which they somehow desire. Deluding themselves into the belief he’s the one keeping Yue Qingyuan’s benevolent facade from breaching into any closeness they shamelessly search out. How many years will they stubbornly gut Shen Qingqiu while disbelieving the truth stood clear at the very start? How long will they continue clinging to the Yue Qingyuan they grew attached to within their own minds? What a pathetic sight they made. They are the flock searching to feast upon him, a mountain who need not live with anyone at his side. Yue Qi was never the compassionate thing anyone believed. He is a survivor first and foremost, as all slaves are.
Or, he should be. If this were truly Yue Qi, he would at the very least attempt to gather information, if not relish in the position granted to him as he did the first time. Had he any sense at all, he would accept this silver platter warily, but silently. Blessings knew how to bite.
A hand touches Shen Qingqiu’s wrist and he snaps it away with a hiss.
“Shen Jiu…” Yue Qi echoes.
Damn them all, he seethes. May each one of these cowards meet a demise tenfold as painful as the man they patronize.
Even if they intend to protect their dear Yue Qingyuan, no one steps into this startling stalemate—just as afraid, if not morbidly curious, to finally unearth the truth of their sect leader’s alleged favoritism. The very favor once envied from the Qing Jing Head Disciple he so mindlessly calls for, and which supposedly continued to carry years after he was given the honorary name Qingqiu. Not that Shen Qingqiu had ever seen a lick of anything worth coveting. Were they so desperate for their darling sect leader’s ceaseless monitoring and placating prostration? No, none in their right mind truly sought such disingenuous courtesy.
As well they shouldn’t. Each peak lord’s dignity was ensured in other manners. Even Shen Qingqiu was permitted to brave this vile name of Qiu and twist it into his own, fashioning himself an honored scholar of Qing Jing; demanding respect, discarding the petty grievances detailing him impersonable.
No amount of honor or praise will ever reach Little Nine, for the boy was buried without dignity.
What a fool Yue Qi is. To be reaching for an unmarked grave after all these years. Does he truly not realize he alone holds the cursed spade?
Yet… his hands remain outstretched. Since the moment he entered the great hall, he’s only now released his grasp on Xuan Su for him. “Shen Jiu. Shen Qingqiu. I understand.” He mutters on, uncaring: “Still, I’m very proud of you. I only…”
“What, Zhangmen-shixiong?” he asks sharply, feeling cold sweat begin to prick on his neck. If Yue Qi forgoes his role as Sect Leader at this point, Shen Qingqiu will never forgive him. Shen Jiu will never forgive him. If one goes through the trouble of burying their past, why bring it back to sully? Demanding silence in his taunting, he smiles cruelly, “Is this not your Qiong Ding Peak? Speak. Or have we a mute for a leader?”
That flash of recognition in those eyes confirms he hears the message, but instead of heeding him, Yue Qi’s expression turns unbearably wistful. “I only wish I could’ve grown strong too.”
A newfound fury burns inside him, the pain of it straining his usual facade at the inadvertent mockery. No matter the state, he should have known: any indulgence is too much.
“There is no need to lie to me,” Yue Qi says pleasantly, voice raised as if he’s assuring the rest despite his eyes piercing Shen Qingqiu alone. Wrought with such intensity it nearly feels he’s attempting to memorize every element he can grasp despite the fan held between them. The light, soothing tone he assumes hardly matches his next words, “I’ve died already. I have failed. The proof is right before us all.”
Clamors of protest rise—most of which contained insistent phrases of you are alive, and hasty offers of if you need proof—though amidst the ruckus, Shen Qingqiu scarcely catches Mu Qingfang’s voice in the undercurrent once they meet Yue Qi’s side, sore with resignation: “Yue-shixiong, you promised to trust me.”
Had he any less grasp on himself, Shen Qingqiu would snap his fan in half.
Everyone’s ramblings went largely ignored with the sort of politely mandated remorse only Yue Qi and Qingyuan were capable of, as he answers Mu Qingfang without sparing a glance. “If I could not even save Shen Jiu, I could never be Sect Leader. He is much stronger than this lowly one.”
Shen Qingqiu’s lungs collapse. Gazes as blades, where they would have sliced into his face until he was more disfigured than this liar.
“I’m truly happy,” he murmurs again with that same kindly apathetic expression, reluctantly tearing his gaze away at Mu Qingfang’s ushering as he continues, dazedly, “Shen Jiu is safe. I must...”
Whatever they derive, he will not cough up a confession to that damned name.
Once guided to his seat, after another quiet exchange between Mu Qingfang, Yue Qi remains standing and relaxes into a formal position; poised with his usual assured air, hands settled on his sword hilt, appearing more aware than he had since the beginning. Gazing upon everyone now, he gently dismisses Mu Qingfang to their own seat further down.
One of his pointed smiles does away with any reluctance. No matter his state, he remains Sect Leader unless all the peak lords denounce him. The healer relents and sits down, restless as anyone when their gaze inevitably gravitates to Shen Qingqiu. He cannot even relish in the irony of the other peak lords misunderstanding a threat as plain as this: if Yue Qingyuan dictates Shen Qingqiu as the anchor, it will create another opportunity to blackmail.
Granting him the full understanding of his damaged core will only be used to rebuff and undermine him at every turn hereafter. The frustration is so nauseating that he scarcely registers the young sect leader clearing his throat.
“Honored Peak Lords, shall we put an end to this farce?”
Yue Qi draws Xuan Su in one broad stroke—
“Foolish—!”
—Shen Jiu darts in to shove it shut, eyes split open. The force of denying Xuan Su knocks Yue Qi to the ground, but Shen Qingqiu has no time to register the blood littering the floor by Yue Qi’s mouth. His thoughts are hitched on the sight of the blade never drawn: its blinding, resounding force nearly dead at the points where it’s been shattered.
There’s no retort he can voice between his muted senses and his racing mind when the peak lords push past him to verify their sect leader’s safety, even as his fan clatters to the ground. The only force strong enough to drag back his attention is Mu Qingfang shoving Xuan Su into Shen Qingqiu’s hand, the energy pulsing unsteadily even with it sheathed. It doesn’t burn, he thinks numbly, it doesn’t hurt at all.
Yue Qi’s eyes meet his with an idle, thoughtful frown—as if Shen Qingqiu is the one out of his mind and not the trembling, idiotic boy laying in ill-fitted robes with blood spilling from his mouth and bruising his cheek where he lay after attempting to stab himself under some false notion he is dead.
“Step aside!” Mu Qingfang commands. Undaunted as they are, the crowd encircling Yue Qi does not share in their confidence. Hauling him up into their arms, they only just manage to drag Yue Qi through the hovering split-tongued vultures. His head lulls past the support their arms can provide, beginning to choke on the excess blood he cannot swallow. In an instant, Wei Qingwei wordlessly takes to their side to support him, swiftly drawing his own longsword to evacuate them to Qian Cao.
Shen Qingqiu stands very still.
Xuan Su thrums in bold protest at being separated from its master, but more unbelievably, it refuses to harm him.
The blood left on the ground is all that is left of Yue Qi. A repugnant crimson which stains his silk fan and sinks into the stone tiles beneath. For a mournful moment, it is silent, then:
“What was that?” Liu Qingge snarls like the beast he is, undeserving of any sort of answer.
Hell breaks.
“So we don’t matter to him,” Shang Qinghua sputters, and all Shen Qingqiu hears is his begging for a blade, “Really? Not at all, Shixiong?!”
“Yue-shixiong was delirious, that is all.”
“Yes, who wouldn’t be, with that much pain in recent memory?”
“Hush,” says Qi Qingqi, cutting through the speculation on the injuries only to glance his way: “Did you see the state of Xuan Su?”
“Does anyone know what happened?!”
Shen Qingqiu kneels and his fingers brush against the fan’s handle. Unsalvageable. Its threads torn from the qi spark he’d infused, with the fabric thoroughly soaked in blood. Yue Qi’s unstable qi likely ruptured one of the several scars covering his skin, leaving stains on the ground from where Mu Qingfang stole him away.
“Shen Qingqiu,” begins Dai Qingren, “Is that the cause of his deviation?”
The tone is accusatory, as though she believes Shen Qingqiu had shattered the sword himself—as he is apparently the singular cause for Yue Qingyuan to ever enter deviation. As if he doesn’t avoid him at all costs. No, as if they think Yue Qingyuan truly cared. Bitter rancor surges through his insides. He shuts his eyes with the vain hope that upon opening them, they would all come to their senses and gut themselves right then and there in shame.
“Why should this lord know?” he sneers icily. Nimbly raising to his feet, he sets a glare upon all of them and throws his ruined fan to the ground with a sharp crack. In its place, he tightens his grasp on Xuan Su’s hilt and a few finally retract, giving him space to breathe.
“He’s known you for the longest time,” the Zui Xian Lord reasons from behind Shen Qingqiu. “Yue Qī, Shen Jiǔ?”
His lips draw thin when he turns to stare the imbecile down. “Does Zhangmen-shixiong’s delirium justify disrespect toward this shixiong?”
Their artificer’s calm voice, no less condescending, intervenes, “Will Shen-shixiong follow? Mu-shiban did say they needed an anchor, and it is clear he trusts you.” Somehow goes unspoken, but the pause speaks volumes in its stead. “Even before this, whatever your… past—”
“Do none of you possess a spine?” Shen Qingqiu twists his mouth into a cold, sardonic smile, flicking his rueful gaze between all of them. “Is it that this one is blackmailing Zhangmen-shixiong, or is it that he trusts me?”
Perhaps it is both in those muddled minds of theirs—that Shen Qingqiu has taken advantage of Yue Qingyuan’s trust and purposely induced his deviation, which is why Qian Cao attempted to summon him after he fled that horrid night. There is then the added insult to their fellow peak lord, that implicit belief Mu Qingfang is so dull as to hand him the very sword he supposedly destroyed to incite such a severe deviation, like the reprehensible slave boy they now suspect.
Qi Qingqi speaks first. “Are we not permitted to reassess with new information?”
“Obviously,” Shen Qingqiu turns to glower upon that traitor, “though these years have proved not one of you capable of discerning truth from rumor. One can only pray you spare Zhangmen-shixiong the indignity.”
This is over with.
Shen Qingqiu turns on his heel, only for some self-righteous bastard to grab his shoulder—Liu Qingge, of course. His expression furrows into a scowl. In a show of utter disrespect, he spares him not more than a moment before tearing free from his grasp, without ever touching Xiu Ya.
“Explain! Yue-shixiong, and you—!”
Whatever Liu Qingge barks after him is swiftly silenced by Qi Qingqi, grounded with enough sensibility to keep the shameless man from chasing after him. Too many times has he done so with the excuse he’d never draw his blade against an opponent with their back turned, as if anything else justifies his reckless ambush.
He ignores every last whisper. All he can think of is the inward grip Yue Qi held on his sword since the beginning, subtly angled only ever to harm himself once drawn. The caverns of his resentment erode even deeper, aimless and caught in the raging concave of his chest. Someone should have known. He should have known.
Shen Qingqiu is going to kill Yue Qingyuan himself.
But first, there is the matter of Xuan Su.