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It is their ritual, and Jin Guangyao knows his part: pass the gates, move quietly to the door, stand in silence until the panel slides open. He cannot feel his feet, but he knows the movements well enough. He reaches the Hanshi, then halts in the courtyard.
This pause is not part of the rite.
(He cannot stand another moment alone.)
And he must not stay outside for much longer, he knows.
(But he has no right to enter.)
He spies the pale sheen of Silence, cast like a veil over the Hanshi. The courtyard where he idles is orderly and lovely.
(He is chaos.)
Would it be so wrong to linger here a while
(and let the wind and whirling snow work upon him? To watch the flickering candlelight within, and know that the candles burn for him, and hold onto that warmth until the end?)
but no, he must not keep Zewu-jun waiting, especially not this of all nights; the day has passed long enough alone. He will beam brightly, and he will lift his hand to the door, and—
"A-Yao?"
Zewu-jun, too, has changed the expected form, emerging into the night with a look of concern.
Jin Guangyao tries to stretch his face into a smile. He does not trust his cold-ravaged throat; instead he gestures to the door, his question unspoken.
(Zewu-jun should refuse him hospitality. He should shatter the travel token and repudiate his sworn brother. The night is freezing; the rest would not take long.)
His cheek is cupped. His wrists are grasped in haste; he is pulled inside.
And the wrappings around his head are unwound, then those of his arms. They are soaked through, like all of his clothing. "A-Yao, what is this?" Zewu-jun asks sharply, holding stiff hands between his own.
(A-Yao cannot say. He does not know anything anymore.)
"W-work," he slurs at last, through frozen lips. "C-c-could not...l-leave."
Tense lines shadow his er-ge's mouth and eyes. It is not long before Jin Guangyao is parted from his robes and guided into a bath like fire. He sits obediently, thawing, wrapping bruised arms around skinned knees.
(She had gasped when she saw the bruises. He had opened to that gasp, to the pain in her eyes.)
He brings his forehead to his knees and shivers, and Lan Xichen does not speak.
(Rule 627: do not pry into the affairs of others.)
But when Jin Guangyao opens his eyes, his limbs bear no marks. The deep killing chill has ebbed, into water that still glows faintly blue.
(Zewu-jun must understand, then: his sworn brother had rushed to reach Gusu before the sixteenth day of the eighth month ended. He flew high above the clouds, and he had to hurry, and he lacks the power to protect himself from the elements while he hurries.)
Dry hands clasp his wet shoulders. "A-Yao. You could have died."
(He wants to laugh wildly. Fate is not so merciful.)
He shapes his features into reassurance, his voice into amusement. "Not with er-ge waiting to receive me."
A deep sigh answers, eyes falling shut.
(Her eyes, limpid like his. Her impatient little sighs—no, no!)
Lan Xichen holds out a hand.
(He ought not. Jin Guangyao should not be touched. Every scorned teacup, every shunned clasp of hands, every swift gather of sleeve and hem ahead of his passing—they had been right. Zewu-jun had been wrong.)
He emerges, and Zewu-jun does not stare. A length of pale cloth is held open. Zewu-jun does not presume.
(She, too, did not presume. She looked aside demurely and opened her arms, and when she looked back)
He gazes up at Zewu-jun.
(when she looked back, he saw worship in her face.)
Er-ge, wise, wondrous… His secret, that he would have shouted to the world. A different world. A world that would not have forced him to keep quiet.
(A ruinous secret, one that Jin Guangshan must never discover.)
He opens his arms and, with the gesture, allows linen to touch him. It is a simple thing, to dry after a bath. Qi could have done it. But that has never been their way.
(Because his cultivation is so low, Zewu-jun's so high. Yet Jin Guangyao had awed her.)
Zewu-jun brings a heavy robe. He keeps it impeccably clean and prepared. It is soft, snowy-white, beautiful as everything of Gusu is. Lan-zongzhu is a consummate host; he ensures always that his guest wants for nothing.
Jin Guangyao follows him to a table where hot tea is arranged. The Hanshi's hearth radiates heat. The pot steams. Two cups rest side by side. A small sweet is set out for him, his favourite. The snow falling outside cannot harm him. The hands preparing tea do not ball into fists at his approach.
(Jin Guangyao cannot rise high and fast and still protect himself. Lan Xichen must know this.)
He can sit here and be still. All that he requires is here, within the Hanshi. He has a tea cup and a warm garment and a place at the table, beside the man he chose
(but no child and no woman and what sort of man doesn’t wed?!)
whose eyes like blameless blessings
(and she was so earnest, so grateful)
ask for nothing. His eyes have never asked.
(Jin-gongzi, you once saved my life...)
Even when Zewu-jun was dying, his eyes never asked for rescue.
(Nothing you should worry over, A-Yao...)
His gaze is so gentle, so tender.
(But tonight Jin Guangyao cannot take what is gentle or tender.)
"Er-ge."
(He must be silenced so he can say no more. His words will break them both.)
He does not know what Lan Xichen sees — desperation or passion or some sick thing between. But the delicate cup is set down with a click, and he is pulled close. Hesitant lips press into his neck, a feather-touch so light as to be obscene.
(He cannot tolerate tenderness now!)
He turns his head and crushes Lan Xichen's mouth against his own. A surprised grunt. Warmth blooms deep within him, and he stifles this longing, turns away from kindly kindling desire; he is
(defiled)
impatient
(oh! A-Yao! should we not wait—)
wanting something
(of course we should marry!)
different.
He lies back in a wanton display and unknots his garment with one hand, noting the flash of er-ge’s eyes as the robe falls open. He parts his lips and stares intensely and the invitation
(cheeks flushing scarlet, wedding-red)
is unmistakable.
The pale silks of Gusu are quickly shed. The long ribbon
(a matter of family)
settles atop the rest like ripples in a pond.
A bottle of oil. A languorous hand, satin-slick fingers.
(But he does. not. want. tenderness! He seethes in a terrible void, and it is the First Jade of Lan, endlessly compassionate, who makes him wait, makes him suffer!)
At last he feels the thing he craves, just barely touching him. His lover's consideration is agony.
(And who did he consider, before exposing himself so shamefully to ruin? Qin Su? Himself? And what of Lan Xichen)
His er-ge, who would not rush him. Who watches, waiting, in the delusion of endless time
(who was almost his own, and ever after out of reach, and smiles now in such sweet ignorance that he could scream into that beautiful face!)
and so Jin Guangyao has no choice but to hook arms like supple steel around Lan Xichen's waist
(Er-ge, what did we wait for?!)
and stare, undaunted, into the dark eyes
(You do not know what I have done!!)
as he drives his lover deep into his own body.
(savage and sharp and so. thoroughly. deserved)
They cry out as one
as one, and pain is a white light blinding him, a blessing, for then he cannot think, cannot think, thank Heaven! spreading fire scalds him; a cool stream of qi follows, dulling the knife until he lifts his hips and presses harder. He tightens himself around his er-ge, unwilling to relent, soothing with hands and lips until the wide worried eyes ease
and he does not look away, he does not let the lurch of despair distract him, he pays no heed to the tears drying on his temples. There is only his er-ge
whose tongue he captures with his own and refuses to release. Whose hand strokes him into sharp pleasure and the sharper pain of need, clawing at his gut with an animal insistence, until he wants to scream from holding back
who tears his essence from him as he shouts, whose mouth swallows his cries, whose own body tenses and pours into him, er-ge, er-ge, er-ge! and he holds him, holds him, holds him until he shakes from the strain
until a sob swelling in his chest chokes him, until his own breath hurts him
and then Lan Xichen is kissing him hard, mingling their hands and pressing their foreheads together and the sweat and wet gasps between them are an ablution
(peace is here. peace is here. peace is here)
almost
(but there is no absolution for Jin Guangyao)
The chime of chou shi sends a shudder through him.
Lan Xichen murmurs to him. The words are shelter, and union, and all of the other lies that Jin Guangyao can no longer let himself believe
(he would claw time to a halt to keep this moment)
and he closes himself again, folding over pain with a smile forced far into his eyes.
He manages the rest, then. He leads them both to er-ge’s bed, a comfortable cocoon beyond the jianghu's glinting gaze. He wraps himself around his lover
(for the last time, and how can anyone rest in such a world)
but Jin Guangyao never sleeps here. His nights in Gusu are marked by the rise and fall of Lan Xichen's breath, the stingy chimes that portion out his presence. Er-ge's limbs are a wide tumult, his sleep always restless. His A-Yao contains him in peace.
(He had, once. He had, in a tale that is soon ending: a very, very long time ago, two men loved. One was serene by day but became a wild sprawl at night. And the other held him with all of his heart.)
He lies awake. And the night passes away, each fen carrying him further from the man in his arms.
(The edges of memory will cut him to pieces, here in this silken bed.)
Lan Xichen turns into him. He strokes the heavy hair, free of the tie that would have
(should have)
bound them together.
The wind cries. He hears snow tapping at the roof. Between his hands rests a face like the moon. A light so pure that his cowardice casts a shadow upon it.
(an invitation in fine calligraphy will tell him, and ink will not weep)
He wants to shake Lan Xichen awake, to gather up this disaster and shove it into er-ge's hands and demand, like a child with a broken toy, that he fix what Jin Guangyao cannot. He wants to cling to Zewu-jun like a frightened boy in the dark, and beg, as he has never begged anyone, to be claimed as Lan-zongzhu can claim no-one, and especially not the polluted product of a corrupted Clan.
Then the chime strikes yin shi.
The final hours before mao, when the Lan rise. And the secret
(the entanglement which no-one must ever discover, which cannot bear the light of day)
would be revealed, and so he must ready himself to leave
(he cannot, he cannot go, er-ge, er-ge please)
before he can let himself fall into a slumber
(would it be so wrong to linger here a while, and hold onto that warmth until the end?)
that would put them both in peril.
This he knows, this above all else: how to force his body to do what he would not. Thus he slips away from the touch of beloved skin, the warmth, the tenderness.
(He will never, in this life, know it again.)
Without speaking
(without sighing, without screaming)
Jin Guangyao steps into the adjoining room. He is unsurprised to find his garments dry and clean, even warmed for his return. Lan-zongzhu is a consummate host; he ensures always that his guest wants for nothing.
From an inner pocket, one that rested over his heart through the journey, he takes a small golden flower. A finely made thing, which the head of the jianghu's most austere Clan does not need. He sets it upon the tea table nonetheless.
And he binds himself then: layer upon layer of gilded clothing, sealed with the Jin's peony emblem, wrapped against a chill beyond mortal endurance.
Once more he goes to look upon Zewu-jun. Who sleeps with an arm outstretched, as though holding a place for him
(but there is no place for Jin Guangyao.)
For a moment Lan Xichen stirs, with an almost-smile. And Jin Guangyao leans down in longing, breathing in the sleep-warmed hair, the scent of the pillow.
(He scorns the old story for its paltry sleeve; he would sever an entire limb to give Zewu-jun rest.)
He sinks to his knees then, bowed beneath the weight of his own wanting. And in these final moments, he can no longer help himself. He cannot hold back again what he ought to have done two years before.
(Would you stop me, this time?)
His fingertips brush the curved edge of the pillow, an errant strand of hair.
(Then sleep a while longer.)
And he touches his forehead to the floor.
(By Heaven, whose blessing you are. By Earth, so vast between us.)
Again he bends down.
(By the Ancestors, who rejoice in you.)
A third and final time, he bows.
(By you, and myself. All that we have and have not done.)
Then he moves beyond the bed, to the mourning clothes neatly mounded. He touches two fingers to his lips, infusing them with the faintest brush of qi, before bringing them to the ribbon.
(For as long as I breathe, you are my breath.)
The silk is softer than he had imagined.
The Hanshi's door slides shut like a sentence, and the winter air steals all but the memory of warmth; Jin Guangyao welcomes it, opening his arms as though to embrace. Hensheng beneath him trembles lightly, anticipating the journey, and his step upon the blade is sure. As he rises, he looks only to the sky, and he lets no feeling cause him to falter.
The flight to Jinlintai takes twelve marks at his greatest capacity.
(He is weary and worn-down. It will last sixteen at least.)
Thankfully, the sky is cloudless and clear.
(The wind blows a fierce rebuke. It is colder than the day before.)
And Lianfang-zun leaves only peace behind him, having observed every courtesy. He has visited the noble Zewu-jun on the occasion of his birthday. He has not imposed excessively on his host's hospitality. He has departed without disturbance, after providing a thoughtful gift.
His errand complete, he may return to Jinlintai. To Clan and family and duty
(to bruising hands and nauseating want and despicable silence)
(for the rest of his life)
and as he reaches the appropriate altitude, he prepares his most pleasant expression
(he has already started to shiver)
and stands perfectly balanced upon his sword, looking ahead to a warm welcome home.
(If he is fortunate, he will not survive the journey.)