[pfsb] ritual aftermath

[lightamidchaos]

He takes Wei Ying from the ritual and back to the room upstairs as quickly as he can, half-wild with worry that he tries to hide.

The other man is unsteady on his feet, dizzy from the vast amounts of resentful energy that had crashed down on them all by the lake. Add to that Harrow's own power, the shock of seeing Jiang Yanli's ghost inhabiting one of the skeletons Harrow had animated, and--

He could curse himself for a fool, and will, later. Right now, there are more important matters.

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[acrookedpath]

Wei Wuxian pulls a face, grumpy enough to object (if only in quiet grumbles), but too off-kilter to actually do anything about it. He lets his eyes close as Lan Zhan busies himself with the tea, and accepts the cup he offers with no further complaint.

It's good, strong tea that tastes of home, and for a terrifying moment he worries his thoughts may unbalance altogether. He breathes in the steam to steady himself, and continues to drink in silence.

[lightamidchaos]

He stays quiet at first, sipping his own tea, trying to tell how Wei Ying is doing from how he is holding himself.

"Do you feel better?"

[acrookedpath]

"Yes." A crooked smile. "Though I suppose anything above nearly fainting on the lake shore would be an improvement, wouldn't it?"

He swallows down more tea.

"A headache. And I am still tired, a little. No worse than that."

[lightamidchaos]

"Mn."

He will be just as glad if he never sees Wei Ying collapse like that again.

"I can ask Bar-guniang for medicine."

[acrookedpath]

He shakes his head, ignoring how the pain flares a little brighter with the movement. "I'm fine, Lan Zhan," he says. "I only need to rest a little longer. And enjoy my tea."

He lifts the cup in a small toast, with an equally small smile.

"And you? Are you well, after...?"

[lightamidchaos]

"I am not ill."

Lying is forbidden. He is not sure he could convince himself it would not be a lie, if he said he was fine.

"Harrow is all right, also."

[acrookedpath]

"She is?" He sags, visibly, with relief. "Good. Good. Then we are all well."

For given values thereof.

"Was she able to finish the ceremony, even though I couldn't...?"

Even though I failed, he wants to say, but cannot move the words further up his throat.

[lightamidchaos]

"She did."

He studies the other man's expression as Wei Ying's words trail into nothingness, and is deeply certain that he recognizes what he sees there.

"Wei Ying. Do not."

[acrookedpath]

"She needed help, Lan Zhan, and I could not." Frustration bleeds into his voice. "And I do not know why. Yes, she is powerful, and her necromancy is different, but I should not have been so undone by it. Is it because I am dead? Is it because I cannot use the energy of the body like her? I am helpless, and -- "

He cuts himself off there.

[lightamidchaos]

"You are not helpless."

Everything else can wait. He goes to the heart of what he has just heard, unhesitating.

"You did not even try to use the resentful energy there. I would have known. As much of it as there was --"

"-- you are not helpless, Wei Ying."

[acrookedpath]

He watches his tea the entire time Lan Zhan speaks, unable to meet his eye, as if this were a reprimand and not a fierce encouragement.

"I was too overwhelmed by it," he says, softly. "And I did not know if it would disrupt the ceremony, if I did." He exhales another small, humorless laugh. "Another thing I should have throught to ask the Ninth before we began."

He drinks.

[lightamidchaos]

He shakes his head.

"She said she had never seen it so strange."

Which is just as well, he thinks, because if she had known and had not warned them--

"That she did not know what it did."

[acrookedpath]

A few more piece of what Lan Zhan is saying click together, and Wei Wuxian lowers his cup.

"You have spoken to her already?"

He'd assumed, when Lan Zhan said the Ninth was fine, that he had seen something Wei Wuxian missed in his half-conscious state.

[lightamidchaos]

"I went to find her."

"Once you were safe. Asleep," he corrects himself, quickly.

"You were worried about her."

[acrookedpath]

"Yes." He exhales. "Thank you, then, for checking on her, Lan Zhan. When she said she did not know what it did... what was different, from when she had performed it before?"

[lightamidchaos]

He shakes his head at the thanks. It is true, that Wei Ying had been worried and in part, so had he - but it is also true that he went seeking answers, to discover if Harrow had known what would happen.

At the question, however, his gaze slips down and off to the side. He cannot meet Wei Ying's glance.

"The enumeration. Usually it would not have ... such power."

Usually it would not have Wei Ying invoking it - but more, he thinks, usually it would not have the Second Jade of Lan summoning spirits through Inquiry.

[acrookedpath]

His throat tightens. Softer, "So I was not have supposed to seen shijie. Or Jin Zixuan."

He cradles his tea in both hands.

"That... would have made some of it easier. Yes."

[lightamidchaos]

"I am sorry."

Barely above a whisper, it is all he can manage to force past the knot in his throat.

[acrookedpath]

He looks up, frowning.

"For what?"

Because the way Lan Zhan says it, it is not the sympathetic apology of Wei Wuxian facing a part of his dead family.

[lightamidchaos]

He swallows, hard.

"Inquiry."

[acrookedpath]

The word strikes him like a slap. Wei Wuxian's stomach plummets.

"You think that -- ?"

He doesn't know why he does it: the miserable guilt etched on Lan Zhan's face; the half-formed memory of how peaceful he felt upon waking, before he realized how shameless he'd been during the night, even for him. But before he can second-guess his impulse, he reaches to grab Lan Zhan's hand.

"Lan Zhan, no. If I am not at fault for the ceremony going as it did, then neither are you."

[lightamidchaos]

His fingers close tight around Wei Ying's.

Wei Ying has not recoiled; Wei Ying has not condemned him.

Lan Wangji finds that he is able to breathe again.

"No fault," he concedes. "For either. Any."

[acrookedpath]

"Yes," he agrees. "It was a collision of many powerful types of cultivation, in a place with strange energy of its own. None of us expected it. We are all safe, and well. That is what matters."

He cracks a smile.

"Well, I may fall asleep again when you return home, Lan Zhan, but I am otherwise well."

[lightamidchaos]

Lan Wangji finally looks up at him again.

"Good. You should rest."

A thoughtful pause.

"And eat. To restore your energy. I will bring breakfast."

[acrookedpath]

Wei Wuxian groans, heartily, but it trails into a laugh soon enough.

"I should not have said anything," he says. "You will worry and fuss for so long you will not go home until shēn hour, and when Zewu-jun comes to bring you lunch you will have to explain you visited an inn at the end of the world. What then! He will think you're crazy! They will test you for fever, they will force-feed you soup..."