Wen Qing is in the infirmary on her break when A-Yuan totters inside, looking absolutely devastated.
“What has he been up to now?” she mutters. Not even two hours ago, she had managed to find the boy buried in the dirt up to his head, crying a little—Wen Qing had to stifle her amusement and give in to her outrage at Wei Wuxian sitting there patting his tiny head, doing absolutely nothing to get him out.
“I can’t find Xian-gege, where is he,” the child sobs, and she melts and puts her hand on his head. For all that A-Yuan whines about getting teased, he is also immensely attached to Wei Wuxian.
“He’s probably working on his corpses, which is why he locked you out of his cave.” Wen Qing has her reservations about raising a child so close to resentful energy, but it is their only option. And for all of Wei Wuxian’s inability to raise children, he has enough sense to know that a child shouldn’t be exposed to too much of it.
Even if he half-buries them in soil and watches them grow, she thinks, stifling a sigh.
“But A-Yuan wants to see him,” the child says, and stomps his foot. “Xian-gege says he’s going into hiding one of these days, so I have to become stronger -”
Wen Qing inhales sharply. Wei Wuxian is never defeatist—but he has been growing weaker, his coreless body slowly eating away at his cultivation and itself.
“A-Yuan,” she interrupts. “Don’t you think that Xian-gege is hiding because he wants to show you how to hide too?”
He hesitates for a moment. “Will I be able to protect Xian-gege and you?”
Oh, this sweet child. “Yes,” she says. In all the ways that matter, she thinks.
She only hopes that he never needs to use the skill in question.
*
A-Yuan remembers very little when the man picks him up. Brother Rich, he thinks, because of the snowy robes stained with blood, the musical instrument strapped to his back. He remembers crying, and tears falling on his cheek from above while someone hid him, and again when he was picked up.
He remembers asking—“Where is Xian-gege?” before he blacks out.
*
It is a beautiful day in summer, and Lan Wangji has been asked a question by a slip of a boy he cannot answer.
Wen Yuan has such small hands that Lan Wangji can barely believe they belong to a human being, sometimes. He keeps his nails clipped, and his fingers are clean and orderly like any of the Lan disciples. He had fit in so immediately with the other children as soon as he had recovered that no one could dare to say otherwise, point fingers at him accusingly like they had at Lan Wangji when he had dragged his feet towards the final steps of the Cloud Recesses and collapsed, Wen Yuan still cradled in his arms, and told him he was a disgrace. The Elders are not pleased, but they know all too well that what is done is done, and neither of the other sects would support a Wen alive, no matter how young—and that they would be branded traitors.
It was a master move, his brother had admitted. Lan Wangji did not tell him what they both knew then—that he had not thought about the politics behind it apart from the fact that it would keep Wen Yuan safe.
“Brother,” he lisps, tugging at his hand, and Lan Wangji knees down.
“Wen Yuan,” he admonishes. “Do not call me that here—people do not know where you came from.” He swallows. “It is dangerous.”
“But -” Wen Yuan begins, and stops. “Where is Xian-gege?”
Lan Wangji feels the scars on his back so acutely for a second that he can barely breathe, the only thing keeping him anchored is the small hand that’s clasped in his.
“Here,” he says, and presses the hand safely ensconced in his to his heart, and then Wen Yuan’s. “And he wants you safe, so call me something else.”
It is a beautiful day in summer, something Lan Wangji would have noticed if all his days weren’t bleak. But then Wen Yuan smiles, and there are tears sparkling in his eyes—and Lan Wangji realizes that he would do anything to see the boy never cry again.
“Father?” he tries, the words unfamiliar on his tongue.
“Fa-ther,” Wen Yuan repeats, smiling through his tears.
“That is adequate,” Lan Wangji says, and rises to his feet. This time he lets Wen Yuan tag along after him to the Quiet Room, ignoring the curious looks that people aim at the two of them.
He pretends he isn’t crying too.
*
The question comes up again six months later, when the boy has finally progressed enough to write his own name without difficulty. He is a bright child in all the ways Lan Xichen had been—and even the Elders who frown on any deed he does are speechless when it comes to finding his faults. His Wen blood can hardly be brought up when his surname is Lan—when he carries a name given to him by one of the Twin Jades .
Lan Wangji might be shunned and feared within his own sect, but to the outside world he remains the pure cultivator he had always been, and he simultaneously hates and fears it. The mighty fall the fastest, he knows, and he had never wanted to rise to this status in the first place.
But this status comes with privileges, and one of them is the choice to have his pick of all the people he wants to mentor or marry. The second is out of the question—the cultivation world knows, even if Lan Yuan does not, that Lan Wangji walks with a widower’s gait, and that haunted look in his eyes can never be replaced. Lan men have only one great love in their lives—it is part of their very cultivation, and for every ten rumours that say Lan Yuan can be no one else but Lan Wangji’s son, there is one that says that his mother is dead—dead because of Lan Wangji’s inability to protect them both.
They are not wrong, Lan Wangji thinks wryly.
Today, when he leads Lan Yuan towards the spring, there is a hesitance in his step that he does not quite understand. He watches him curiously fumble for words—Lan Yuan barely ever fumbles, model student that he is—so this must be hard for him. He decides to give him time. Patience solves a lot of problems.
When they sit down, both with their own qin by their side, is when Lan Yuan manages to say it.
“Father,” Lan Yuan asks. “Can I learn how to play Inquiry?”
His words, like his intent, are clear, so unlike a little five year old who can barely pick up his own instrument. Lan Wangji envies him sometimes—for this freedom of choice that he always wanted but never got. Never will, perhaps as the spare to the heir—but he is wrong in that. He could have, and he lost the chance.
“Your fingers are not fine-tuned enough to learn how to play it yet,” he says. He does not mention the other dangers—the spirits that lurk ready to possess a fresh cultivator’s body—all the texts that had been salvaged from Yiling that mentioned how to make fierce corpses, and how to turn Inquiry against itself. Dark arts, the Elders had spat at him, and Xichen had locked them away, firmly shutting them into silence.
“I will learn,” Lan Yuan says stubbornly.
There are many things he can say to that statement. Lan Wangji does not doubt he can learn—there is skill in him, yet untested, and he is only five. If he starts now he will become a master at it for certain, and learn to play all the melodies required for exorcism.
But to learn—to learn to do something one must have to start.
Lan Wangji isn’t sure he’s ready to start.
“I will teach you,” he says finally. “But first you must practice the basics, until you get the hang of it.”
“And?” Lan Yuan demands expectantly, with the tone in his voice so resembling someone else that he blinks and sees double, the shadow of another child in red and black in his face.
Lan Wangji’s hands tremble before he stills.
“And I will play,” he allows. He breathes in deeply, and thinks of the notes. “Who do you want to call?”
Lan Yuan looks all around their little clearing, as if checking for eavesdroppers, and then leans in to whisper in his ear, “Do you think you could call Brother Xian?”
He nearly drops the qin. “Who -”
Lan Yuan’s face contorts into a sad frown. “Uncle… I asked him about it and uncle said that’s why you were sad.”
Xichen. Of course. Lan Yuan is a bright child, he could have asked anyone easily.
“Even if I call him,” Lan Wangji says, “there is no guarantee that he will answer.” It is why he has set aside his qin after the first time he attempted to play it at the Burial Mounds, knowing that if Wei Wuxian did not answer him now, he never would.
“If you don’t try,” Lan Yuan insists, “how will he know?” He makes a fist and puts it to his heart. “A-Yuan tells gege I love him every day, that’s how he knows.”
A-Yuan can barely remember his full name now, Lan Wangji knows. Perhaps it is for the best.
“I will play,” he says. “But you must not until you learn—and when you are able to—if you remember—I will let you play with me.”
“Will I find him then?” His face is so hopeful. Lan Wangji has to believe—even if he cannot -
“You will,” he affirms. “You will.”
*
Lan Sizhui frowns at the flags in front of him.
“You’re so good at this!” Jingyi praises. “How do you do the strokes so fluidly every time?”
“I just do,” he begins, and then stops. There is a faint memory in the back of his head, insisting that it break through. “I had… learned it to find something.”
“And here I thought it was a natural talent,” Jingyi jokes. “Come off it, it’s the spirit summoning array, how could you have known it before? You probably saw it during the war back when we were kids, or during lessons with the older kids. I remember how many times Lan Qiren made me write mine -”
Sizhui doesn’t buy it. He puts the flags away, concentrating on his sword en-route to Mo Village. There are fierce corpses to be taken care of, and he has no time to dawdle.
He will think about that faint shadow in his memory later—later -
Later—he thinks, watching the man in the Mo family home, who looks nothing like the one at the very edge of his memories, but sparks familiarity with every look. Later.
Later—he thinks, when the man escapes, and then returns in the forest, when Lan Wangji takes him by the hand and says he will take him back to Gusu, like he has with no one else except A-Yuan. He knows it in his bones, even if the realization comes years after he had first promised it—a memory just faintly out of reach.
He will find him.
*
Wei Wuxian hears it before he sees them—hidden by the tiny grove. He marvels at the water dancing to their tune—Inquiry is truly the most beautiful tune when played by the Jades of Gusu.
Perhaps doubly so, he thinks with a hint of pride, when it is performed by the father and the son.
The last note of the song hangs still in the air, and he wonders who they were looking for, not having caught the name the notes spell out, when the water droplets rush up to dance on their strings, and both serene heads turn in his direction, ribbons fluttering in the wind.
“Oh?” he says in delight, blush blooming rosy on his face. “Looking for me?”
“Wei Ying,” Lan Wangji says with a nod, and for some reason Sizhui looks -
Looks effervescently happy, like all his dreams came true.
“Brother Xian,” he says, eyes shining wet.
Wei Wuxian does not anticipate the tackle-hug he gets, but he finds he’s not complaining.
“What a sticky child,” he says. “Aren’t you too old for hugs?”
“No,” Sizhui muffles into his chest, “I’ve finally found you.”
Name: Meghna Twitter: wangxianist Tumblr: yasha-shirayuki