Chapter Text
Ling’s not officially an emperor yet when Edward’s first letter arrives. Well fucking finally, Greed pipes up—rare, given his slumbering shape in Ling’s mind. Two years since the Promised Day.
So Ling sits at his beautiful mahogany desk and, between sessions of scheming of ways to kill the old Emperor faster, plucks out Edward’s letter. The summer in Xing is always sweltering. He sips on sweetened mulberry tea.
Hey annoyingface, Ed starts. Ling has to sigh before he continues. I’m going to head west. I figure Alphonse and I might as well try to learn what we can about alchemy and Alkahestry. Equivalent Exchange’s an imperfect theorem—I’m sure of it. The mathematics is sure too. Anyways. Al’s probably gonna be in your hair at some point so y’know. Do your Emperor thing—
Ling squints at the paper as he reads. Edward started the letter in bold Xingese strokes, decided he was frustrated with Traditional Xingese, switched to Simplified Xingese, and crossed it out to continue in stiff Amestrian letters.
—Anyways. So I’ve decided I’m going to propose to Winry. I suppose if it goes badly I’ll just have to fake my death and go to Xing. That’s my Plan B. Plan F is becoming a monk. Issue is I’ve kinda met god? And I can’t say the guy and I are friends? But we’re also not not-friends?
Ling sighs. Half-full clay pots across the Blue Yearn. Ditch the pot for me, Ling thinks. He hesitates between the brush and pen. He’ll make Ed work for this one a little. In Traditional Xingese he starts: Well, Edward, I hope your way of propositioning Winry is better than your Plan B. If you need a backup Plan E, you would make a very funny and short consort.
The page blots as Ling holds the brush for too long. He adds: besides, your delicate constitution could never survive being a monk. You’d have to shave off your hair too.
Lan Fan, who is now soon to become Lan Fan-tzchi, the honourable head of his Emperor’s guard, gives him a stink eye as he gives her the letter to seal.
“This is payback. Psychological warfare is the best kind of warfare, you know.” Ling sips his tea. “Did I tell you he made me eat a boot?”
Ling is still not Emperor by the time he shows up for the Rockbell-Elric wedding. Six more weeks, he thinks and his gut clenches at the thought of Lan Fan in that snake-den. This is the Liu clan’s wet dream. Instead of do something reasonable like march back across the desert, he rings the doorbell.
Winry Rockbell’s very pregnant form and wide grin greets him. The late evening sun sets her face.
“Ling! Good to see you.” She squeezes him into a hug. “Ed’s being totally useless so Al took him for a walk. We just finished dinner but there are some leftovers for you. Oh also Mustang took the big couch so you’ll have to take the, uh, other one.”
At Ling’s look she adds, “The hotel nearby got swept up in a flash food and the other one’s run by an Ishvalan family, so, you know…”
And there are only two hotels in Resembool. Instead of braving his Resembool Amestrian or Ishvalan at the other hotel, Ling crosses the threshold.
Smoke drifts in from the kitchen, tobacco and simmering stew. There’s a paw-prints all over the wooden floor. Who schedules a wedding in the spring in South Amestris?
“How’s the baby?” Ling says as he takes his shoes off.
Winry passes him a pair of pink fluffy slippers. “She’s a real kicker. Okay don’t tell Ed but I think the baby’s gotta be a girl. We went out for dinner in Central a few weeks ago and I really felt her kicking so I told Ed the baby’s coming now.”
“Now?” Ling says. Winry is at best six months along.
Winry waves a hand. “I just wanted the waiter to actually hurry up and give me my pasta. I’d been waiting for an hour.”
“Did it work?” They’re very comfy pink slippers.
“Way too well. ‘Cause Ed started panicking too. He’s been reading all these books on how to deliver babies and—“ Winry pauses to wave over her shoulder and beyond the hallway. “Ling’s here.”
Roy Mustang stumbles into the hallway, hair dishevelled. He’s got a sweater on and some pants. Ling stares.
“You know, I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen you out of that boring military outfit,” Ling stares.
Mustang scowls. “Pink slippers?”
“Where’s your better half?”
“I’m stepping out of this,” Winry says and bumps past Mustang into the living room.
Mustang’s scowl deepens. “She was… offered a hotel room.”
Ling starts laughing. He’s going to become Emperor and someone’s probably trying to sabotage him back in Xing. He’s in Resembool wearing fluffy pink slippers and crashing with the future Fuhrer for Edward Elric’s wedding.
“This would be a pretty fucking great time for a double-assassination,” Greed says between laughs. “Two for one combo.”
Mustang curses him and walks into the living room.
It really is a supremely lumpy couch. Moonlight spills in over Ling and Mustang. Bastard’s got a silk eye mask, five step skincare routine, and earplugs. Then he had the audacity to take the nice couch.
The ceiling thuds, followed by sounds of Edward’s screeching. Ling eyes Mustang’s sleeping form. Maybe if he’s quick he can steal Mustang’s earbuds.
Ling slips out of the couch and creeps towards Mustang.
The ceiling thuds again—will he stop hitting it with his automail leg? Alphonse says something and Ed groans.
Ling’s nearly there when— click, hiss.
The kitchen lamp turns on, soft yellow light spilling into the living room. Mustang stirs. Goddamnit, Greed says.
Ling retreats. Can’t sleep so may as well go join whatever intruder’s in the kitchen.
He find Pinako Rockbell in a fluffy pink bathrobe—so that’s where the slippers come from. She’s rummaging around the kitchen.
“Winry keeps hiding my tobacco,” she says. “Can you reach the top cabinet?”
Ling does. He finds an old cookie tin filled with—oh there it is.
“Thank you.” More screeching from above. “Well, I’m going to the porch for some air and peace of mind. Care to join?”
So Ling goes. There’s an old rocking chair and bench out. It’s just rained and it smells divine. This slice of Amestris smells more than anything—creeks, haystacks, manure, rainwater. Head East and you’ll find Ishvalan ash.
“Is he always this bad?” Ling says.
Pinako rest the pipe on her lip as she speaks. “He’s always been terrible with things he can’t control. He’s just like his father.”
Amestrian families are so simple. The language explains it too: mother, father, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew. No distinguishing of paternal or maternal figures. No distinguishing who is the older or younger uncle.
“If I can ask, were they married?” Ling asks. The flip side: ambiguity and undernegotiated roles.
Pinako puffs smoke into Ling’s face. “Trisha and Hohenheim? No. But I don’t think they needed to. The love was there.”
“But not for him to come home. Home-home,” Ling says. Amestrian slang picked up from the streets of Rush Valley. Is she your friend or your friend-friend?
Pinako looks at him strangely. “No.”
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude,” Ling says. That’s the other thing about Amestris. Public and private information is so topsy-turvy.
Pinako opens her mouth to speak when some porch door wrenches open.
“Hey— “ Edward says as he almost stumbles on Ling. “What are you guys doing out here?”
“Edward, dear,” Pinako begins, voice serene, “now that you’ve grown, you don’t need to be loud enough for people to hear you before they see you.”
Edward stomps down the steps, decides he really does need to get the last word in, and points a finger at them, “You two need to stop scheming.”
“I never scheme,” Ling says, equally serene. “So will you become a monk after all?”
Pinako snorts at that. Edward really does stomp off then into the night.
“He’ll be alright,” Pinako says with a smile.
Amestris is a landlocked state separated from Xing by desert. It’s a military state and the only reason it hasn’t collapsed is because it is more or less an infinite resource generation machine. This is why Mustang’s naive optimism will eat that country alive, should he become Fuhrer.
It’s also why the newly minted Emperor of Xing does not visit. It’s why he concerns himself with matters of agriculture, securing Xing’s Eastern ports from pirates, and picking at clan structure.
And it’s good fun! There are clans stretching up and down the mountains to the flatlands. He visits an old quarry down south and finds ancient sculptures carved into limestone from people with light brown eyes like Al’s.
Really, he’s not thinking of Amestris much.
“Have you heard what they’re calling me?” He’s sitting with Lan Fan during the Waning Hour. An old Xingese custom that prohibits work the hour after dinner. Traditionally, you were meant to go to a shrine and give an offering of your meal to the gods. Now, it’s the only time he gets a break from the court. And his goddamn spymaster.
“Wei wants to see you after,” Lan Fan says, sharpening her kunai. Wei being said spymaster. “You seem tired, my Emperor.”
This is Ling’s new office but the mahogany desk is his old one. Scratches carved into it from when he was five and protesting memorising esoteric Xingese poetry. It’s always some wise guy and his seven farts that turn into a philosophical treatise on statecraft.
“Did you hear what they’re calling me?” Ling says. He examines Lan Fan’s kunais sprawled over his desk. There are two titles for each emperor. The formal Emperor and then the informal title. The informal title solidifies in time. The Wise Princess was one of the most famous ones. Princess, because there is no explicit Xingese word for queen much to Wei’s displeasure. Specific languages cuts out roles before they can even begin.
Lan Fan exhales. “Yes.”
“Moth King,” Ling says. “Eating the fabric of this country and its traditions to then burn myself in the very light I’m seeking.”
“If there are dissidents we can fight them. I can go search for them,” Lan Fan starts but Ling shakes his head.
“When Master Fuu was teaching me how to fight with swords, do you know what he told me?” Ling says. He picks up one of Lan Fan’s kunai and twists the handle. “That I wouldn’t be a good emperor if I didn’t learn to keep my heart so soft. To know when to strike.”
It’s telling that it makes Lan Fan’s mouth twist into a smile. “He was a tough teacher.”
Ling hums. It’s true. Someone like you should’ve never been emperor, he thinks and doesn’t know if it’s him or Greed. But that’s his competitive advantage. There are many ways to crack an egg, as they say in West Amestris. Many ways to break the tongue, as they say in Xingese.
“We have work to do, my Emperor. Shall I send for Wei?” Lan Fan says and Ling nods.
The problem with getting everything you want is you want more. A little more gold never hurt anybody, Greed says.
Years later, Alphonse Elric stumbles out East with an engagement ring and scandal in his back pocket.
“Well,” his master of coin says, “better the Changs than us Yao. No offence, your Excellency.”
Ling makes a mental note to look into whether this one’s siphoning away money to the Yaos. Wouldn’t the Liu have a field day with that.
Ling says nothing about it because his word would carry too much weight. It’s a favour of good fortune that Alphonse’s Amestrian sensibilities and lack of social hierarchy make him request a meeting with Ling. He’ll get Wei to leak the info.
“Hey!” Alphonse slides into one of Ling’s personal meeting rooms and crushes him in a hug. “Long time no see!”
Ling laughs. “Since the wedding!”
“Wow you really haven’t changed a bit,” Al says. He must have just arrived if he’s still wandering around in Amestrian button-downs. He’s in his early twenties now, broad and tanned from the desert.
“It’s the water down here,” Ling says with a wink. He gestures for Al to sit. The furniture here a twist of classic Xingese and modern Aerugan sensibilities. Red upholstery with magpies and cherubs sewn into the sides.
“So how have you been?” Ling says when Al starts fidgeting with his cufflinks.
“Yeah, good, Nina’s started going to school now,” Al says. He fidgets with the ring on his finger—a plain silver band. “Ed tries to come home to see her and Winry every couple months. I think he was pretty proud her first word was ‘dada’. Winry was so pissed off the week after.”
“She’ll be picking up alchemy in no time,” Ling says.
Al laughs. “Yeah I’ve been trying to teach her some stuff here and there. She keeps wanting to go visit Ed. It’s like with dad again, I swear. I think he’s in Creta now, did he mention?”
Ling smiles that polite politician smile. “No, I haven’t gotten a letter from him.”
“He’s horrible at sending letters home. When he does send them, they’re half-mad and ramblings about how the fruit out there tastes weird.” Al shrugs. “So I dunno if you’re missing out that much.”
Ling’s smile calcifies. Even he’s not gonna stick his nose in family business. “So why are you here in Xing, really?”
“Um, so, you know,” Al starts. “I kinda proposed to Mei and I didn’t think it would turn into this whole thing but it did?”
And it’s highly entertaining and headache-inducing for everyone on the sidelines, Ling thinks.
“And I was, uhhh.” Al leans forward. His hands have callouses now. “Okay, I kinda wanted to ask if it was okay?”
Ling frowns. “Why would you need to ask me that?”
“I don’t know? I don’t know how things work here?” Al says. “I feel like I’m making everyone mad at me? I met the Changs for dinner and—okay, look, my mouth went numb after the first plate of dumplings but Mei said I had to eat at least three—“
“Well three’s just being polite.”
“—Gee, thanks. Anyways, I can’t tell if Mei’s mom wants to kill me. I think her dad likes me but I just… I don’t know if he was just being friendly or not. And I feel like I’m doing something wrong by making this into a big deal.”
Elric brother’s family problems are all yours kid, Greed says. Ling pushes him down.
Ling taps the side of the sofa. The embroidered cherubs catch his nail. “Look, I can’t say or do anything. I think this whole thing is really… well.”
Ling looks at Alphonse and the wide-eyed, stiff way he’s holding himself. Yeah, Ling thinks, that’s me after facing the consequences of Lan Fan losing her arm.
“But,” Ling says, “It won’t go wrong—at least not because of any other people. I can do that from my end.”
Al exhales. “Thank you.”
Ling nods and stands.
“Oh and one other thing,” Al says. He grins at Ling. Never a good thing when alchemists do that. “I’m gonna move in with Mei next week. I uh started doing a degree in alkahestry in Xing.”
Ling sighs. “Do you have to do it before the wedding? The Xingese are like the Amestrians in that regards.”
Al stands up, still grinning. “Thanks Ling.”
Ling’s visiting the Winter Estate when the letter arrives. It’s by the infamous Blue Yearn River—they’ve got clay pots here and everything. You guys are so morbid, holy shit, Greed says. Tell me about it, Ling replies.
He dismisses the handmaiden and opens the letter. Ed’s scrawl finds him. Only clear Amestrian this one. Curious. Al had said Ed’s letters are sprawling and meandering. This one is one sentence:
Hey Ling, do you—or Our Friend—know why Homunculi don’t get older?