Chapter Text
The first to hear of the trouble was Lan Sizhui. The young masters took turns listening to the petitioners who came to Cloud Recesses to ask for the cultivators’ assistance and the woman arrived there on his watch.
She came from a small town in the eastern part of the Lan lands. She was in her forties, not rich but comfortably off, judging by her clothes, and her voice was pleasantly low. Also, she was obviously ill at ease, and Sizhui could see why. Her story had absolutely nothing to do with any otherworldly visitations.
‘My sister is not much younger than me, but she still looks nice. She has lovely thick hair. Her husband used to say she looked like an empress when she bound it up.’
‘Used to?’ The young man caught the past tense. ‘Is he dead?’
‘No! This is the point. Years ago, soon after they were married, he bought for her a gold hairpin. It was very expensive, but he worked hard and saved the money. “My beautiful wife should wear beautiful things”, he said. Two weeks ago there was a big festival in our town. My sister braided her hair and fastened it with her precious pin. Even I must admit that she looked very attractive. In the evening they came back home and they, um, the young master understands – she had other things on her mind. So she just put the pin beside the bed. And in the morning, this is what they found.’
She held something out towards the young cultivator and he instinctively took the proffered object.
The pin must have been exquisite, a bunch of golden flowers trembling on delicate stems, twisting tendrils and hanging beads that jingled sweetly; but now it was just a jumble of gold wires, twisted and warped beyond any hope of repair. It took considerable force to mangle it so, thought Sizhui. There was true anger at work here.
‘My sister’s husband was very hurt. He went as far as to suspect that she had damaged his gift on purpose. To tell him that she no longer considered him virile. Ridiculous! I know her. She would never do it. He may be getting older, he may not be as vigorous as he once was, but she loves him! And she has always put immense value on this pin.’
‘This is very unfortunate indeed,’ commiserated Sizhui with his usual politeness. ‘But I fail to perceive the space for our intervention here.’
‘Young master, such acts of malice are happening all over the town. I’ve been asking round. Couples are fighting. It feels as if people had swallowed a mind-altering poison.’
***
Lan Wangji looked at the manuscripts heaped on his desk.
The woman’s story might turn out to have a perfectly ordinary explanation; but then, it might not, and he was Han Guang Jun, the lonely hunter famous for never turning down a plea for assistance. Now that he was no longer alone, he did not intend to change his ways. But those manuscripts had been sent to him from another sect for assessment and, the matter being of some urgency, for the past few days he had been working through them very assiduously.
Even a few months ago, he would have been in a quandary.
But now he was not. The man who stood by his side could be trusted with the mission, even though this meant they’d have to part for a while; something they had not done since that miraculous moment on Dafan Mountain.
‘Wei Ying, can you take the juniors and go? Start the investigation and I will join you as soon as I finish with these.’
‘Fine. Lan Sizhui! Lan Jingyi! Muster the gang, we’re leaving at noon!’
Lan Wangji sighed as he watched his retreating back. He wished he could go right now. He barely dared to admit to himself how much he loved these shared wanderings, just he and Wei Ying, plus occasionally the bunch of youngsters. He did not resent their company, for he valued the intellectual exercise they provided him with, not to mention the sheer pleasure of watching Wei Ying teach them.
Wei Ying’s attitude to sect rules was scandalous. He was corrupting the hitherto impeccable Lan disciples at an alarming rate. But, for some reason Lan Wangji did not entirely understand, the approach worked wonders. It’s only been a few months and he could already see the kids blooming. Their hearts were as brave and their minds as keen as before; but now their eyes were laughing.
Strangely enough, the thought of Wei Ying making the Lan disciples laugh filled his heart with a feeling he had only recently learnt to recognise as tenderness.
‘I want to night-hunt with you for the rest of my life,’ he whispered.
He still found it hard to believe that he had actually heard those words, and from the man he had wanted to say them for so many years.
***
The Lan troop was airborne before the sun reached its zenith, well aware that Senior Wei would give them a tongue-lashing had any of them tarried. No-one commented on the fact that while their mentor flew with them, effortlessly matching their speed, there was no sword under his feet. He just needed to whistle a short tune and he rose into the air. The young men firmly closed their minds to the question of how this was done.
Having descended towards the town in a tidy formation, they landed just outside its walls and walked in. Needless displays of power were prohibited by a very low-number rule. They found lodgings at an inn, ate the midday meal – Senior Wei did not argue, he knew the juniors turned cantankerous when unfed – and divided the tasks.
***
The first results of their enquiries were discouraging.
Nothing of import seems to have happened in this town for years, with the exception of a giant landslide caused by the spring rains two years before, which carried away a part of the north-south highway that crossed the countryside half a day’s journey away from the town. The whole road needed to be shifted and the new highway ran right outside its walls. The local traders and innkeepers were delighted with the increased traffic, but this was practically all.
***
Two brothers who farmed adjoining plots of land had nearly broken their hoes on each other, hurling insults, when an exchange of goods and services had gone sour. The team established that the dispute arose around the relative worth of a sheep versus days of working the rice paddy and discounted the matter. This was a case for a judge, not for a cultivator.
***
The schoolmaster had a hanging scroll stolen from the day room. It was not very valuable, but a cherished memento: the calligraphy on it was a poem that the schoolmaster had written for his wife when he was wooing her. The lady in question was devastated over its loss, and the gentleman sulky.
Two incense sticks worth of an investigation revealed that the scroll had not, in fact, been stolen; the servants found it damaged one morning and put it out of sight for fear of a reprimand. When this came to light, they brought it back from its hiding place. It was indeed defaced, as if it had been scratched with long fingernails. The writing was still legible, though, and in the end the schoolmaster promised his wife to rewrite the poem. All would be well.
The only remaining question was how the scroll had got damaged in the first place. The servants blamed the cat; only it had been hanging too high for any cat to have got at it. Still, none of them confessed.
***
A young man was studying for his examinations and could not concentrate because of a demon that oppressed him during sleep by sitting on his chest and throwing his thoughts in confusion. The claim was made by his mother, the young man himself hanging back, clearly mortified and making vague gestures at the cultivators. He later caught up with them in the street and explained that his thoughts were indeed being thrown in confusion, but by a local beauty whose name he stalwartly refused to mention (not that he was asked). The cultivators said they understood. Some of them truly did.
***
The two gardens that lay side by side in a quiet district of the town were known as the Garden of the Calligrapher and the Garden of the Concubine, but the reason for that had long been forgotten. The land had been municipal property for decades and the town council would appoint a man to look after them.
That area fell to Lan Sizhui and Lan Yi, the baby of the troop. Together they decided that while the place seemed unpromising as far as information went, they might just as well look in. If the gardens proved attractive, they would recommend a visit to the rest of the team.
The council had been lucky in their most recent choice of a gardener. No longer young, but strong like an ox, he was obviously in love with these gardens. He showed the young Lans round, pointing out their assets with great pride.
‘Were these gardens designed together?’ asked Sizhui.
‘Yes, they were. It is not immediately obvious, but they were. The Garden of the Calligrapher is an arrangement of rocks and pines. A winter space. The young masters should come to see it under snow. A splendid sight. The Garden of the Concubine is one of water and flowering trees. A spring garden. But, strange thing, both of them look their best in the autumn. Because in all the other seasons, the Garden of the Calligrapher is too…’ The man hesitated, short of a word.
‘Austere?’ prompted Sizhui. He enjoyed listening to people who had a passion for their job.
‘Yes, that’s it. Austere. And the Garden of the Concubine is only beautiful. But in the autumn, the austere garden seems at peace, and the beautiful garden enchants the soul.’
‘Huh. This sounds interesting. The designer must have been a very sensitive man.’
‘This I cannot know, but he certainly did a good job.’
But, the gardener told them worriedly, while the Garden of the Calligrapher thrived, the Garden of the Concubine had begun to wither.
‘Two years ago, not the last spring but the spring before, we had great rains. I did what I could to drain the excess moisture, but the water balance must have got disturbed. The winter garden came back to its old self, although much later in the year. The spring garden did bloom, but very sparsely, and since then it has not been well. I am still hoping, though.’
***
The hunter who hanged himself had lived some way away, a little up the mountain. He had no family. His little hut had been burnt, together with all his possessions, after his death. They were told the body had been buried behind the remnants of his abode.
The team latched onto the suicide because they had virtually nothing else to go on. They had talked to the hairpin owner, her very grumpy husband hovering in the background, but they did not learn anything beyond what they already knew. Not even one person they accosted reported anything out of the ordinary; certainly no uncanny activity. The youngsters were getting desperate. They felt they would disappoint Han Guang Jun if they did not discover anything.
‘Maybe Senior Wei can summon his soul?’ said Lan Jingyi hopefully. ‘It’s not that anyone will see us there.’
He was irritable and argumentative as if his name were not Lan, but at the same time of all the sect’s disciples he was the most accepting of the dark path. He had been born too late to remember the campaign that brought the Yiling Patriarch down and, being lazy, he recognised the advantages of Wei Wuxian’s methods. He was the second after Lan Sizhui to start using the name Wei, not Mo, for their new senior.
This time, they walked. They had two novices with them, who had not yet learnt to fly their swords. On the way from Gusu the two eldest Lans carried them on their backs, but now all that awaited them was a pleasant afternoon hike, there was no need to tax anybody’s powers, whether physical, spiritual or… otherwise.
Wei Wuxian had promised Han Guang Jun (and through him his brother, in whose domain he now lived) that he would not walk the darkest paths without reason. He intended to keep his word. He had too much to lose now.
But as they stood in a little clearing that was already being claimed by the forest, no grave marker in sight, he shrugged. This was where his methods were the most efficient. Otherwise they would spend the afternoon digging in the ground like a team of earthworms, possibly to no avail.
‘Move back a little.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘Nothing that I would like you to learn.’
The boys saw Senior Wei squat, ball his hand into a fist, and strike the ground.
They felt the earth under their feet vibrate slightly, painfully, as if some telluric current had radiated from him, sending a message all the way to the bedrock that a man stronger than the mountains had arrived and he would brook no resistance.
Immediately after the punch Senior Wei laid his hand flat on the ground.
Then he stretched up and pointed.
‘There,’ he said calmly. ‘This is where the man is buried.’
Once they knew, the grave was discernible, if only as a patch of darker grass.
‘Shall we dig him up?’
‘No need. He will come to us himself.’
Senior Wei pulled his black flute from his sash and put it to his lips.
The melody he played was strangely cadenced, although by no means unpleasant. The boys shivered. They expected eldritch wonders to start happening any moment.
And they were disappointed. Nothing happened.
Senior Wei rubbed his chin with his fingers.
‘How interesting. There’s nothing in there.’
‘A desecration?!’
‘No, no! There’s a body in there all right,’ he corrected himself. ‘Mouldering nicely, thank you. But no soul. The man destroyed it. It will not return. Lan Sizhui, please, how can a soul return to earth?’
‘To reincarnate, which return is voluntary. As a ghost, which return may be voluntary or involuntary. For a summoning, which return is caused by the spell and thus involuntary,’ answered Lan Sizhui smoothly. The question had been for the benefit of the novices, he himself had learnt this ages ago, and he actually showed off a little.
‘Thank you. And this soul here will not return. Never. Gone.’
‘How can this be done?’ The boys shifted uneasily. This was serious stuff.
‘A soul can, of course, be obliterated by a cultivator. Not by you. You are learning to send souls to the otherworld, where they belong. But there are some who can do it.’
He looked at them, carefully emptying his eyes of emotion, and noted with delight that they shrank back a little. He loved cultivating his image. Besides, it was true; he could. He had done it to thousands of souls.
‘But to do it to one’s own soul requires very strong intent, so strong it is nearly inhuman. We all like getting second chances, eh? Trust me, I know; I’m enjoying mine. This is why spiritual self-annihilation is a very rare phenomenon. Humph. Curious. Very curious. Suicide, I understand. But this? It seems a little extreme.’
‘Perhaps there was an error in the summoning,’ offered one of the boys unthinkingly.
Wei Wuxian gave him his best teacher’s stare.
‘Care to identify the fault in your reasoning?’ he asked pleasantly.
The boy was quick to see his mistake.
‘I apologise, Senior Wei! You can’t have made an error in the summoning!’
The stare grew definitely colder. The whole group squirmed.
‘Lan Jingyi, I happen to know you know the correct answer. I once heard you state it. So please don’t disappoint me.’
The young man drew himself to full height.
‘An advanced-level magical weapon cannot fail the first time and succeed the second,’ he recited. ‘The summoning was performed accurately. A second attempt is pointless.’
‘And it loses you time and drains your powers,’ added Wei Wuxian. ‘Which in combat conditions is dangerous. By the way, Lan gongzi, I never thanked you. I appreciated your perspicacity that day.’ He gave him a small bow. Soon after he had returned to life, Lan Jingyi saved him a second lash from Zidian and that was no small thing.
The boy grinned. But his answering bow was both graceful and courteous. His name was Lan, after all.
‘All right, no point in lingering here. We won’t learn a thing. The man is gone forever, nothing I can do.’
***
The yield of the evening’s enquiries was as follows.
Two young women had nearly scratched each other’s eyes out in the marketplace. The young masters located both of them, but they were unwilling to share the details of the incident. There had been a wayward beau at the root of it.
A small but cherished garden had been ransacked. Street urchins were suspected. They apparently had a reason to bear a grudge; the mistress of the house was not charitable. Her husband, a much older gentleman, blamed her bitterly. The garden had been the apple of his eye.
Sizhui said he could sense a pattern emerging but was unable to pinpoint it. The others were sceptical. Jingyi said that a pattern that consisted of exceptions was no pattern at all. Master Wei had nothing constructive to add. He shooed them in for supper instead.
Afterwards, he shared a drink with the two almost-adults – ‘Just don’t tell Han Guang Jun’, he said and they swore they wouldn’t; he had been joking, but he was touched by their loyalty anyway – and sent the whole bunch to bed only a little later than the prescribed time. He drank a second jar on his own, noting how little satisfaction it offered without an impassive Lan sipping his tea opposite him. He briefly debated with himself whether a midnight walk might alleviate his boredom, decided against it and repaired upstairs.
***
‘How come that since I returned so much of what I say in jest comes back to haunt me?’ he mused a while later as he sat on the ledge of his room’s window. ‘This is so unfair. I told him I couldn’t sleep without him and now here I am, staring at the moon like a dazed owl.’
Bamboo leaves rustled in a nearby courtyard, further away cats fought or made love, it was his first night alone since Yunping four months ago, and sleep just wouldn’t come. He missed the long, hard body to drape himself over, the slow rise and fall of the chest under his cheek.
He… He missed sex, too.
Initially, he had not always been entirely sure he liked what they were doing. He got himself a man who was large, and eager, and – inexperienced. He had to grit his teeth. Truth to tell, they were both green. They had a few awkward moments. Some of his pleas for mercy had been genuine. But now… He would give anything to be writhing under Lan Zhan at this moment, not sitting alone under the waxing moon.
He curled up, absentmindedly looking at his bare foot washed in the pale glow. There was a thin white line glistening just above the ankle. A thread? He reached to remove it and discovered he couldn’t. It was a small scar, of the kind that teenage boys get from rough play. He stared at it, a sudden tightening at his heart. He used to have scores of those. But he would never know how this one came to mark his skin.
This scar was not his.
This body was…
Once or twice he had been close to asking Lan Zhan which of his two bodies he liked better. But each time the question, initially intended as playful, froze on his lips. Because what if Lan Zhan did have a preference, and it was for the one that had been destroyed, in a rather disagreeable manner, on the Burial Mounds? So no. Better forget that taller, broader, more muscular, more masculine frame he used to have.
When Wei Wuxian returned from the dead, he found his new body neglected. Now, after a few months of adventures, it had filled out. But he already knew he would always be lean and never as strong as he used to be when alive for the first time.
His thoughts went to the troubled youth who let himself be persuaded into recalling the most hated villain from the otherworld and thus granted him, Wei Wuxian, a second chance at life while forever losing his first.
He owed him.
Until now, he had no opportunity to examine this gift he had been given. Even before Yunping he had not been alone for long enough, and if he had, there were other things on his mind. But tonight he was both safe and alone, sleep wouldn’t come and this demented moonlight had put him in a weird mood.
Slowly, meditatively, Wei Wuxian began to take stock of his body.
He was already staring at his feet, so he started there. They were strong, sinewy. He flexed an ankle. It moved with satisfying ease. He had already noted that his walk was lighter now. In his previous life he had weighed more.
Hands. Clean. This had not always been the case, especially later, towards the end. Distinct tendons on the back. A jutting bone at the wrist. Long fingers, nimble on the flute. Fingernails pink and glossy like a girl’s.
He lifted one finger to touch his lips. Ah… Still tender from the night before. Lan Zhan was ruthless when he kissed.
He shivered and pushed this thought from his mind. If not, he would have moaned.
Face. That he had already come to terms with. He liked it, actually. The almond-shaped eyes were better than his old ones, and so were the eyebrows, as black and as arched as the wings of a swift. The brown irises had an unusual russet tinge. The nose was – well, just a nose. But the wide mouth was perfect for grinning and the teeth white and even. So this was all right.
Neck, long. He uncurled, giving his hands the space to roam. Collarbones, prominent. Shoulders, bony. But the skin smooth. Lan Zhan would rub it pink every time.
Chest. The sleek curvature of pectoral muscles.
To go lower, he had to untie the tapes that held his shirt closed. He tugged at the knot.
A night bird flew noiselessly across the face of the moon. Brushed by its shadow, Wei Wuxian came to his senses. What was he doing?! A young master touching himself up at a window on a moonlit night, all he needed was for someone to see him and there would be no end to gossip. He jumped off the ledge and made a few steps back, into the room.
He pulled off his shirt, and then his trousers, and threw them away.
He stood naked in the pool of moonlight pouring in through the window, every plane and every curve of his body limned in silver. Had his lover been there to see him, he would have knelt in adoration.
But Wei Wuxian was unaware of his eerie beauty. He continued to explore himself.
Nipples like unripe berries. He already knew them to turn dark brown under Lan Zhan’s mouth. Ribs. Abdomen. Hard and flat like a board. Nothing to be ashamed of there.
Hips. Narrow. Elastic. Those, too, he liked. He had a feeling that since he returned, his catlike saunter when he charmed ghouls into obedience had acquired a new grace.
Long, slender thighs. Strongly bound knees. Sculpted calves. Slim ankles. This was a body of a runner, not a wrestler. He could live with that. He had never liked wrestling anyway.
He straightened up.
He pushed his thumbs into the hipbones, exploring the rigid structure underneath the skin. He put his hands on the small of his back and stretched. The pull on the muscles was pleasant. This was a healthy body. It won’t require much care.
He moved his hands lower to feel his buttocks. Aw! There were bruises there, left by hard fingers digging into his flesh. Wei Wuxian twisted round, trying to assess the damage, but he could see only a part of his back and the curves beneath. Never mind. He was getting used to being bruised. Han Guang Jun was immensely powerful and he had never needed to control his strength. All his life he had battled monsters and avoided human touch.
Until now.
Wei Wuxian chuckled. Ah, Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, you’re a man among men. Fierce like a tiger, bashful like a maiden, you rough me up however you want and I love it every way. I never expected I would feel like this! You are… You are the best in the world.
Last night was the first time he had managed to coax his lover into leaving the initiative to him. Lan Zhan seemed fearful. Acquiescence was new to him. But he leant back, allowing himself to be straddled. Then he wrapped them both in his white robe.
When sober, this perfect Lan was shy about his nakedness.
The silk rustled as Wei Wuxian rode him, finally able to control the pace and the depth. When Lan Zhan was close to his peak, he grabbed Wei Wuxian’s butt, holding him on himself. Wei Wuxian did not complain. He was far too busy moaning out his bliss.
No worries. Han Guang Jun sometimes struck the strings of his guqin hard. Other times, he caressed them like the tenderest lover. He would learn to caress his man the same way. And Wei Wuxian was no weakling. He could take a bruise, and give one, too.
Even in this new body.
He stood straight, pulling his shoulder blades together. He moved his hands upwards in one long stroke, back to his breast. He reached to press his upper arm. No, he will never again be able to draw a bow as heavy as he used to.
So…?
Wei Wuxian smiled, and it was not a benign smile.
I am the Yiling Patriarch. I have my ways. My bow may be lighter now, but my arrows still find their target even when my eyes are bound.
I am the Yiling Patriarch. I do what I do. Ghouls fear me and corpses obey me.
I am the Yiling Patriarch! Only now I’m wiser. I’m not too proud to listen to advice from the one who loves me.
The one who…
He lifted his arms and slowly pulled at the ribbon that held his hair. It slithered to the floor and a black mass fell to his shoulders. He combed his open palms through the tresses, his movement sensuous.
…loves me…
In his past life, and even in the present, Wei Wuxian never looked after his hair in any significant way. Clean and bound up, that’s how he liked it. But over the last four months Lan Zhan seemed to have developed an inexplicable desire to stroke it, kiss it, pull at it, bury his face in it.
The first time he put a comb to his mane, Wei Wuxian had shied like a horse, pulling it from his hands. The second, he yielded, a little puzzled at Lan Zhan’s heavy breathing, and decided that the feeling was pleasant. Still, he couldn’t understand his lover’s fascination. It was Lan Zhan who had beautiful hair, not he. The third, he leant against Lan Zhan’s chest and allowed himself to enjoy the unhurried touch. The fourth, he was hooked. And now his hair was soft, pliant, caressed into beauty.
He lifted a strand to his nose. It smelt nice, of soap and herbs, and his lover’s hands.
Hands…? Last night Lan Zhan had rubbed his groin with Wei Wuxian’s hair, moaning quietly as Wei Wuxian sucked on his shaft before he straddled him and took it into himself.
What Wei Wuxian could smell in his hair was the scent of his lover’s sex.
And at that realisation, he lost control. His cock jumped up, swelling with blood.
These parts of him would no longer be ignored.
He reached down.
In his first life, he had never been truly attracted to any girl. He flirted with them, yes, but the prodigious sexual exploits of the Yiling Patriarch were a legend. Pornography didn’t count, despite the impressive quantity he had gone through. Neither did masturbation.
Wei Wuxian had died a virgin, almost wholly ignorant of his own body.
And now, as he explored the hard curve of his shaft and the texture of his balls, he suddenly realised that he did not remember what his previous set of genitals had been like.
He chuckled. He was aware that many men obsessed about their size in comparison with other men. Had he been more experienced, he might have actually ended up obsessing about his size in comparison with himself.
So it was a good thing he had been so innocent before he died.
All that he had to go on by way of comparisons was Lan Zhan. But while Lan Zhan was endowed generously enough to upset any male, Wei Wuxian was wholly immune to frustration on that basis. All of Lan Zhan’s size, hardness, scent and taste were his to enjoy.
His lover kissed his mouth raw, bit him to draw blood, took him hard and made him writhe, toss his head and cry for mercy as he rode him – and now he missed him so much that was ready to howl. Oh fuck, Lan Zhan! Why are you not here! I want you!
You said everyday; and now who has reneged on the deal?
Oh, I’ll make you pay for this as soon as you turn up.
In the meantime, no, I can’t stand it.
Wei Wuxian grabbed his erection, fell on the bed and pleasured himself, digging his heels into the mattress and pushing his hips upwards, until he came.