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Lan Wangji knows he is terrible with feelings, and with expressing them. He knows that he is deficient, knows that his words will only ever succeed in pushing Wei Ying away. He knows that he will never be able to make Wei Ying understand, that every attempt to communicate his caring has and always will fail.
It leaves him feeling sick and wretched, disgust and self-hatred unquelled by the knowledge that he should not feel them.
His words are deficient, and his actions can only display so much—so when a spirit gets lucky on a night hunt, branding him with a curse mark that displays his feelings to those around him, when he should lock himself away in the Jingshi until it fades, should not allow his emotions to be imposed onto others, he finds himself instead thinking of Yiling.
The curse seems to work on emotional proximity as well as the physical, random passersby nigh-unaffected while his juniors report feeling foreign wisps of fondness and protectiveness. “It feels safe,” one of them confides shyly when he asks after it.
Given the exhaustion Lan Wangji feels pulling on him, the heartache that lingers from Wei Ying’s latest rejection, it seems the juniors can only feel the emotions pertaining to them. Good. This is not their burden to bear.
Lan Wangji sends them home in the morning, knows he should follow, and sets off for Yiling.
He does not need Wei Ying to reciprocate. That has never been what he needs. He cannot stand to see Wei Ying destroy and isolate himself, cannot stand to know Wei Ying thinks Lan Wangji would lock him up, would condemn him.
Wei Ying does not understand. Maybe now, with Lan Wangji’s emotions bleeding from him, he can be made to. It is a good thing, this allowance. Wei Ying will finally know. He will know before it is too late. How Lan Wangji cares for him, how Lan Wangji cannot condemn him. How Lan Wangji’s devotion to him runs stronger than anything else he has ever known.
The closer he gets to Yiling, the sicker he feels. Wei Ying will know soon. For better, or for worse.
Maybe in the aftermath, he will allow Lan Wangji to remain by his side. Will allow him to help, in some way, to devote himself as he so longs to—even if Wei Ying is disgusted by that devotion, surely he will see its versatility.
(Surely he will let Lan Wangji have that, at least.)
Wei Wuxian is teasing A-Yuan, cheerfully scrubbing dirt in the boy’s hair, when it hits.
It feels like a wave, like being capsized, going under so quickly it’s impossible to know which way is up.
It takes him a moment to reorient, to come back to himself enough to hear little A-Yuan’s worried “Xian-gege?”
“Ah,” Wei Wuxian says, and he still feels like he’s underwater, “why don’t you go play with fourth uncle for a bit?”
A-Yuan is reluctant, but he scurries off after a moment of Wei Wuxian not indulging him.
With his little distraction gone, Wei Wuxian is allowed to cope with the enormity of it, to disentangle himself from the wave of feeling enough to recognize it, to recognize the ropes of the tangled web which so easily ensnared his mind. He feels sick, unsteady. The longing alone is nigh-unbearable, accompanied by grief and regret and exhaustion and pain, tied together with an undercurrent that make his heart ache and his head spin.
He grasps at his chest, at the hollowness in his lungs and the renewed heaviness of his heart, wishing he could pull it out and examine it.
What the fuck is going on?
It takes him some time to steady himself, to dampen the foreign emotions so he feels truly in control again, and when he finally looks up, he finds Wen Qing watching him with concern.
“Ah! Wen Qing, I didn’t see you there. I was just… uh….”
Wen Qing apparently has some kindness in her heart after all, for she mercifully cuts off what is sure to be a pitiful excuse. “Hanguang-jun is here. He says he wants to speak with you.”
Lan Zhan . This time, the renewed pang of longing and regret is his own. We never did get to be friends. Wei Wuxian will never regret cultivating the demonic path, cannot regret doing what he had to nor the discoveries he has made. He regrets, with a fierce sort of longing, that he made Lan Zhan hate him so. He wishes the world were kinder, so that their methods needn’t be so frightfully opposed. So Lan Zhan shouldn’t feel the need to keep coming here only to insist on locking Wei Wuxian up.
Wei Wuxian would usually delight in his visit nonetheless, indulge himself in forcing Lan Zhan into a farce of friendship before Lan Zhan makes his demands, but today, with his confused emotional state and the whirlpool of longing and regret threatening just beneath the surface—“Now’s not really a good time. Tell him maybe next time.”
“I have,” Wen Qing gripes, “He won’t leave, no matter how he’s told to. He just keeps insisting to speak to you.”
Wei Wuxian frowns. That doesn’t sound like Lan Zhan. Sure, he’s stubborn, but to do something so blatantly rude as to outright refuse to leave when told to? Wei Wuxian’s sure there’s a Lan precept somewhere which forbids that. Something must be genuinely wrong.
Wei Wuxian hops to his feet, pushing past Wen Qing and ignoring the annoyance in her voice as she tells him which part of the border Lan Zhan’s waiting at.
The sight of Lan Zhan standing amidst the Burial Grounds’ filth is as discordant, as unsettling as it was the last time. It makes Wei Wuxian feel guilt despite not being the one who brought him here.
The foreign feelings swirling inside Wei Wuxian have been growing stronger as he nears Lan Zhan, and when he calls out and Lan Zhan’s head snaps to him, they explode out of his control and he stumbles. Fuck .
“Wei Ying!” Lan Zhan’s voice is sharp, as much a reprimand as ever. Wei Wuxian is hit with a wave of worry alongside it, strong enough to bowl him over.
He shudders. What the…?
Lan Zhan makes a small, comprehending sound.
“What’s that sound for?”
Lan Zhan turns his head to the side, face impassive as ever though he won’t look at Wei Wuxian, “I’ve been cursed.” He says it so bluntly, so without preamble, that it takes a moment for the words to register in Wei Wuxian’s mind.
“ Hah? What do you mean, you’ve been cursed?” Wei Wuxian grabs Lan Zhan’s wrist, ignoring the strange punch of longing the action sends through him, and makes to drag Lan Zhan up into the Burial Mounds. “C’mon, Wen Qing’s a doctor, we’ve gotta fix whatever’s—”
“Wei Ying.” Lan Zhan stands fast, not allowing Wei Ying to pull him along, not even allowing Wei Ying the indulgence of caring for him. “I am fine.”
“You just said you were cursed!”
“Mn.”
“So you’re not fine.” The foreign emotions have been overwhelmed by a fondness that makes Wei Ying ache. He ignores it in favor of this ridiculous argument, the bubbling in his chest entirely his own as he gets to pretend everything’s okay for a moment. Gets to pretend Lan Zhan’s come here for help, not because he wants to lock Wei Ying up. As he gets to pretend he’s someone Lan Zhan would trust with this.
“It is not a harmful curse.” Lan Zhan seems to deliberate something for a moment. “It… allows others to feel my emotions.”
Wei Wuxian’s eyes practically bulge out of their sockets as he chokes. “ What !?”
“It allows others to feel my emotions,” Lan Zhan repeats, face impervious as ever even as Wei Wuxian feels a hint of foreign amusement, riddled with underlying nerves.
“Then that—it’s you?” Wei Wuxian feels dizzy with it, with the idea that this intense longing, this maelstrom of deep, complex, conflicting emotion, might be from the ever-impassive Hanging-jun.
“Mn.”
Wei Wuxian squints at him, trying to match up the overpowering emotions, the unchained longing —and who need Lan Zhan long for like this? Surely he could have anyone he wanted; Wei Wuxian cannot think of a reason anyone could refuse the great Hanguang-jun—with Lan Zhan’s impassive face. It doesn’t work.
“You’re messing with me,” Wei Wuxian concludes, even though that’s almost as out-of-character as the emotions. “Is this your revenge for all those times in Cloud Recesses? Ha, ha. Whose emotions are they really?”
Lan Zhan stares blankly at him, but Wei Wuxian can feel the annoyance, the odd twinge of hurt, and for some reason it’s enough to convince him.
“Well damn.”
“Mn.”
As Wei Wuxian watches Lan Zhan, trying to puzzle him out, Lan Zhan’s apparently abundant longing surfaces again, stronger than ever and only growing the longer they’re silent.
“This is like. Excessive, Lan Zhan.”
“Mn?”
“Whoever she is, you really need to just confess at this point.” Wei Wuxian grins, delighted by the chance to slip into old patterns of teasing. “It’s not like you need to worry about being rejected; you’re far too pretty for that.”
Lan Zhan’s emotions react, snapping in like a hunter’s trap, a vice grip over Wei Wuxian’s heart. Heartache and embarrassment and pain and a little bit of lust , all wrapped up in a strange, very out-of-character sort of giddiness . Wei Wuxian must be misidentifying it, because Lan Zhan, and also because Lan Zhan’s expression doesn’t even twitch.
“Wei Ying,” he says, and he at least sounds a little pained. He’s not forthcoming with anything else, though, so—once the foreign emotions have subsided enough Wei Wuxian can properly breathe again—Wei Wuxian decides to forgo waiting for Lan Zhan to get his words together.
“What? Is she dead or something? Is that why you’ve not already wed her?” Wei Wuxian asks it as a joke, a gentle prodding—-surely Lan Zhan’s longing wouldn’t feel so directed if she were—but Wei Wuxian genuinely can’t think of another reason Lan Zhan wouldn’t already have the object of his affections.
Wei Wuxian does stumble, this time, when he’s hit with Lan Zhan’s wave of horror and pain, its undercurrent of desire all the more out of place, like a riptide trying to drag him out to sea. Wow, Wei Wuxian thinks when he’s regained enough of his coherence, Lan Zhan really needs to get his shit together.
It’s not a thought Wei Wuxian ever thought he’d get to have about Lan Zhan, but who knew? Apparently he’s an absolute mess when it comes to the person he loves—and it has to be that, doesn’t it? There’s no way the strength of this emotion could be anything but Lan Zhan being completely head-over-heels in love—and isn’t that a thought? Lan Zhan in love.
Wei Wuxian had been convinced it wasn’t possible, and it makes him horribly curious. Who could possibly be good enough to make Lan Zhan feel like this? Wei Wuxian can only imagine some unbelievably dashing maiden with a heart of gold. The thought makes his heart ache, though he doesn’t know why.
He feels it when Lan Zhan stamps down on his emotions, collecting himself. “Wei Ying,” he says, voice flat though his desperation seizes Wei Wuxian’s heart, “Return to Gusu with me.”
Wei Wuxian burns with hurt. They had something going here, they were having a perfectly good time, and all Lan Zhan can think about is locking Wei Wuxian up. Typical. Does his disgust for Wei Wuxian’s methods really run that deep, that even now all he wants is to—his disgust. Wei Wuxian finally has access to it, will finally be able to know the depths of Lan Zhan’s hatred of him. But when he dives under in a burst of self-destruction, letting the waves of Lan Zhan’s emotions pull him in, all he finds is more of that longing with a through line of worry and heartache.
Wei Wuxian frowns, bringing a hand to his chest. Surely he’s misidentifying it? “Where’s your condemnation?” he asks, without preamble as he has always been.
He’s hit with a wave of hurt, deep and so painful it feels as if Wei Wuxian’s heart has been crushed. “I do not wish to condemn you,” Lan Zhan tells him, quiet so it sounds like a confession. He’s said it before, nearly word for word, but Wei Wuxian has never before been able to feel the sentiment behind it, to know what Lan Zhan actually means.
“But then—then why…?” Wei Wuxian cannot bring himself to contradict Lan Zhan, not now, with the honesty of those words searing into him.
Lan Zhan just stares at him, brow furrowing slightly in an expression of concentration.
Wei Wuxian is hit with a flood of worry so intense he blacks out immediately.
This… is not going how Lan Wangji planned. He’d even prepared himself beforehand, had decided ahead of time every word he would say so he couldn’t mess it up. He’d had no way to prepare for Wei Ying, and Wei Ying, in typical Wei Ying fashion, had destroyed all his plans with a deadly combination of teasing, breathtaking grins, and more obliviousness than one person should be capable of.
At least Lan Wangji had managed to explain the curse before Wei Ying had completely derailed him. But then Wei Ying had started saying things, that Lan Wangji was too pretty for anyone to reject him, inferring that Lan Wangji should already be wed to the object of his affections… and all of Lan Wangji’s carefully planned explanations fell apart as all that came out was ‘ Return to Gusu with me. ’
But then they’d been getting somewhere, Wei Ying’s ability to feel Lan Wangji’s emotions allowing him to finally realize that Lan Wangji truly didn’t wish to condemn him… and Lan Wangji had already felt as though he were fraying at the edges, composure melting away as it always wished to in Wei Ying’s presence, and he’d thought that maybe the emotions could fix this too.
Which brings him to now, clutching Wei Ying to his chest like Wei Ying’s some swooning maiden.
“Wei Ying?”
No response.
“Wei Ying?”
Wei Ying doesn’t even twitch, all of his weight resting on Lan Wangji.
He’s completely out cold.
Lan Wangji wishes, not for the first time since he met Wei Ying, that he were someone who drank. He just hopes the Wen remnants won’t kill him for this, because Lan Wangji’s not sure he would have the will to defend himself.
Lan Wangji sighs, shifts Wei Ying into a more comfortable position, and starts up towards the Wen settlement. He may not be currently welcome, but Wei Ying needs to lay down and Lan Wangji is loathe to lay Wei Ying on the filthy dirt of the Burial Mounds.
He knows, logically, that Wei Ying likely slept on it every night of the three months he was stuck in this place, but Lan Wangji would have given anything to prevent it then, too, if he could have. If he’d known.
Wen Qing is the first to acknowledge him, the rest ignoring him and going about their days as though Lan Wangji carrying their Yiling Laozu around like a ragdoll is a regular occurrence.
“What did he do this time ?” Wen Qing asks. Lan Wangji’s really not sure how to feel about the fact she automatically believes Wei Ying at fault despite him being the one out cold.
When Lan Wangji isn’t forthcoming with an answer, she just sighs, flapping a hand dismissively. “I assume you’d be more freaked out if he were in any danger.” At least someone can recognize that Lan Wangji cares about Wei Ying. She fixes him with a sharp eye. “If whatever’s going on worsens, you tell me; he certainly won’t.”
Lan Wangji feels a rush of appreciation for her, and her gaze turns quizzical. She ushers him towards Wei Ying’s Demon Quelling Cave. (And how relieving it had been, to see in such a stupid name that, no matter the blood they’ve both shed, no matter the unorthodox, dangerous methods, Wei Ying is still the same ridiculous man Lan Wangji fell in love with in the Cloud Recesses.)
Apparently satisfied to let Lan Wangji handle her patient (boss? Leader? Savior? It is hard to define just what Wei Ying is to these people he has liberated and given new life in this dead place), she leaves him to find somewhere in the mess to deposit Wei Ying.
With Wei Ying safely lain down, Lan Wangji allows himself to feel guilt. He had only meant to—to communicate, to Wei Ying, how much Lan Wangji cares, to get him to understand why Lan Wangji wants to bring him back to Gusu. What he’d achieved instead was to so thoroughly overwhelm Wei Ying so that Wei Ying passed out completely.
Lan Wangji should not have been allowed emotions. He clearly cannot use them properly, if this is the result.
He sighs, allowing himself this time to observe Wei Ying, to gaze upon what is not his even to steal glances of. He needs to ensure that he does not accidentally bludgeon Wei Ying to unconsciousness again. He will allow himself this, this period of feeling before Wei Ying wakes, and when he does Lan wangji will recapture his control, to hopefully make this sharing of feelings more a window than a session of Empathy .
Control is what he is good at, though Wei Ying likes to test that. It will be fine. He will give his proper apology and reissue his request. He will not slip up again.
Wei Wuxian comes to with a pounding headache and a certainty that he drank way too much of fourth uncle’s wine to the point of hallucinating Lan Zhan in love . He lets out a snort. Who knew his drunken delusions could get so ridiculous? Usually they at least focus on people who are actually there.
“Wei Ying.” …Maybe they had this time, too.
“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian shoots to sitting and immediately regrets it. “Ow….” An odd, foreign bubble of worry sits in his chest. That’s weird; why would I be worried about myself….
His eyes alight on Lan Zhan, standing awkwardly at his bedside. Lan Zhan’s face is as flat as ever, but when their eyes meet, Wei Wuxian feels the bubble of worry more presently. No fucking way.
Lan Zhan bows deeply. “I apologize. I did not intend to allow my emotions to get out of hand enough to affect you so.”
Wei Wuxian is almost too amazed by the accompanying realization to feel uncomfortable about the apology. “You mean that wasn’t a drunk hallucination?”
Lan Zhan straightens, and great, now he’s more concerned. “Do you… often hallucinate while drunk?”
Wei Wuxian shakes his head in disbelief, making no attempt to stop the fond smile creeping over his face. For such a boring person, Lan Zhan is awfully entertaining.
Something in his memories is bothering him, something that feels monumentous, like he’s standing on thin ice and knows he’ll be sent under any moment. “You… you don’t want to lock me up.”
There’s something spiteful visible in Lan Zhan’s eyes, even as Wei Ying can feel his heartache and regret. “I told you.” It should feel like an I told you so , but it doesn’t quite. It’s far too heavy for that, resigned and lacking in admonishment.
“Well yeah but—you really, actually don’t wanna lock me up.” Wei Wuxian’s sure he looks ridiculous, the way he’s staring at Lan Zhan.
Lan Zhan sighs, a breath that wouldn’t be noticeable if Wei Wuxian couldn’t feel the fondness of it, the exhaustion. “Incorrigible,” he says, and Wei Wuxian cannot disagree.
“But if you don’t want to lock me up…. Why don’t you want to lock me up?”
Lan Zhan looks at him, then, something strangely imploring in his eyes. Look at me, it says, you know how I feel. Is that not enough?
“You should,” Wei Wuxian protests weakly, though he’s to quite sure what he’s arguing for. That Lan Zhan should want to lock him up? It’s not that he wants that, far from it, but Wei Wuxian’s… everything… runs in contradiction to the Lan precepts Lan Zhan loves so much, his demonic cultivation no more than a stain on the world in Lan sect’s eyes. Lan Zhan’s never liked him anyway, and Wei Wuxian can’t believe any level of hidden fondness would be enough to excuse the demonic cultivation aspect.
Wei Wuxian’s lifted a hand to Lan Zhan’s brow to check his temperature before he even registers he’s begun moving. Lan Zhan doesn’t flinch back enough to dodge Wei Wuxian’s hand. Wei Wuxian frowns. His temperature feels normal, warmer than Wei Wuxian’s run since before the transplant but certainly not warm enough to be feverish.
Lan Zhan’s eyes are wide, and when Wei Wuxian shifts his attention to the bundle of Lan Zhan’s emotions, he finds—well. He’s not entirely sure what he finds, a strange tangle of emotions both those recognizable and those Wei Wuxian can’t put a name to. There’s warmth… discomfort… anticipation? Like he’s wishing for something he’s not allowed to want. It makes Wei Wuxian frown; Lan Zhan should be allowed whatever he wants; it feels wrong that he should be denied anything.
Wei Wuxian’s hand slips with his focus, his little finger brushing against the soft, cool fabric of Lan Zhan’s forehead ribbon. Wei Wuxian hardly registers Lan Zhan’s gasp, too wrapped up in the wave of desire from Lan Zhan, the longing going from background noise to the very air seeming infused with it, the horror and shame that comes hand in hand with the arousal —and isn’t that odd, something as uncouth as arousal coming from Gusu Lan’s second jade. The air feels charged as though before a storm, and Wei Wuxian’s not convinced it’s all coming from Lan Zhan.
Wei Wuxian knew Lan Zhan had a thing about his forehead ribbon, but this is—Wei Wuxian was under the impression that Lan Zhan hated other people touching it, but this isn’t discomfort. This is the thrill of getting something you’re not allowed, the first sip of an illicit jar of Emperor’s Smile.
Wei Wuxian absolutely should not take advantage of this. Wei Wuxian has never been good about what he should or should not do.
He feels a grin settle on his face, the one Jiang Cheng had called predatory, like a cat getting a new toy, and shifts his hand a little higher, pressing against the ribbon the slightest bit more.
“ Wei Ying .” Lan Zhan sounds a little pained, but Wei Wuxian can feel how he enjoys it, can feel how he aches to lean into the touch. He can feel the relief the emotion provides, the tint of guilt overwhelmed by the odd possessiveness it produces.
It’s addicting.
“Do you like it when people touch your ribbon?” Wei Wuxian teases. Then, just to be annoying, he adds, “Or is that just for me?”
Lan Zhan’s breath hitches so clearly to be audible, the longing intensifying again, accompanied by a cocktail of guilt and desire and love .
“ Oh .” Wei Wuxian—Wei Wuxian might need a moment. He wants to ask Lan Zhan if he’s sure, but that’s a ridiculous question; he can feel how sure Lan Zhan is, how Lan Zhan wants—wants him .
“You—the girl you like…? It’s me? ”
Lan Zhan closes his eyes as though that will let him escape this conversation. It’s such a childish action that Wei Wuxian can only find it endearing.
But Lan Zhan is… trembling. Not physically; he stands as still and graceful and emotionless as if he were carved from ice. His emotions, though, the sense of Lan Zhan which Wei Wuxian’s finally gotten used to—they're quaking. Anticipatory; terrified. It strikes Wei Wuxian, then, that Lan Zhan cares. How much it matters to him, somehow, what Wei Wuxian thinks. Wei Wuxian’s opinion should be worth less than dirt to him, and yet he awaits it with a terrified sort of reverence. A sailor lost at sea, watching a storm blow in and knowing its winds will bring him safely home or leave him broken on the seafloor.
Lan Zhan is in love with me , Wei Wuxian thinks, as if that will somehow make it believable. “You’re in love with me,” he says aloud, because he cannot believe something so ridiculous without confirmation.
“Mn,” Lan Zhan agrees. His nerves are getting worse by the moment—Wei Wuxian will alleviate them as soon as he can convince himself that this isn’t just some sort of weird out-of-body experience.
“ Me , me?” Wei Wuxian asks nonsensically, gesturing to… well, all of him. He knows he’s hot, but everything else… he’s just about the opposite of what he would expect Lan Zhan’s type to be. Especially because, up until today, Wei Wuxian was under the impression that Lan Zhan didn’t think anyone good enough for him.
He gets a wave of indignation and frustration for his efforts. Yeah, that makes more sense.
“Wei Ying.” Lan Wangji’s eyes trap him in a gaze he cannot look away from. “You are…” his words trail off, but his emotions swell to fill in the gap they leave. Wei Wuxian’s eyes swell from the force of it, from the feeling of being loved so strongly.
“ Why,” he gasps out, as though it’s been forced out of him, and he’s sure his bafflement is apparent in his tone. It’s both genuine curiosity and another attempt at self-destruction, a part of him sure that if forced to explain, Lan Zhan will realize that there really is no reason good enough to love someone like Wei Wuxian.
Lan Zhan doesn’t respond aloud, but his expression gains a further pained edge, and Wei Wuxian can feel it like a knife to the ribs.
Ah, he’s being cruel to leave Lan Wangji hanging like this. But Wei Wuxian doesn’t know how he feels, and he certainly doesn’t know how to put it into words. He knows he’s always craved Lan Wangji’s attention, knows he finds Lan Wangji attractive, takes a deep, settling sort of pleasure in the way Lan Wangji feels about him, knows that he would kiss Lan Wangji in a heartbeat—but is that what it is to be in love, or is Wei Wuxian just greedy, drunk on the heady feeling of Lan Wangji loving him ? (Seriously, who wouldn’t get drunk on such a feeling, from Gusu Lan’s second Jade? Wei Wuxian doesn’t think he can be blamed for this part—and he thus doesn’t think it counts as evidence towards how he might feel towards that second Jade.)
If Wei Wuxian were a better person, a more selfless one, he would wait to respond until he’s sorted out this tangle of feelings in his chest, until he knows he can respond in kind to Lan Wangji’s affections, to not lead him on when he clearly already feels so deeply for Wei Wuxian.
Wei Wuxian is tired of being selfless, though, and he can feel the pain he is putting Lan Wangji through by making him wait, agonizingly, for an answer. Wei Wuxian does not know how to express what he feels, doesn’t want to tell Lan Wangji anything he doesn’t know the truth of, but he does know that he wants to kiss Lan Wangji.
So, Wei Wuxian steps forward to capture Lan Wangji in what is the second kiss of his life.
And immediately passes out again from the force of Lan Wangji’s reaction to him.
When Wei Wuxian comes to, he’s back in bed with his lips tingling and Lan Wangji kneeling beside him.
Wei Wuxian feels a knot of Lan Wangji’s dejection in his chest, and Lan Wangji’s head is hung in shame. It’s almost too adorable to be completely hilarious.
Unabashed himself, he finds himself laughing, giddy off the feeling of knowing Lan Wangji’s regard for him, for knowing that the great Hanguang-jun ’s feelings for him are so great.
“Wei Ying!”
Wei Wuxian hasn’t laughed this freely in far too long. He feels strange, affected, as though, somehow, everything’s going to be okay now.
He can feel Lan Wangji’s concern for him, but it only spurs the laughter on further.
Seeking to rectify that concern, Wei Wuxian grabs onto the front of Lan Wangji’s robes, reeling him into another bumbling kiss—even worse, this time; though he doesn’t pass out, he still can’t stop laughing, and the motion hardly resembles a kiss after all.
It gets the point across, though, the sinking feeling from Lan Wangji replaced by a fondness that makes Wei Wuxian want to cry.
“Ah Lan Zhan, my Lan Zhan. How stupid I’ve been.” It takes a moment for Wei Wuxian’s words to catch up with him. He yanks back from Lan Wangji when they do. “Sorry! I shouldn’t presume.” Stupid , to make such a presumption. My Lan Zhan , he’d said so carelessly, as if he has any claim over Lan Wangji. He feels an uncharacteristic well of shame. As if his grimy hands could presume to hold the great Hanguang-jun in their grasp. As if—
“Wei Ying.” Wei Wuxian startles from his spiraling thoughts at the sound of Lan Wangji’s voice, even as ever. His emotions, while Wei Wuxian was distracted by his own stupidity, have retained that same aching fondness—now permitted with little sparks of delight. Wei Wuxian feels it as his nerves swell, then—“ My Wei Ying,” Lan Wangji says softly, achingly quiet, slow as though he’s taking his time tasting the words.
Wei Wuxian’s heart does a little jump in his chest.
“I can’t come with you to Gusu,” he blurts out. The bubble in his chest of Lan Zhan’s joy pops, making way for devastation. “ Not because of you. These people—you saw them, Lan Wangji, they’re not soldiers. They need me, here.”
“They can come as well.” Lan Zhan’s determination is stubborn, in his eyes and in Wei Wuxian’s chest.
Wei Wuxian smiles wanly. “You know they can’t, Lan Zhan.” Wei Wuxian can feel how Lan wangji knows he’s right, knows that hosting the Wens would be an unpopular decision even within his own sect, that hosting Wei Wuxian alone would already be pushing it, even if he were to turn the Wen remnants over.
Lan Wangji clenches his jaw, looking away. He closes his eyes. His frustration is an odd, roiling thing, sudden when it gives way to resignation. Wei Wuxian expects him to pull away, then, to leave for Gusu with this new thing between them having changed nothing. He’s not sure why he keeps trying to predict Lan Wangji’s actions, when he’s evidently so bad at it. “Then I will stay.”
“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian wants him to. Oh, how he wants him to. But—“You can’t just abandon your responsibilities like that. Your sect—”
“Will be fine in my absence.” He turns his blazing eyes to Wei Wuxian. You will not , his gaze clearly indicates. It should sting, that Lan Wangji doesn’t trust Wei Wuxian to hold everything together without him. Knowing how deeply Lan Wangji cares for him, all it does is make Wei Wuxian’s heart ache.
The truth is this: Wei Wuxian grows tireder with every day that passes. He is sleeping less and less, his weight dropping, the screaming of the dead growing louder where it reverberates around his skull. He hasn’t healed properly since he lost his core. He feels his wounds in every movement, weighing him down and reminding him of all he’s lost, of all his failures. He feels the weight of the Wen remnants’ lives pressing down against his now-bony shoulders, and he is not sure how much longer he can carry it before he collapses.
If Lan Wangji wishes to stay—and the fierce determination in Wei Wuxian’s chest says that he truly does—then Wei Wuxian cannot find it in himself to argue further. Instead, he lets himself list forward, to lean his face against Lan Wangji’s chest.
“If I were a better man, I would make you leave,” he comments idly.
“It is a good thing, then, that you are not.”
And there’s really nothing Wei Wuxian can say to that.