wuding | a home.

a home.

They fall together, like fresh snow off the mountaintop: first, in measured, patient, cultivating reunion after an extended dinner at their inn. Then, with passion. Then, syrupy and slow, with morning. In a rare, turn, after bathing, Lan Wangji denies himself the rigors and discipline of morning and coaxes them back abed, to hold his lover throughout his rest near sunrise, until halfway to midday.

He stirs them, inevitably, when the blinding bright white of the day overwhelms, and they must set for the road to make good pace to Cloud Recesses while still enjoying their stroll. They arrive, meandering, in the depths of a trickling, golden afternoon, when much of the clan is distracted with the latest lecture of a visiting hermit — they say, an aspiring immortal — and neither Uncle nor Sizhui can be politely parted from his wisdom. First, a brief stop with Liang. Secondly, for Lan Wangji, yet slowed by his fading wounds and bruises, to test the recovery of his disciples.

Lastly, facing the dregs of an afternoon together with no duties, no assignments, no occupation — curiosity wins over. With the packed necessities of a quick meal in his qiankun pouch, he steers Wei Ying to walk the winding, if peaceful path toward the peripheral territories, past the liminal, isolated quietude of the jingshi and into the periphery of Lan Wangji's inherited grounds.

A short walk, yet they may have breached the threshold of a brave new world. He had chosen the space for its proximity to river water, cunning, lively spikes of rice stabbing the field, alongside feral flowers. Already, the builders and architects have marked a path to make a road, but they have yet to set down wood or stone for steps. These, he knows, are still young days for their home, Wei Ying's house, rising on strong, sprawling bones that stretch out over a considerable territory: a number of rooms, some superfluous, including an isolated study for Wei Ying's pleasure and a music chamber. A large kitchen, for all much of the house yet misses its roof. A segment for the archery post Lan Wangji had bidden. The house, designed to host an inner garden, even boasts the allocated space for a pond men had been digging until mere hours prior, when their toil ended.

"To grow lotus," he murmurs, nodding ahead where the pond is yet to glisten and crest, where its waters are short of rising. And he does not ask, Do you like it, what it can be? But his gaze flickers between Wei Ying's face and the home in desperate, hungry study.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Ah. A leech. Who knew they attacked so far from the seas? A broken, half-muffled exhalation betrays his amusement as Wei Ying clings to him, and he delves them in the dangerous ploy of navigating an exit from the bathtub and migrating towards their bed, thieving a linen cloth along the way. Undaunted, he passes it over Wei Ying's shoulders and back, absorbing the worst of his wet, before attending to Lan Wangji's own.

"I am untroubled by Wei Ying's theatrics." In truth, at times they stimulate him, far too endeared with Wei Ying's enthusiasm for whatever latest part he has concocted for himself. "He appears to find them freeing. An accessory to bed play."

An interesting, relatively modest way of acknowledging Wei Ying seems stimulated and infinitely more earnest when he pretends to be a different person, particularly when his day has overcome him. Whilst speaking, he begins to collect their discarded silks, setting them aside for later laundering when disciples drop by to collect the buckets that carried bathing water, treys and defiled goods, come morning. Instead, he selects two layers of silk for his person, and a dark single one for Wei Ying, offering them out.

"If you wish my preferences: I enjoy to kiss you." No matter how rough or aloof their play, he cannot skip that part of his lovemaking.

It’s awkward to walk while he’s holding onto Lan Zhan like this, but he doesn’t want to let go. Lan Zhan seems to be amused by his antics, so he continues to playfully hinder their progress towards their bed. He’d slept so well the night before being both sated and back to their familiar bed. The mattress here has their combined scent clinging to it and he finds it comforting. The bedding in Jinlintai always smelled strongly floral every morning with fresh sheets. Lan laundering has minimal scent associated with it, so it just tends to smell of sandalwood from Lan Zhan’s incense by the time they rest their heads.

“As long as Lan Zhan doesn’t mind, we can keep playing around like usual,” he agrees. Sometimes he just wants to be taken advantage of and other times he just wants to forget the stresses of the day without opening himself to conversing about them. He’s relieved that Lan Zhan doesn’t seem to mind.

He only lets Lan Zhan go when they need to don their night robes. He does so but only after another squeeze. It’s getting close to Lan Zhan’s bedtime, but he wants to lie down with him and talk or cuddle for a little while until Lan Zhan is ready to fall asleep. He doesn’t have any plans for the rest of his evening before his own eventual sleeping, but that’s nothing new. Sometimes he just sits in the room with Lan Zhan to watch him sleep and other times he works on improving some of his own inventions or talismans.

“I like kissing, too,” he admits while he pulls his robe over his shoulders. “It doesn’t really make sense for a night time intruder, but we don’t have to worry about believability all the time. Since we both want to kiss, then I say we should just do it.”

Strange, if somehow fitting that Wei Ying drags himself through the steps of donning a single layer of silks as rapidly as Lan Wangji masters two. He eases in, belt fettering in conservatively, before turning around to attend to his husband like a doting servant, domesticating the starting wrinkles and folds of his robes, teasing them smooth.

Then, carefully, he relinquishes Wei Ying, coaxing him back toward their bed, carefully wiped for any lingering signs of their previous lovemaking. Fleetingly, he considers wilting within and calling Wei Ying into his arms; instead, he sits unexpectedly, back to the wall and legs a rigid line — waving his lover down, so that his head might drift into Lan Wangji's lap.

It has been some time since anyone stroked Wei Ying's hair. Their young, perpetually spoiled infant has certainly created an appetite in everyone.

"Wei Ying." This, softer, testing the lines of their mutual trust. He will not enjoy the answer, yet knows, if he does not ask, it will haunt him. "If... our play on this night pleased you. Why suspend it before you reached completion?"

He’s used to Lan Zhan helping him into and out of his robes, so he lifts his arms so Lan Zhan can tie the sash around him. It had felt weird at first to be doted on like this. Despite growing up in the head family’s household, he never had his own servants and preferred to do things like dressing on his own. With Lan Zhan, it’s different. They’re equals in their relationship. If he had the patience to work with the layers upon layers of silk needed to clothe the second son of Gusu Lan, he’d do it in a heartbeat. As it is, his attempts would just waste time.

He stops in front of the bed, slightly perplexed. Well, if Lan Zhan doesn’t want to lay down yet, he’s not going to complain. He crawls into the bed next to him and lays perpendicularly to him with his head on his husband’s thighs. He smiles to himself, shivering once when Lan Zhan first touches him and then relaxing immediately after.

“Hmm?” He touches the silk over his husband’s knees, smoothening the wrinkles that sitting caused. There. Pristine and perfect just like the man wearing the garment. “Oh that? I really wanted to kiss you,” he says with grin. “And I guess… since we had that argument earlier, it felt a little off. Was that bad?”

Kittenish and sweet, Wei Ying softens and melts across his legs, finally accepting his due: the brunt and unequivocal weight of Lan Wangji's affection. He starts with slow, tender strokes, sweeping the hair off Wei Ying's forehead, whispering it away behind his ear with tepid caresses.

Sweetheart. His soaring, boundless love.

"Also wanted to kiss Wei Ying." A different way of accepting his lover's interjection. It was not bad, could never be bad. There is between them a private, growing gentle understanding that indulgence is a thing they may permit themselves. That they live and breathe only for the next moment when they might come together again. How, then, could they begrudge kisses?

"As long as it was not —" A pause that snags, drags. "Disappointment." Over Lan Wangji's performance, his roughness, his numerous failures.

There’s something nice about giving and receiving affection from Lan Zhan with no assumptions for where it will lead. He’ll have to remember to do this for Lan Zhan, too. His eyes drift closed, relaxed but not on the verge of falling asleep. He’s feeling more alert after their second bath.

“I like kissing Lan Zhan. I’m glad we’re going to start kissing while we’re playing around with consent in bed,” he admits. It really is the one thing he misses most when they’re doing a story like that. Now that he’s thinking about kissing, he wants to kiss Lan Zhan! But he wants to enjoy this affection, too. It’s tough being so thoroughly in love.

“Not disappointment. Were you worried about that?” He takes one of Lan Zhan’s hands and pulls it down to kiss. “You’re so adorable, Lan Zhan. I love you too much for something like that to get in the way of things. I just wanted to love you and feel loved by you with nothing between us for a little while.” He kisses the hand again before loosening his hold and giving his husband the choice of what he wants to do with his hands again. “Tonight was fun. Did you think so, too?”

And was tonight fun? In truth, in retrospect, their limbs slack and appetites eased, he feels somehow as if he could go again. Take Wei Ying and take Wei Ying and take Wei Ying. As if his husband is no more than a mountain to climb, a sea to navigate, a demon's hold to conquer. As if Wei Ying can be reduced to a base, desirable trophy.

His hand stills over Wei Ying's hair, faintly remembering to revisit his husband's forehead with his mouth.

"I enjoyed it." Inevitable, primal. His body feels alive only in the wake of Wei Ying's generosity of sharing his body. "Yet I do not feel sated. Through no fault of Wei Ying's. There are times when one turn does not suffice. Or a second. A third."

It at once shames him to say and feeds his pride to know that he is so responsive to his husband's presence, so greedily desirous. That a quiet, low simmer lives in him, even after he achieved completion.

He rolls onto his back so he can look up at Lan Zhan and receive that kiss on his forehead. He stretches his arms upwards, in front of Lan Zhan at first and then he cups his husband’s cheeks and squishes them together to pucker out his lips for a moment. He’s feeling pleasantly playful and altogether in love.

“Oh?” He asks, grin turning a bit mischievous. “We should do something about that,” he suggests, pushing Lan Zhan’s hair behind his ear, resting his other hand on his own belly. “You’re so pretty, Lan Zhan. With your hair down and blushing like a new bride. Did you know your ears are always the first part of you that goes red? I wonder if it was like that when we were kids, too. Back when I was just your annoying crush. I probably just thought you were going red in anger.”

It feels good to know Lan Zhan wants him after they’ve already slept together once tonight. He doesn’t think Lan Zhan will get bored of him, but the reassurance is welcomed.

The angle isn’t great, but he touches the edge of one of Lan Zhan’s ears. The same one he’d just exposed. “How do you want me, husband?”

His face, squished and turned and contorted, feels hardly his own in Wei Ying's grasp, but he fights to conform — to allow his husband full command of him, diligently following Wei Ying's direction. To please him, he even holds the pose as he was last positioned for a few heartbeats, before inevitably melting back into respite.

Beneath Wei Ying's touch, he feels his ears begin to flush and fill already. He shakes his head, more to intercede than to shrug him off.

"Unnecessary, now." He has already availed himself indiscreetly of his husband's body, and Wei Ying will not sate him through sacrifice. "It is not... a hunger of the flesh."

That part of him is still tenderly quiescent, as quick to stir in answer to Wei Ying's passion as ever, but not presently starved for attention. His body is tense with the sort of crackling restlessness that grows silent, but not extinct.

"The need rises without reason. Fades likewise."

“But you said you’re not sated,” he points out. “If you don’t want another go, then how can I help make sure you go to sleep feeling satisfied?” He’s confused more so when Lan Zhan mentions that this longing isn’t of the flesh. He knows how to help out with those sorts of desires, but he has no idea how to help with whatever Lan Zhan needs tonight.

Maybe it’s lingering grief? After thirteen years of loss and mourning, it just makes sense for it to come creeping back in. Especially after a fight. His heart aches for his husband, so he takes his hand again and brings it to his cheek and holds it there, pressing his face against it.

“What about… if I’ll hold you and kiss you until you feel whole again?” And if it leads somewhere deeper, they can decide what to do about it then. “Or I can just keep talking to you until you have to put a pillow over your head so you can fall asleep. We could stay like this, too. Anything you want is what I want too!”

"...Wei Ying." Sweet Wei Ying, wonderful Wei Ying. So belligerently, tirelessly helpful that he wishes to exhaust himself even in the face of Lan Wangji's accepting contentment. He suffers, nobly, through the next spell of his lover's affection, drifting down to bring their mouths together at a clumsy, back-straining angle that finally convinces him to waive Wei Ying off his lap and slip down beside him.

The easy tolerance of Lan Wangji's peculiarities feels new, unearned. Entirely at odds with the learnings of Cloud Recesses, and it pains Lan Wangji to understand that habit has acclimated him to deprivation.

"It is... like eating short of being full. To stay alert, nimble." Wanting. "You are aware of need, but it does not ache."

He does not ask or require for a solution. Wanting his husband is a beastly, greedy, jealous and consuming thing — yet beautiful in its devotion. He appreciates knowing that, come what may, a part of him will always be dedicated to the study and worship of Wei Ying.

He understands the wordless communication about their arrangement and he kisses Lan Zhan’s hand one more time before pushing himself back up to a sitting position. He crawls up to the head of the bed so he can slip under the covers and wait for Lan Zhan to lay himself down next to him before closing the space between them. As nice as laying his head on Lan Zhan’s lap had been, the full body cuddles are his favorite.

“Does this help?” He asks, meaning the new cuddling position. Under the blanket, their legs are already tangled together. His cold toes finding comfort in the warmth his husband’s ankles and calves provides. Only now he thinks about it after being teased, but it doesn’t make him move his feet away.

“Want to kiss some more?” He brings his face closer to Lan Zhan’s and brushes their lips together. “I’m here for you no matter what you need, okay?” His arms are bent between them. He leaves one arm like that and touches Lan Zhan’s cheek with the other.

He can’t shake the feeling that he’d left his husband lacking even though Lan Zhan said it isn’t anything he’d done or not done. No, he shouldn’t take the blame for something like this. It would only make Lan Zhan feel like hiding this sort of thing from him.

Reconfigured, they hang onto each other like sweet children, learning the first steps of courtship. At times, their mouths meet, brazen. At others, Lan Wangji teases, playfully nosing. Then, Wei Ying orbits him once more, and he yields, impossibly fond.

"Forgive me." Tender words, trickled. "Misspeaking, I troubled Wei Ying."

Agitated him, gave him clear pause and reason to reconsider. He does not persist, only chasing his husband's lips to reassure him. This is the marriage game: to confide enough to share, but not to alarm. To know when one's mind is better offered out or divided.

He has cast, on this day, too deep a shadow on Wei Ying to be readily forgiven. Will learn, adjust, discipline himself.

His cheek presses into Wei Ying's hand, no better than a kept creature recognising his master. "How may I reassure my love?"

He doesn’t think to hide the pout upon those words. He’d been too eager to please and now Lan Zhan will hide from him this sort of thing in the future. When had he become so insecure? Probably around the same time he left the Jiang clan, come to think of it. Or maybe it was before that. He’d lost a lot - though not nearly as much as Jiang Cheng and his shijie - when Lotus Pier had been under siege.

It’s hard to keep sulking when he has his lovely husband kissing him. He gradually relaxes, kissing back and chasing when Lan Zhan teases his lips. A smile slowly spreads across his face as they take turns leading and following.

“No need,” he answers, resting his head and taking the time to just look at Lan Zhan. “I’m a problem solver. It’s only natural that I’d want to do something to help you, but if there’s nothing I can do, then I won’t worry about it. You shouldn’t either.” He leans forward and presses his forehead against Lan Zhan’s.

Just this. Just like this. He breathes, and it feels almost as if the world breathes him, mouth wet still with the shadow of Wei Ying's kisses, raw from the friction of their touch. An arm climbs over Wei Ying's shoulders, bridging their span. He keeps Wei Ying beside him, too terribly, wonderfully close, blanketing the negative space above Lan Wangji's form.

"You were prepared to sleep with me once more, despite the strain of your body." Even now, gently set above Lan Wangji, Wei Ying yet houses obvious discomfort after their coupling. Uninvited, but butterfly-soft, Lan Wangji's hand treads down to his husband's rump to give it an appreciative tap, signaling the hurt they both know blooms there.

"Do not do so again." A pause, then tenderly. "But thank you."

It is a strange gift he worries he will dishonour, to receive so much of Wei Ying's affection that his husband is prepared to put aside his own welfare, only to satisfy him. He is unworthy of this, horrified of ever unwittingly taking advantage — yet grateful, all the same.

He smiles at his husband, nudging his nose closer and sparing him a few more kisses before he speaks. “We wouldn’t have to do it the normal way. I have hands and a mouth,” he points out and kisses him again to punctuate it. “But you’re right. I would have invited you inside me again if it’s what you were craving.”

Telling the truth isn’t so bad, even if there’s a part of him that wanted to deny there’s any discomfort for the sake of pleasing Lan Zhan physically. This way… it feels more intimate, despite the lack of sexual intimacy. Maybe he’s finally growing up some.

“I just love you so damn much, Lan Zhan. You feel the same about me, too. I’d be upset if you were doing something that hurt you just to make me happy, so… I’ll try not to put either of us in that position anymore. I guess I almost broke that vow I made on our wedding night. Thanks for setting me on the right path again.”

He traces Lan Zhan’s cheek and jaw, then his throat and collarbone. “If you change your mind and want my mouth again, just let me know. I’m always up for some more fun.”

Hands and a mouth, and of course Lan Wangji is but a man, still, impossibly tempted to search Wei Ying's limbs and face with a long, smoldering gaze. Yes, and how pretty they are, how well Lan Wangji has acquainted them. Few things compare to the bliss of possessing the whole of Wei Ying's body, but his grip and the attention of his lips rank high.

They kiss, dragging, drawn out. With no obstacles or destination. Lan Wangji derails only long enough to reassert their intimacy, the lack of concern. Then, it strikes him, half whim, half experiment:

"Wake early enough tomorrow and spirited," without hurts and ache, "and you may take me instead." And before Wei Ying might groan, moan and counteroffer to derail them later into the evening, "At night, we cultivate."

If Wei Ying struggled to do so simply when they attempted it by way of Lan Wangji giving him pleasure, the exercise of retaining his qi and drawing Wangji's in when he penetrates may prove — ...daunting.

Who knew kissing could be both stimulating and relaxing? He feels like his whole body is ready to melt under the attention. Of course, he’s still a younger man than Lan Zhan and his interest in deepening the affection between them into something more sexual is only natural. And the way Lan Zhan looks at him now makes him wonder if Lan Zhan is still up for another round tonight.

His hand wanders over Lan Zhan’s chest, just enjoying the act of touching his husband and being touched too. He pouts for just a moment at the idea of getting up early, but he does like the idea of giving Lan Zhan that sort of intensely pleasurable experience again. He knows that the real reason is that Lan Zhan wants to give his ass a chance to rest before dual cultivation while still fulfilling a need for both of them. “How early?” He’s going to end up falling asleep in the middle of the afternoon if it’s too early.

But it’s worth it.

“Deal,” he says, regardless of Lan Zhan’s answer. He usually wakes up half hard anyway, so it wouldn’t take too much to get him in the mood come morning.

“You just want to keep me in bed with you tonight.” It’s a playful accusation. He likes the idea of sleeping next to Lan Zhan all night long, but he’s just not built to lead a Lan schedule. When he tries to go to bed early, he ends up spending hours in bed staring at the ceiling or at Lan Zhan depending on how full the moon is or if they have braziers burning. Regardless of how successful his attempts are, he just wakes up feeling like he’s a walking corpse.

"Start of si shi," he offers, well past the time of a dutiful rise, but after Lan Wangji's own sword training — an elegant solution, should Wei Ying's enthusiasm sabotage his form. Last they loved in this way, Wei Ying took him gently, hesitantly, with academic curiosity. Now he has tasted the performance, he is likely to want to perfect it, within the limits of sparing his husband. It thrills some part of him that anticipates, unlike Wei Ying, not so much the act of surrender, as much as the one of giving.

Now, he has not embraced yield. He turns suddenly, until Wei Ying is flattened beneath him, his clever hand crushed beneath Lan Wangji's chest, and Wangji's arms barely remembering to come beside his husband and brace himself barely lightly up. Their gazes meet, feverishly.

"As if you could refuse me." The difference in their physical power and qi, if not their cultivation, is strong enough to favor him. Perhaps there is a resemblance between him and a naked brute who defiles virgins, after all.

"Take a sword, in two days' time. After we cultivate. Face me."

Lan Zhan acting so intimidating may scare a lesser man, but he just laughs and squirms under him until he finds a comfortable little nook for his arms. Gods how he loves this man. “As if I could resist you,” he corrects, nudging a cheek with his nose. Once they’re settled again, he meets Lan Zhan’s gaze, eyes traveling to his husband’s lips as he speaks.

“Two days,” he says thoughtfully, then his smile turns impish. Shortly after cultivation, he might be able to hold his own against Lan Zhan for a short while like when they first met. If it’s an endurance battle, he’d have no chance whatsoever. But a quick bout where he doesn’t need to conserve his qi? Well, maybe he can remind Lan Zhan why he fell in love with him in the first place. “I won’t go easy on you.”

He closes the gap between them with a kiss, gentle at first but prying. They still haven’t faced off with the bow yet. He’s only tried archery a few times in this new body and he’s been frustrated by it. But they’ll have an archery yard at their new house. He knows Lan Zhan won’t judge him for his short comings and he doesn’t like leaving the jingshi while Lan Zhan sleeps any more… “And maybe tomorrow we can find somewhere private for some target practice.”

There: Wei Ying how he would always enjoy to have him, if comfort and practicality allowed. Enshrouded from every direction, spared any possibility of attack or exposure. Given the chance, Lan Wangji would become as his clothes, his armour.

He settles simply for these moments, tamed by Wei Ying's sweetness, answering it with nosing in kind, until he must wilt down, only sustaining himself up on his elbows.

"Sizhui will shame us both." But he agrees with a nod, and so Wei Ying's challenge goes accepted. All peasants may hold a blade, but archery ranks foremost among the gentlemanly arts, a sport of as much deadly precision as pomp and circumstance. To kill with the sword is to do so rapidly, intimately, afficiently. The arrow is for showmanship —

And Lan Wangji has married the greatest showman of them all. He will lose. It is a readily absorbed, foregone conclusion. It does not shame him. On the contrary, he will serve Wei Ying with all the dutiful admiration and reverent attention owed by an indentured servant to a precocious, capricious master.

He starts now, with intent to attend Wei Ying's flesh, hand sweeping their night table until it closes on a different, more modest salve pot, light from old abuses. The healing balm that a flushed, embarrassed Lan healer delivered to the sect's second son with gentle, metaphor-drenched urgings to please show delicacy when availing himself of his husband's body.

"Do you prefer to, or shall I?"

It has been long enough since their last shameful excesses that Wei Ying might prefer the privacy of applying the ointment himself. This, too, Lan Wangji must accept.

“Should we invite him?” He knows Sizhui, too, would never judge him on his shortcomings, but for some reason it still strikes him as more embarrassing when it’s Sizhui who sees him. Still, it would be nice for Lan Zhan to spend some time with him. Only time can heal the hurt of Lan Zhan’s disapproval of Sizhui’s choice in suitors. And time spent together will hopefully heal more quickly than time spent apart.

He wants to touch Lan Zhan’s face and when his husband moves to grab the healing salve, he takes the opportunity to work one arm free so he can do so. His fingers comb through Lan Zhan’s hair, working out any tangles that attempt to form from laying down before his hair’s dry. There are far fewer in Lan Zhan’s hair than the mess of his own.

“I’m not picky,” which is a lie, but truth in this specific case. He works his other arm free and reaches for the jar so he can open it. He takes a sniff of it and the scent is pungent and medicinal. Good, it hasn’t gone off yet despite the age of it. “Do you want to?”

Lan Zhan’s already inspected the damage, so it’s not like he will discover something new to feel bad about. If he’s the one to medicate himself, he’ll have to get out of bed to wash his hands and he’s so comfortable that he’d rather stay in bed. He offers the opened jar to his husband, grinning a little.

“Is that monk going to be lecturing tomorrow?” He asks, wondering if Sizhui would rather attend that than spend time with his dads. And… well, he’s curious, too. Though, if he attends a lecture, he’ll likely interrupt with his own questions and commentary.

A nod, gentle and aborted, as he accepts the salve pot. It feels too flimsy in his hand, too light and skeletal. He will have to ask their supply replenished. Incidents, as today's, can strike unexpectedly.

He is not stingy when he dips his fingers in and rescues a wealth of the balm, spread thickly between his fingertips. Dipping in, he allows Wei Ying easier access to his hair, to the thin tangles that pull and drag in the deft knitting of his fingertips. Distract yourself.

"Sizhui, as you wish. Perhaps the second turn." After Wei Ying has experienced being witnessed by another, comfortable person.

He does his own part, furthering their conversation in a honeyed voice, as if two of his fingers do not slide between Wei Ying's parted thighs to seek out his rim, teasing it wet, before delving inside. This is not intended for passion or the sport of wrenching Wei Ying's pleasure and stealing his gasps: he only thrusts in and pulls out, a few times and again.

"The venerable one accepted our hospitality for three days." A strange matter to discuss amid such things, yet. "Speak to him after morning practice."

He hums his agreement, thinking it is probably best to invite Sizhui after he gets a feel for the bow again. Back in his first body, the bow felt like an extension of himself just as the sword had. Even after the separation between his self and his qi, he’d been able to perform perfectly. He’d always enjoyed the sport and often hunted pheasants and other critters to bring home for his shijie to prepare. Part of him would love to do it again, but he thinks Lan Zhan’s heart wouldn’t be able to take such a thing.

He hisses when Lan Zhan’s fingers enter him the first time, but he wills himself to take it without further complaint. While the salve eventually numbs and encourage healing, it stings quite a bit at first.

“I have a few questions for him,” he admits. He feels like he’s already found the key he needs to reach immortality with Lan Zhan, but there’s always the possibility of discovering something more efficient by looking at it from another’s perspective. “All of what we’re working on are Lan secrets, so I’ll be careful what I share.” Not that any dignified cultivator would consider mixing spiritual and resentment qi even if it meant living forever.

Most Lans will consider it blasphemy and he doesn’t expect it to catch on. For the very least, it would take a generation or two to neutralize the stigma of demonic cultivation. Over a decade later, it’s taboo unless it’s too convenient not to use (like some of his inventions).

Cold, perfunctory, unpractised. He is gentle with Wei Ying's flesh, if not amorous, the clinical approach to his venture sufficing, when he means to quiet his husband, sooner than stir his appetites again. His lips chase Wei Ying's forehead, as if these petty trinkets of affection might exorcise his starting hurts.

"I have no worries." Then, extracting his fingers, "More?"

And drowning their medical treatment again, he continues as he had never interrupted himself, as if they are discussing paltry matters together by the window sill, while rains descend.

"Recall he is a hermit of the mountains. Given to seclusion. Lacking in the..." Ability to withstand Wei Ying's chatter and infectious enthusiasm. "Graces of everyday men."

In short, perhaps do not overwhelm or enthrall him, do not shine as bright as living fire. A difficult task for one as enticing as Wei Ying.

a home.

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