Work Text:
The matchmakers came back, the year after Jiang Yanli died.
It didn't matter about his previous reputation, or the lengths he had gone loudly proclaiming that he didn't want any woman without ten thousand specific and contradictory traits. Matchmakers had come and gone before Lotus Pier burnt, leaving Jiang Cheng in an aimless fury every time. He didn't want a wife, who he would have to touch, to let into his rooms, to fuck until she was pregnant. He didn't want anyone except A'Jie to touch him at all, if it wasn't the violence of a spar, or Wei Wuxian grabbing him because he was insufferable.
Wei Wuxian had laughed at him, when he'd pinned the man (boy, then, they were both boys) during a spar, screaming in his face to stop flirting, to stop pretending, to stop play acting, to stop leading girls on when Wei Wuxian didn't want to marry them either. He'd been so angry that he was expected to marry, and Wei Wuxian wouldn't have to. Older boys in town had talked like they were jealous, of Jiang Cheng, because he would have a wife sooner than them, since he didn't have to build his trade first. It was absurd. Infuriating. Irrational.
The third time the matchmakers came, Wei Wuxian had tugged Jiang Cheng into the water, swimming under the floating piers so they could eavesdrop on the matchmakers as they reported to his mother. They had expounded on his virtues as a prospective husband to his mother, and once the Violet Spider had left, they had heard one matchmaker, before Lotus Pier burnt, reframe his demands as the much softer, and surprisingly accurate, "Jiang-gongzi doesn't want a wife who can't be a worthy companion to his sister". Another had said, "Jiang-gongzi knows no wife can stand up to his mother, so will avoid the whole thing as long as possible." Wei Wuxian had laughed so hard at that he'd had to shove a hand in his mouth, and then duck underwater so the women wouldn't hear him.
He didn't want a wife. He didn't want a woman who would take over part of his household. He didn't want a woman who would be intimidated by his mother. He didn't want the obligation to get children on some woman he didn't know. Jiang Cheng, at that age, was almost entirely sure that Wei Wuxian flirted with girls in town specifically to mess with Jiang Cheng's head. He probably had. The little shit was always grinning when he turned away from them, like he was keeping score, and Jiang Cheng was losing simply because he didn't want to play.
That Jiang Cheng, before the Wen torched the place he loved, before Wei fucking Wuxian had terrified every cultivator with half a brain by raising corpses of friends and enemy on the battlefield, before Jiang Cheng had been left fighting for access to his only living relative--that Jiang Cheng might have married, and been relatively content. He hadn't wanted a woman, or a man, or anything so exotic he'd only seen it in Nie Huaisang's collections, his nose scrunching as Wei Wuxian blushed. But if he had to have a wife, for reasons of succession and heirs, the only real criteria which had mattered was that she would be worthy of Jiang Yanli's protection and love (because A'Jie was far too generous with her affection, as evidenced by the Peacock).
Jiang-Zongzhu, after the war, after Wei fucking Wuxian had lost his soul and his last restraint, after a servant had laid out white garments for him to wear for Jiang Yanli--well, that Jiang Cheng had no criteria at all that mattered.
The matchmakers came anyway.
Jiang Cheng had been neglecting his training duties, because he only practiced with sword or Zidian when Jin Ling was safely napping. Jin Ling was a fussy baby, and Jiang Cheng was very likely to push the Jin servants who came with his nephew out of the way, to hold the boy himself. Jin Ling settled quickly, when Jiang Cheng talked to him, holding the boy against his chest. It was easy enough to complete the diplomatic and financial and administrative duties of his sect with a baby on his chest.
He didn't always fall asleep in Jiang Cheng's arms, but he was happy enough to get a mouthful of expensive purple robe, and gum at it to soothe himself. He liked the weight of the boy. He liked looking down at his face, trying to see glimpses of A'Jie through the predominantly Peacock-features.
It soothed Jiang Cheng, to greet the matchmakers holding his nephew.
It obviously soothed the matchmakers as well, since one old woman was smiling widely at Jiang Cheng, probably already composing letters to mothers of likely girls, about Jiang Cheng's attributes as a doting father.
It would have been different if the matchmakers had come back when Jin Ling wasn't the last person he loved. If Jiang Yanli was sitting beside him, Jin Ling in her arms, perhaps a younger sibling growing in her belly, Jiang Cheng might have grumbled, but let the women talk to A'Jie. Or even if she was alive, in Jinlintai, and he had never had tiny baby fingernails catching in his embroidered outer robes, he might have sat politely himself, and considered the necessity of heirs.
A'Jie isn't here, worrying about him. Wei Wuxian isn't here, blushing when he sees beautiful people (which at least had given Jiang Cheng an idea of the types of girls most men liked to look at). Mother is dead, her head raised as she considers the responsibility of helping to mold her potential grandchildren into fierce cultivators. Father is dead, and with him, the vague sense that the Jiang sect is the Jiang bloodline.
Jiang Cheng knows better now. The Jiang bloodline is him, and the infant drooling on his robes. Who cares if he never has anyone else of his blood.
The Jiang sect is the shidis and shimeis who survived the Sunshot Campaign, and feel relief when they see Jiang Cheng practicing with Zidian in the evening light. It's their families, for they are old enough for wives and husbands and children. It's the blacksmith and her apprentice who had been in Meishan learning from the blacksmith's old master when Lotus Pier burnt. It's the centuries old agreements, barely written down, with farmers and boaters and builders and silk dyers.
The Jiang sect will survive without Jiang Cheng marrying.
"We have a selection of beautiful, talented women for your consideration, Jiang-zongzhu," said the woman with the most expensive gown. She lay a sheet of names across her palm, waiting for a servant to bring it to him. What would a list of names tell him?
A younger woman steps forward, young enough that she never met Jiang Cheng who was young and angry but filial. "Some of these girls hold their tongue, and a few enjoy arguments. Some are beautiful, and most are graceful, but some are more clever than comely. I even found a daughter who fought beside her father in the Sunshot Campaign, who appreciated your skills at battle. She said the sight of Zidian gave her hope."
"No." Jiang Cheng said.
"Zongzhu," his head disciple murmured, her eyes flicking over the women, back to Jiang Cheng, "you'll need heirs."
"I have one," Jiang Cheng said, as Jin Ling tugged at a strand of hair, and Jiang Cheng untangled it just as automatically.
The matchmakers were listening, of course they were. Their entire blasted existence required them to know all the gossip, to listen at every door, to keep track of personalities and romantic entanglements. The matchmakers were looking at Jin Ling's gold blankets, and gold bracelets, and the gold dressed servant who hovered at the door ready to sweep the baby away when he was hungry.
"I'll find an heir within the sect disciples, raise someone up to the part."
"Zongzhu," she said, and she remembered. She remembered Jiang Cheng when he was angry at Wei Wuxian for hunting pheasants without him, and soothed by A'Jie with soup and kind eyes.
No one spoke his name anymore. The only person who dared to talk to him familiarly is fucking Jin Guangyao, and that was only to make him angry, to lose ground.
He didn't need a wife who would expect such things of him.
"No," Jiang Cheng repeated. "Bar me again. Spread whatever rumours you like. Say I threw you all out of Lotus Pier, screaming. I'll do it, if you push. I won't marry."
"Yes, Jiang-Zongzhu," the young one said, the others repeating after her.
Jin Ling gurgled spit bubbles all over his robes, as the matchmakers were escorted out.
"You won't be mad at Jiu Jiu if you don't have any cousins, will you?" Jiang Cheng asked the baby. Jin Ling looked grumpily horrified at the prospect, or perhaps he had wind. "You understand me."