Chapter Text
Lan Sizhui is in Qinghe, waiting for a return letter.
Lan-zongzhu has begun to insist that Nie-zongzhu write him one on the spot, even if it's only a plea of ignorance, a request for more time. Lan Sizhui doesn't know the exact particulars, but he knows Lan-zongzhu's exasperation. He is trusted enough, considered close enough to family, that he is privileged to know the kind of things that make Lan Xichen's mouth twist in annoyance.
Although he had listened with a sympathetic smile, the truth is he doesn't care that much. He's more concerned with other things he is permitted—to deliver this letter alone, to wait in the town outside of the Unclean Realm until, sometime late at night, the reply will be done. A whole long afternoon, the kind of thing no other boy his age would be allowed. Lan Xichen had noted it with a smile—Lan Sizhui does not know what he assumes, but Lan Xichen seems to guess that he might have something he wants to do, alone. "I know that you can take care of yourself," Lan-zongzhu had said, "and will not do anything to disgrace the Lan Sect. Since I know that, there's no need to trouble you with any other orders."
Lan Sizhui had bowed, said his thanks. He was, in fact, not planning to bring disgrace to the Lan Sect; that was what the second set of robes in his bag were for. But he knows that if Lan-zongzhu knew what he planned to do, even his indulgent expression would twist in shock and anger.
He cares a little about that. He cares more about what Hanguang-jun would think.
He goes about his business anyway.
It's easy to find a secluded place to change robes, to neatly fold his forehead ribbon and tuck it away in his pouch. He lingers on it for a moment; asking himself one more time if he's going too far. The answer, he decides at last, is still no. He might be bending a few rules until they break, but he's been redoubling his efforts to prove an exemplary member of the Lan Sect otherwise.
Surely that made up for his one indiscretion, the one appetite he has to indulge before it can be controlled.
Thus disguised, he passes easily through town. Finds the inn that they'd agreed on, and tells the owner who he's looking for. Not giving his own name, and it's not asked. One of the serving boys takes a minute away from the tables to mount the steps, to point out the room he's to enter on the second floor; but before they've reached the top, guqin music ripples faintly through the air. Sizhui's heart jumps, and his stomach tightens in anticipation.
"I can find my way from here," he tells the boy—scarcely younger than him, and eyeing him dubiously. "Thank you."
If he has opinions, he keeps them to himself. Just descends the steps again, flicking his cloth over his shoulder, as Sizhui turns toward the row of doors. Allows himself to be drawn, like a moth to flame, by the familiar music.
It's one that Hanguang-jun plays every now and then, a wistful and dreamy piece; deceptively simple, complex beneath the surface in a way that trips up beginners. Lan Sizhui listens, for a moment, before knocking on the door.
The music doesn't stop; a man's cool voice merely says, "Enter."
Lan Sizhui closes his eyes for a moment. Thinks of Hanguang-jun in his room, at his instrument. Permits himself the fantasy, lets the coolness of a Gusu night settle over his mind, washing away the bleakly sunny Qinghe afternoon.
Opens the door, comes inside. Closes it and bows.
The man in white, within, lifts his hands from his guqin.
"You're late," Su Minshan says.
Lan Sizhui says, "My apologies."
They hadn't agreed on a time. He wonders, for a giddy moment, if this means he'll be punished.
This is how it began.
Lan Sizhui is thoughtful, conscientious. These are things that those who approved of him have observed; Hanguang-jun in his brief manner, each word carrying the weight of poetry. Lan Xichen smiling a little less distantly than usual as Lan Sizhui finished recounting the method he would approach a commoner woman's complaint with. One of the elders giving him a rare nod. You're not so hotheaded as most boys your age.
There is nothing careful about what he wants, but he approaches it with care nonetheless.
Lan Wangji could not know. Lan Sizhui will not dirty the fragile thing they have, the intimacies that he is permitted—to brew tea, some evenings, to listen to the irregular music spilling from Lan Wangji's guqin as he composes. To urge him respectfully to rest more, carry messages for him.
Almost like a real son.
It's safest, he decides at last, to leave out the Lan Sect altogether. Lan Sizhui is not wholly disliked, but aside from Jingyi his actual friends were few, and Jingyi was... well, absolutely out of the question. And a teacher, an elder Lan? There were always whispers that some of them bent the rules, had their own appetites, of course. But the whispers weren't particularly detailed, and choosing wrong would be beyond disastrous. Lan Sizhui would be lucky if his only punishment was the discipline whip.
So; he'd found the location of this place from a man involved in a case the juniors had handled, a relatively routine haunting. The young man had witnessed the ghost a few times. They'd needed to question him, but he'd done something to upset Jingyi (who doesn't say what it was, but the anger furrowed in his brow and the disgusted pinch of his mouth speak loud enough) so Sizhui had stepped up to the task.
Thrown in a few questions of his own.
The young man, one Zhao Xiang, had been very helpful, even if he'd stalled for a minute; grinning. "I'll tell you," he says. "But the, ah, information you're looking for... sure I can't help you with it, Lan-gongzi?"
Lan Sizhui hesitates, considers. Zhao Xiang is a handsome man, with laughing eyes. But he's too... Lan Sizhui struggles with the right word. Too bright. Too loud. Too young.
The last thought makes him blush, and he bows his head politely to hide it. "I don't think so, but thank you for your offer."
Zhao Xiang chuckles. "You don't need to duck your head. I'm not offended." He leans forward, swats Lan Sizhui on the arm in a painfully familiar manner; points out toward the gate. Gives directions, then leans back against the post, adds with a slight smile, "Watch out, though. A cute little thing like you might learn more than he bargained for, you know?"
For a sharp moment, Lan Sizhui finds himself flooded with something that could be desire or simple nostalgia—a vicious sharpness of focus on the motion of Zhao Xiang's fingers, the lazy turn of his wrist, his half-closed black eyes. It aches. It could be familiarity, or the desire for such things to become familiar.
But it passes. Lan Sizhui nods. "I can take care of myself, but thank you, Zhao-gongzi."
He secures a few hours before he'll be expected back. He settles things with his conscience.
The place looks half wine shop, half cheap inn, and is surprisingly busy for the time of day. When Sizhui enters and is gestured to a table by a slight, overworked-looking waiter, he only gets a brief sidelong glance from the man; looking around, it seems as if some of the crowd are genuinely travelers. Tired-looking men getting down a meal before they return to the road. Others, though... You'll know by the way they look at you, Zhao Xiang had said, as they parted. There were men that were alternating between their tea or wine—usually wine—and glancing around the room, as if casually admiring the sights. The sights being, presumably, the other people, since there were few decorations on the worn walls. Sizhui orders tea, and sneaks glances up from it in turn. Stage fright churning his guts now that he's here.
There's a few older men, but he finds himself indifferent to those with gray in their hair. The ones that look like merchants and clerks. The younger men seem too young, their gazes brash and far too aggressive as they dart them around the room; teeth showing in sharp smiles. Lan Sizhui begins to think that perhaps this is not what he wants, after all; that he will leave here in an hour without having changed, without having touched the pit in his belly.
But between moving bodies, he glimpses a man at the end of the room, and something goes hot and liquid in his chest.
He can't identify why at first. He's only seen the man for a moment; his back is to Lan Sizhui. Aside from the alertness of his posture, he could be one of the tired-out travelers, unaware of the company they moved in. He's wearing dark gray robes, of costly but not gaudy make. When he shifts, it can be glimpsed that there's tea on his table, not wine.
It's his posture, Lan Sizhui realizes, suddenly. His posture is very good. Back straight, head raised elegantly. The turn of his hand as he took up his cup graceful and deliberate. Lan Sizhui's mouth runs dry as the motion crosses the line from resonance to true familiarity. He can accept the coincidence of there being another cultivator, but—surely, he thinks, there can't be another Lan in this place.
But then the man turns his head, following someone's movement, so that the side of his face shows.
Recognition hits Sizhui like a blow to the stomach. Breath temporarily knocked out. He sees, in his mind's eyes, the first conference he'd attended; clumsy and shy in the presence of so many people, in the absence of Hanguang-jun, who refused to attend such things. He sees the elder that had organized the group as Lan Xichen went forward and away to greet Lianfang-zun, look to the side—sees his face knit in distaste.
He'll learn later that it must have been an error, to even let them see each other—the Lan party and this man. Lan-zongzhu will say so to the elder, in an undertone, convey Lianfang-zun's apology for him. But at that moment, they do all see him.
He stands tall and straight, wrist tucked against the small of his back; Lan posture. White robes, whatever embroidery or detail they might boast invisible from this distance, making them look nearly plain; like a disciple or a wandering ascetic. His head is inclined, slightly, to listen to the Chief Cultivator's conversation with Lan-zongzhu. Lan Sizhui could only see the edge of his face, the sharp line of his nose, the arc of a fine eyebrow. His bare forehead.
It's uncanny. The familiarity that speaks to his gut broken by sudden differences, like a note played deliberately wrong in a tune. A teacher's demonstration of error.
Jingyi had said, too loudly, Who is that?
And the elder hadn't reminded him to be quiet; had simply said in return, Su She. He used to be an outer disciple of the Lan.
The information hadn't been much, but the tone had told them all they needed to know.
Su She had looked in their direction. His face had been quiet for a moment, indifferent. But then he'd really seen them; storm clouds had gathered, and he'd looked away, mouth curving sharply in displeasure. Lan Sizhui had felt sick in the weight that gathered in the air, the palpable hatred that had passed between the elder and this man. Used to be an outer disciple. Part of, but not really part of, the Lan.
Sizhui had once had a name that wasn't Lan. That was the first moment he could remember feeling it weighing on him, like something clinging to his back.
And now Su She—no, Su Minshan was his proper name, Lan Sizhui had learned that some time later—was here, in the place where men like Zhao Xiang gathered, in the same place Lan Sizhui had come.
Lan Sizhui's heart shudders, throbs unwisely. Overeager. He can feel the pulse sinking lower, and tries to push it away, but the damage is more than done. Why was Su Minshan here, so close to Gusu, he tries asking himself, and can't focus on finding the answer; only on the fact that he was here, now, and he didn't seem to just be a traveler.
And he's surely about Hanguang-jun's age, old enough. He has the obvious strength of a cultivator, and the way he moves—everything—Lan Sizhui is usually so thoughtful, but currently all he can think of is this; Su Minshan's mouth will taste of tea, not cheap wine.
He leaves payment on the table, and gets up from his seat. It would be easy to lie to himself and tell himself that he's leaving until he's halfway across the room, but he doesn't. He comes to the side of Su Minshan's table and bows.
Su Minshan double-takes upon seeing him, sharp eyes skimming over his white robes, catching on his forehead ribbon. Before Lan Sizhui can speak, he says, "You—" then stops. He looks him over one more time. Glances at the room around them. Asks, "Do you know where you are?"
"I do," Lan Sizhui says. There is still time, he thinks, to turn back. Acknowledging that fact only makes it surer that he won't. "May I sit?"
He doesn't sit, in the end. They go upstairs. Separated times. Lan Sizhui mounting the steps first, lingering uncertainly in the hallway; time stretching almost long enough for him to regret his decision before Su Minshan appears.
Su Minshan turns and looks him up and down, hand on a door. "I'm going in," he says, with a tone of finality to it. Lan Sizhui can, with some trouble, read the subtext. So are you coming in? Are you really going to do this?
Lan Sizhui is more uncomfortable with standing in the hall than anything else; he nods in firm acknowledgement. Su Minshan hesitates for a moment more, then, with a shake of his head, leads the way.
"How old are you?" he'd asked, downstairs, thin brows drawn together.
"Old enough," Lan Sizhui had said. "I have my courtesy name."
Su Minshan had given him a similar look of confusion. But he'd continued forward, as he did now. Lighting the lamp, crossing behind Lan Sizhui to lock the door. Lan Sizhui watched his motions, heart beating in his throat. Hands beginning to sweat. It occurs to him that he should set some expectations.
"I only have an hour or so," he says. "And I can't have any." He falters for a moment. "There can't be any signs. Of this."
"No marks," Su Minshan says, with a bored tinge to his voice. Like that's a commonplace request. "Anything else?"
Lan Sizhui struggles for a moment, mouth half-open. Su Minshan asks, "Do you not know?" His voice half mocking, half gentle. He comes to a halt in front of Lan Sizhui, eyeing him. He looks all wrong in dark gray, Lan Sizhui thinks distractedly. He wonders how Su Minshan can stand to wear it.
"You sought me out," Su Minshan says speculatively, "not another boy your age, so... you want me to show you what to do, perhaps?" He leans forward a little. "Is this the first time?"
Lan Sizhui hesitates. "Yes."
Su Minshan's eyes spark with pleasure. "I see. And do you have any idea of what you want?"
Yes, says the gaping pit in Lan Sizhui's stomach. Yes, yes. It has lots of ideas. It whispers them, groans them. Lan Sizhui's face heats, and he shakes his head. He's worried, suddenly, that indecisiveness might count against him, but Su Minshan only nods.
"All right," he says, and then brisk, businesslike: "I don't undress, and you don't touch me without being told. Understood?"
Lan Sizhui blinks. "You don't... undress?"
Su Minshan says, his tone casually arrogant, "I won't need to. Do you object?"
Maybe he should be offended, offput. He's not. He tries not to examine why. "No," he says. He wonders if he should have any rules. He definitely doesn't mind the idea of undressing, though, even if it makes him shiver. "It's fine."
To not touch without being told—that's fine, too. In all honesty, he wouldn't know what to do with his hands.
"Well, then." Su Minshan stands in the window's light for a moment, the meager sunlight blocked by his body as he affixes a talisman to the window. Gilding the broad frame of his shoulders, the tightly pulled line of his waist. For a moment, he's nothing but the long spill of black hair and his elegant posture in the light's simplification. Sizhui's chest tightens.
Su Minshan turns away from the window. Studies him with unreadable eyes.
"Well," he says. "Are you going to sit down?"
Lan Sizhui looks around, and Su Minshan clarifies, "On the bed."
He'd sort of expected to be ordered to take his robes off first. He sits on the bed, plucking at his robes to arrange them around his legs, aware that the motion is fastidious—awkward. Unable to do anything about it.
Su Minshan steps closer. "Have you ever even kissed someone?" he asks.
Lan Sizhui hesitates, then decides to be honest and shakes his head.
Su Minshan reaches up to his hair. Apparently his rule about not undressing doesn't apply to his hair ornaments; he removes his guan, carefully lays it aside. "Touched yourself?"
His tone is so casual, Lan Sizhui's cheeks are hot before his ears realize what they've captured. "That—is against the rules."
"So?" Su Minshan combs his fingers through his hair, loosening it. "You haven't said no."
Lan Sizhui hesitates a moment longer. Looks at his knees, at Su Minshan's shadow lying across them. "I don't," he says at last, "think that I've broken the rules."
Su Minshan's voice grows a little less indifferent; curiosity creeping in. "Does that mean that you have done something?" Before Lan Sizhui can respond, his shadow straightens. He comes closer so quickly that Sizhui looks up to him already standing over him, arms loosely folded across his chest. "Show me."
Lan Sizhui hesitates, hands twisted in his robes. Su Minshan tilts his head to the side. "Are you going to get shy now?"
"Please give me a minute, I'm not used to this," Lan Sizhui says in a burst.
He half expects a laugh, but surprisingly Su Minshan says—after a pause—"All right." He sounds less cutting. "Show me when you're ready, then."
Show me. Show me how you've bent the rules. Show me, Sizhui.
Lan Sizhui squeezes his eyes tight shut in embarrassment. Nothing has really happened, he's just sitting on a bed with his robes still on—the bright sunlight sluicing through the window to his right. Just sitting under someone's eyes, under their quiet but insistent presence. And he's getting hard. Thinking about what he's supposed to do doesn't help. Defeated, at last, just wanting to get it over with, he darts his hand up to his mouth.
When he pushes two fingers into his own mouth, Su Minshan makes a sound—a soft exhale. It makes Lan Sizhui's cock harden even more. Even with his eyes closed, he can't ignore that he's being watched. Showing the man that stands over him exactly how he'd touched himself. He pushes the fingers into his mouth until they almost hit the back, and—face coloring as he keeps his word, and shows exactly what he'd done—sucks.
He pumps them in and out a few times, slow. Painfully aware of how much spit is spilling over, wetting his lips. The slick soft noises it makes. How his cock twitches as he nips at the tips of his own fingers. His head is getting foggy, thoughts slow and warped with arousal.
In response there's silence. Ragged silence, like it could be torn apart at any moment. Lan Sizhui pulls his hand away from his mouth, wipes it quickly on his robes. Says, voice thin, "That's. That's what I did."
Still silence. Then, finally, a rough exhale. A voice asking quietly, "Was that all?"
He hesitates, but he can't lie. Doesn't want to lie. He shakes his head.
"Show me."
His face feels hot as a boiling kettle. He doesn't look up; just shifts. "I'll have to lie down."
"So lie down."
He swallows, obeys. Lowers himself down on his front, and bites his lip to suppress a moan as his aching cock presses against the firmness of the bed. There's a comprehending click of the tongue from behind him, and Lan Sizhui begins to push himself up again, thinking that the demonstration was done.
Instead, a hand presses down heavily on the small of his back, urging him down to the bed. "Not yet. Show me."
It's like the touch flattens his thoughts as well, crushes them inside his head. The yawning pit in his stomach rules, and all it cares about is being filled. Sizhui chews on his lip and rocks his hips against the bed, shows how he would make little thrusts every now and then, small enough they could be disguised as restless stirring under a blanket. His cock aches and throbs in his robes. and he thinks dizzily that he might come from this. The demonstration of his error, and the hand still resting on his back—the eyes resting on him, the weight of observation. Judgement.
Lan Sizhui presses his forehead to the thin blanket, shivering. The bed dips beside him; the hand on the small of his back strokes slowly up his spine, and down again.
Lan Sizhui whimpers, without meaning to, says, "Ha—"
He bites it off there. It's barely a syllable. Could be mistaken for a breath, an exclamation. But the hand on his back stills, and the hazy glow of his mind falters.
"What," Su Minshan says, voice low and chilly, "were you about to say?"
He lifts his hands, and Lan Sizhui hastily scrambles to turn over. Blink the blur from his eyes. Su Minshan is looking at him with narrowed eyes, and Lan Jingyi's voice suddenly flashes across Lan Sizhui's mind— I hear he goes mad if anyone compares him to Hanguang-jun. It's true!
Lan Sizhui swallows.
"No," Su Minshan continues, after a second. "I know what you were going to say." Lan Sizhui's brief, guilty silence seems to have decided him. But though he looks quietly furious, he's still keeping his voice low. He hasn't risen from the bed yet. "So explain to me why you wanted to call... Hanguang-jun's name, just then."
"I," Lan Sizhui says weakly. He struggles with lying, even though it's not really forbidden outside of Cloud Recesses; so instead of saying I wasn't he said, "If you're thinking something terrible, I've never done this with him. He's—he's like a father to me."
Su Minshan's eyebrows rise, and Lan Sizhui feels his face getting hotter.
"I wasn't really thinking—" he tries saying, and breaks off. It's very hard to think, with his cock still throbbing from the stimulation of minutes ago, still sprawled on his elbows on a bed while Su Minshan sits by him. "I don't think you and him are alike. I only..."
"Hm." Su Minshan says. His face was a little less cold, now—although, Lan Sizhui thought guiltily, he was hardly thinking of any complimentary reason that he and Lan Wangji were unalike—but it's still distant. "Only what?"
Lan Sizhui hesitates, torn, and finally reaches for the truth. It can hardly make things worse. "You move like a Lan, still," he blurts. "I came here to find someone, and I wasn't interested in anybody, and then I saw you, and... I don't know. I don't know why I want that, I just do." He draws a ragged breath. "Do you want me to leave?" His voice only cracks slightly.
Neither of them move. For a minute more Su Minshan looks at him, then his expression changing. To a kind of wry, almost mocking sympathy.
"Do you call him something else, when you're alone?" he says. When Lan Sizhui blinks, confused, he elaborates, "You said he is like a father to you. Does he let you call him a-die behind closed doors?"
Lan Sizhui's stomach tightens oddly, pleasurably, at the thought.
"No," he says, slowly. Unsure of where this is going. "I... I've never asked for that."
"Well." Su Minshan studies him with that odd look for a moment more; then the bitter curve of a smile. "You can call it out now, if you want to."
Then, as Lan Sizhui stares, Su Minshan reaches down to cover his cock with his hand. Presses down in a hard, slow grind, almost painful. The wry look drops from his face, leaving it calm and intent.
Lan Sizhui whimpers involuntarily, clutching back at the bed, and Su Minshan says, "How are you fit to be a Lan, if you can't control these desires?"
His voice is different. The tone, the cadence.
Lan Sizhui's cock kicks. He can't speak for a minute; just blink, shocked stupid by the force of it. Su Minshan rubs his cock again, the same slow hard fondle that makes it ache and sting. "Sizhui," he says, voice cool and tranquil, "this is shameful."
Oh, Lan Sizhui thinks. Oh. One of his hands falters forward, twists into Su Minshan's white robes. His mouth falls open, wet and wanting. Su Minshan's hand moves again, slow and firm, and Sizhui bucks up into it, whispers, "A-die—"
Su Minshan's fine eyebrows arch. "You want to call me that?" His tone is still cold and musical. "Do you deserve it though, Sizhui? Why should I lay claim to such a shameless son?"
"I'm sorry," Lan Sizhui gets out. "I've tried to be good, I follow the rules—"
Su Minshan blinks, narrows his eyes very slightly. It's—it's actually a shockingly good approximation of Lan Wangji's quiet down face, the last warning you get before Silence. It shuts Lan Sizhui up out of surprise more than anything, but it does the job. "Followed the rules?" he repeats, his tone unimpressed. "Likely."
Lan Sizhui wants to protest, but he hasn't been told he can speak. He bites his lip and waits, trying to ignore the weight of Su Minshan's hand still resting over his aching cock.
"Do not be promiscuous," Su Minshan says. He squeezes, suddenly, hard enough to hurt, and Lan Sizhui cries out. "Showing such lust under my hand, it's hard to imagine you haven't..."
"I haven't," Lan Sizhui pleads, tears of both pain and frustration beading in his eyes. "I swear."
"No? Are you a filial son, then, saving yourself for your father's use?"
Su Minshan's tone is faintly mocking, breaking the spell a little, but the words still hit hard, sink in deep. Lan Sizhui tucks his head to the side, squeezing his eyes shut, and nods. Gasps, when Su Minshan fondles him again, soft and slow, pleasure blossoming over pain in an intoxicating confusion.
"I see." His voice is almost gentle now. "You can't help it."
Lan Sizhui nods again, tightly, a sob rattling trapped inside of his throat.
"Perhaps I was too harsh," Su Minshan says. "You were right to come to me. It would have been disastrous if you'd gone to someone else. Another classmate or teacher. Imagine what they would have thought..."
Lan Sizhui swallows hard, protests, "I wouldn't—"
"Don't interrupt," hard, and then, gentle; "Imagine how disappointed I would have been."
His stomach twists, caught between dread and hunger.
Su Minshan continues, tone speculative, as his hand smooths along the line of Lan Sizhui's cock. "I would have been forced to discipline you."
One of the elders had said once, his tone wistful, that Lan Wangji had used to be much harsher where punishment was concerned. Lan Wangji was, now, almost shockingly lenient compared to some of their teachers. Handstands, lines, reprimands, that sort of thing. Lan Sizhui can't think of any time he's sent one of them to the Ancestral Hall; and it's ludicrous to imagine him raising a hand to them himself.
But.
It's foolish. It's somehow more shameful to admit than even the desire that had filled his mouth when he had seen Hanguang-jun half-dressed by accident late one night, but he wants it. He wants that rough, immediate intimacy, the blow of a father against a disobedient son. A pain to be seen through, to prove that he was worthy by enduring.
You didn't beat things that didn't belong to you.
He whispers, through his dry mouth, "If H—if a-die wishes to punish me, still, for failing to control myself, I am prepared to accept it."
There's a triumphant glimmer in Su Minshan's eyes when Lan Sizhui glances up for a moment, as if he'd been proved right about something. It vanishes the next moment though, as he inclines his head to the side. "A good attitude to have," he murmurs, "but Sizhui, I wonder if you honestly crave punishment, or if you simply want my hand on you."
Lan Sizhui shakes his head. In all honesty, he hadn't connected the two things; of course it had been a strange mix of hurt and pleasure when Su Minshan squeezed his cock, but he didn't think that he'd get any pleasure from an actual blow. "I want, I want to be punished. For disappointing you already. For breaking the rules. That's all."
Su Minshan studies him for a moment more, then the corner of his mouth twitches in a smile. "Very well," he says. "Your core is young, but strong. I think you can take twelve strikes."
Lan Sizhui nods his head. "Whatever you think is right." The number even seems a little low, but he doesn't want to argue.
It's good that he didn't.
Su Minshan hits hard. It's only his hand, but by the ninth Lan Sizhui's breath is sobbing in his throat and his ass aches like his legs used to after training, throbbing and steady. His cock is part of the pulse as well; though it had flagged a little during the first few strikes, but as the pain had spread and grown it had, paradoxically, hardened again. Being in position to rub against Su Minshan's thigh, sprawled over his lap, didn't help.
Being spanked like a child should be humiliating, ridiculous, but—
Su Minshan's hand smooths over the place he'd just struck. Another paradox; he'd grown kinder as he caused Lan Sizhui more pain. "Nine," he says. He'd even stopped making Lan Sizhui count after the first few. "Nearly there, Sizhui. You're doing well."
Lan Sizhui makes a wounded noise, biting his knuckles.
He can feel Su Minshan's cock now, too, pressing into his side through their robes. It feels big. In the yellow book Lan Sizhui had been tricked into looking at once, by a visiting disciple, the wide-eyed maiden had been saying something about so big, you're going to break me on your cock. Lan Sizhui had been disgusted and alarmed, at the time. Now, the words come back to him with a kind of clarity. The sort of sense that strange things make in dreams.
Ten hits without warning, making Sizhui yelp; it comes out a whimper around the knuckle he's still biting on. He squirms a little, afterward, with the pain, and thinks that he can feel Su Minshan's cock pushing even more insistently against his side. In the wild dreamy place the beating has sent him to, he wants to see it. Touch it. Taste it. Take it inside his body, like a key in a lock, a sword in a sheathe. Break on it. But he can't, doesn't even ask for it, because there are two blows left, and Lan Sizhui is a dutiful boy.
"Ten," Su Minshan says. His voice is a little more his own, for a moment, sharp and amused. "Do you think you can make it to twelve without coming in your robes?"
Before Lan Sizhui can figure out if he can answer, Su Minshan continues, almost as if he's talking to himself. "You take to it so well. I wasn't expecting that." His voice cools again, regains its musical cadence. "But you really are obedient, Sizhui."
He is. Hanguang-jun has not praised that in him, but others have. Zewu-jun. Lan Qiren. Thoughts of white robes, of hands resting in momentary approving touch on his shoulders, muddy together with the ache in his ass and the almost unbearable hardness of his cock. He pants for breath.
When Su Minshan hits him again, stinging and deliberate across the base of his ass, Lan Sizhui jerks his hips involuntarily against Su Minshan's thigh. Something blooms in him, white-hot and shuddering, and he moans aloud, involuntarily. Feels a hand settle on his ass, pressing softly, urging him to push his hips forward a little more. Draw out the pulsing of pleasure. He feels, with a distant shock of confusion, something wet and hot staining his trousers and inner robe, soaking down his thigh.
The hand on his ass slides down, dips between his parted thighs; draws a finger over the wet spot, as if confirming it. Lan Sizhui shudders. Despite the ebbing pleasure making the pain stand out in violent contrast, he wants the next blow like a breath of air. He presses his thighs together, lifting his ass just a little. He forces his voice out, shaking. "E-eleven."
There's a long pause. Then the last blow comes down, quick and shocking, and Lan Sizhui gasps with it, his whole body shivering. The hand settles on his ass again, rubbing gently.
"Good boy," the voice above him says, in its Lan accent. "Very good."
Lan Sizhui's cock had ached weakly, one last time. With his face buried in the blanket, he felt strangely transported, blissful; he felt like he was about to cry. He didn't want to move.
And, surprisingly, Su Minshan didn't try to move him. His cock was still hard, pressing obviously into Lan Sizhui's side, but for the moment he just let Lan Sizhui lie slumped across his lap, his trembles slowly ebbing, and strokes gently at his ass, his back, the untidy spill of his hair. Like he's aimlessly caressing a pet.
After what felt like a long while, he quietly observed, "You should start cleaning up if you don't want to be missed."
Lan Sizhui manages to get up on his elbows, blink the crusty feeling from his eyes. "Ah..." The sun is at a different angle, through the window. How long had he drifted? Embarrassed, he said, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to..." He pauses, uncertain of what he'd even done.
"No need," Su Minshan said, tone casual. He helped Lan Sizhui sit up, got up to retrieve a cloth from the washing basin nearby and extended it to him. As Lan Sizhui took it, he'd added, "But if you come find me again, I'll teach you how to do something other than just lying there."
Neither of them acknowledged what Lan Sizhui had called him, what they both knew. Lan Sizhui had wiped his face, first, and said honestly, "I was only meaning to do this once."
Su Minshan had scoffed quietly. "Of course."
He hadn't said that it would happen again. He didn't need to.
They both knew that as well.
By now, Lan Sizhui has learned a great deal more, including the detail that not undressing doesn't mean that some things can't be bared. Like now; Su Minshan's robes parted and his pants pulled down just enough to expose his cock as Lan Sizhui rides it, hands braced on his shoulders. Su Minshan's hands rest on his waist. Caging and supporting. Lan Sizhui has always been small for his age, and something goes a little more fuzzy in his brain when he sees how large Su Minshan's hands look, clasped around his waist. He whimpers, closing his eyes for a moment as he sinks down. He's more accustomed to this part now, his body accepting its new use with grudging compliance, but taking Su Minshan's cock in to the base is still stuffing, overwhelming, makes him feel his fullness in his spine and the roof of his mouth.
He's seen the soft line of Lan Wangji's cock through his inner robes, just a time or two. That had looked big, too. And now that he'd had this, his fantasies have become unfortunately vivid—where before he'd only felt violent, aimless hunger, yearning after something it barely understood, now he sits pouring Lan Wangji tea and thinks about crawling into his lap to kiss him, spreading his legs so that Lan Wangji can pull back his robes and sink into Lan Sizhui's eager, waiting body. He lies in bed at night and fights not to touch himself and thinks about sleeping in Lan Wangji's room instead, in another bed or his bed or a mat on the floor—it didn't matter. Just so if Lan Wangji wanted him, Lan Sizhui would be there.
The grip on his waist tightens and Su Minshan says, noncommittally, "You've had your eyes closed for a minute now. What are you thinking about, Sizhui?"
Lan Sizhui's eyes snap open and his cheeks flush even darker. "I—" He breaks off with a gasp as Su Minshan takes over the motion, pulling him down on his cock and then urging him up again. " Ah, nothing really..."
"Nothing really... distracted you?" There's a hint of warning in the tone. When Lan Sizhui had come back to him, the first time, Su Minshan had said , One more condition. When we're together like this, if I ask a question you answer as truthfully as if you were still in Cloud Recesses. Understood?
Lan Sizhui swallows hard, and admits, "I was thinking about being in... in someone's room."
"Sounds a little boring by itself," Su Minshan says dryly, and Lan Sizhui can't help but give him an indignant look.
"Of course that wasn't all. Someone's room, at... at night, so if they woke up and needed anything I'd be there. I, ah." Lan Sizhui loses his breath for a moment as Su Minshan pulls him down, slow and firm, then gets it again. "Sometimes when I wake up, I'm hard, so... if someone..."
"Your father," Su Minshan says quietly. It's clear he knows what Lan Sizhui is talking about.
Lan Sizhui nods quickly. "If a-die woke up, he could just... use me to relieve it." He turns even brighter red at the thought that follows, and squeezes his eyes closed, but it slips out. "I don't even have to be awake."
Su Minshan exhales harshly, and his cock throbs inside Lan Sizhui. "I don't think we have time for you to take a nap," he mutters, "or I'd gladly make that a reality."
Lan Sizhui had been expecting either a considering hum, or the sharp half-laughing noise Su Minshan made sometimes when the conversation cut a little explicitly closer to Lan Sizhui's shameful desire for Lan Wangji—sometimes Lan Sizhui suspects that half of what he gets out of this is the amusement of Hanguang-jun's ward desiring so immodestly. He blinks down at Su Minshan in shock, and is startled into a yelp as he's pulled down once again on his cock, the stroke rougher than before. "Diedie—" he gasps. His brain spins, frantically. He's good at making plans, quick; one takes shape even as his restraint tries and fails to catch up. "I could go somewhere first, a little early—I'll probably have another chance to get away—and I'm good at falling asleep quickly, I could be asleep by the time you got there—"
Su Minshan's eyes light up at the idea, but before he can respond, there's a muffled noise nearby. People talking. The two of them look in unison at the wall it had come from; a room that Lan Sizhui was sure had been empty earlier.
After a moment, Su Minshan says, "I guess some travelers must have needed a room unexpectedly."
His grip tightens on Lan Sizhui's hips, and he adds, with a glitter in his eye, "Let's hope the owner didn't tell them they had a room next to an estranged father and son meeting again, hm?"
Lan Sizhui flushes hard. "I didn't tell him—wait, did you tell him that?"
Su Minshan shrugs. "We needed some cover story, and I'd gotten tired of implying I was meeting a spy."
While Lan Sizhui is still fumbling for words, Su Minshan spreads a hand behind his back and tips them over, putting Lan Sizhui on the floor beneath him. He puts his elbows on either side of Lan Sizhui's shoulders and smiles down at him, faintly. It's an oddly playful expression on his usually cold and angry face.
"Let's hope," he says, "they're not Great Sect cultivators. Anyone who has cause to remember your voice."
Lan Sizhui, sprawled beneath him, stares up openmouthed. He should tell him to stop; should leave now before he recklessly endangers himself.
But then, he shouldn't be here in the first place.
Silently, he reaches up and covers his own mouth. Su Minshan's eyes spark. Lan Sizhui pictures, involuntarily, his fellow juniors on the other side of the wall. The ones that liked Sizhui and the ones that tolerated him. The ones that whispered behind their hands about him.
He almost wants to remove his hand, wants to whine and moan and cry out, to imagine everyone growing red-faced, some disgusted and some jealous, as they hear how well he takes his father's cock.
What is wrong with me, Lan Sizhui thought dazedly, muffling the sounds in his palm as Su Minshan began to fuck him. That still made noise—short, hard strokes, the slap of skin on skin only muffled a little by the cloth of Su Minshan's robes. But it's quiet enough that it might be drowned out by the voices through the wall. Lan Sizhui wants to be picked up and fucked against that wall. What is wrong with me?
For the moment, he has no answer. So he just hikes his trembling legs higher on Su Minshan's hips, bites the meat of his palm, and closes his eyes.
Tries not to think of Lan Wangji bending him over before the shocked, envious eyes of a hundred white-robed cultivators.
Tries not to think about mediating to fall asleep in an inn room, and waking up already half-opened on Su Minshan's cock.
Later, when he'd delivered Nie-zongzhu's multi-page reply—which Lan Sizhui somewhat suspects has no real information in it—Lan Xichen asked, without looking up, "Did you enjoy having some time to yourself?"
Lan Sizhui manages to get out a response without too much hesitation. "Very much, zongzhu. Thank you." He makes his tone a little shy, a little secretive. Lets Lan Xichen assume what he will—whatever doesn’t involve a man that, Lan Sizhui is sure, he is as disdainful of as any member of the Lan sect is.
It's not really lying. It still leaves a bad taste in his mouth, but it's not breaking a rule. Just like he checked, discreetly, and most people would be challenged to call seeing one man every few months, never so much as touching yourself in the interim, truly promiscuous. Just like he tries not to envy when Hanguang-jun nods at someone else's suggestion, or feel angry when another elder blames him for anything that went wrong on the latest training hunt.
He almost wants to touch his ribbon to reassure himself, but he won't do anything so obvious. Just bows his head. "I'll be glad to carry a reply message, if necessary. For now, I'm going to head for the sleeping quarters—I heard the bell a moment ago."
Lan Xichen nods, says, "You're very conscientious about the rules, Sizhui." He sounds a little sad, for some reason, but mostly approving. Good is implied, but not said aloud.
Lan Sizhui envisions, briefly and vividly, going to his knees and offering his mouth for Zewu-jun's use. Trying to wring another scrap of praise from his lips. He blinks it away, and says, evenly enough. "Good night, Lan-zongzhu."
He does touch his ribbon, as he leaves. He can feel it all the time, but sometimes it's hard to believe it's there.
But it's there. It's fine.
He has this under control.