wuji

[flauntist]

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[flauntist]

[ Come hunt, he'd said, forgetting himself. Come hunt, and with it all inherent and uncertain things: the offer, the threat, the dare. He'd expected a no. He still expects a no, even with all the requisite formalities exchanged. Time and place, echoing like a promise and he's not sure this current skin is suited to survive such an ordeal. But. But.

He's no expert when it comes to parsing Lan Wangji's words. He's improved, over time. He can pick the intent and reaction out more often than he can't, can read the tiny shifts that strangers don't so that conversations he plays no part in occur with the other party all but blind in comparison. The selfish part of him takes pride in the *knowing*. The selfish part of him, he understands now, wants more. The want is hard to gauge with entire sects between them.

A kinder man might have given the venerable Hanguang-jun an inn, at least. A city. Some semblance of civilization to land his weary feet at, surely. Wei Wuxian--ever a bastion of propriety--perches himself on a boulder, jar in hand, at a barely-descript crossroads in the middle of nowhere northern Lanling and watches the slowly darkening sky as Little Apple finds a meal in the long grasses that hem in the edge of the nearby woods. ]

[taciturnly]

( have you ever had your body freeze in fear, in shock, in fragmented self-control, while the other half strives to fling itself across the distance between you and the cause of that fluttering ache between your ribs? it feels a lot like nausea, and lan wangji’s head spins, swims, the same way his eyes turn a little red-brimmed, a little blurry.

his grief, his pain. his guilt. it doesn’t spill over, but it’s there, catching the night sky’s light, casting a halo around wei wuxian’s silhouette. he blinks. wei wuxian is still there, almost surreal, and he doesn’t deflect. it’s a game they’ve played for a long time. a game lan wangji thought he’d mastered, his typical silence the greatest diversion of all. but he doesn’t want to run anymore. he doesn’t even know whether he could, when wei wuxian so effortlessly pins him there. it’s a fantasy he selfishly indulges in, to gain his affections, but it is one he won’t ever ask of him, or entertain outside of dreams. wei wuxian, alive, is enough, but right now, for a fleeting moment, his hopes turn adamantine and soften all his jagged edges, eroded by time.

or lack thereof.

he smiles. he doesn’t even mean to, but all things considered, it’s preferable to the alternative, on his knees in actual dirt, shoulders shaking under the weight of too much, unleashed at last. he smiles a weak smile, and when he thinks his voice won’t tremble, he speaks. ) I was taught how to, underneath these robes. ( and he doesn’t mean his literal robes. just. beyond the decorum, the precepts, and the desolate austerity of his clan in particular. wei wuxian showed him… well. maybe not a brighter way, but most assuredly a better one, even with its many pains. especially with them.

and somewhere under the scorching sun, lan wangji allowed himself to bloom. )