[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]

"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..."

[lightamidchaos]

"He is not to visit today. You need not worry," he says, dryly.

He squeezes Wei Ying's hand, then lets go and reaches for his forehead ribbon, still hanging on the nearby hook.

[acrookedpath]

"Does that mean you will not receive any lunch?" He is aghast -- mostly playful, still, but there's a new sharpness to his gaze. "Lan Zhan! I should be fussing over you! I will send you home with entire boxes of food, just wait."

He pokes Lan Zhan in the knee.

[lightamidchaos]

"Mn."

He finishes tying his ribbon as he avoids looking at Wei Ying. He has no intention of telling Wei Ying that he is expected to practice inedia during the day, only taking a meal in the evening.

The knee jab, however, draws a quick look of startled disbelief. He shakes his head and gets to his feet, reaching for the rest of his clean robes where they hang draped over the footboard.

[acrookedpath]

Wei Wuxian beams, utterly guileless at disrupting Lan Zhan's routine, and returns to his tea.

Lan Zhan's lack of an answer does not ease his worries. He knows too well that the other man will deflect, or stay silent, if he does not want to speak the truth. And -- as it takes one insufferable person incapable of accepting help to know another -- getting him to bring back any food from the inn will be difficult.

(The old fury over Lan Zhan's seclusion sits in his belly like a hot coal. It smolders quietly; it flares a little brighter, now, as he pictures Lan Qiren walking away from Cold Pond Cave. As he imagines resentful energy twining around his own hands, ready to strike in revenge for the damage done to Lan Zhan.)

[lightamidchaos]

He finishes dressing and fixes his hair with quick, deft motions, then looks at Wei Ying.

"I will not be long."

Suiting actions to words, he goes quickly to the door, and disappears through it, downstairs to the common room.

[acrookedpath]

Cheerily, Wei Wuxian waves good-bye as Lan Zhan heads out the door.

As soon as the talisman shimmers to lock everything back in place, his smile fades, and he drops his hand with a long, long sigh. His teacup is nearly empty; he refills it, curls up at the headboard, and looks out the window of his room.

They're up high enough that he can only see a thin strip of the grounds before they fade out into the woods. The inlet isn't visible; there's only a sliver of a corner of the lake, blue-green water lapping gently at the shore. No ice. No mist. No coffin floating in the water, with something so angry inside that it would obliterate a universe if let free.

(He should have just called for the energy. It would have hardly been missed from a ghost that violent.)

He glances to Lan Zhan's outer robes where they hang from the privacy screen. An ugly water line breaks them in two at the chest. It must be from when he went to speak to the Ninth, he thinks tiredly. He can only hope he will not be punished for that as well.

At least his headache is nearly gone. All he needed was some tea after all.