Chapter 74: The Broad Han, Seventeen

After that fight was done, Wen Ning too, on account of his ferocious, frenzied, hair-raising display, gradually came by an unflattering nickname — but that is a later story. Though Jiang Cheng had run him through the belly, Wei Wuxian paid it little mind, tucked his entrails back in, and, as if nothing at all had happened, set Wen Ning to hunting down a few evil spirits, then bought several great sacks of potatoes to carry home.

Back at the Burial Mounds, Wen Qing bound his wound and scolded him till his head spun, for what she had sent him to buy was radish seeds.

After that came a stretch of placid, uneventful days. Wei Wuxian led his fifty Wen cultivators across the Burial Mounds, tilling a little earth, mending a few roofs, refining the odd corpse, fashioning his implements. His idle hours he spent playing with Wen Qing's cousin's child, Wen Yuan, a boy of barely a year or two — hanging him up in a tree, or burying him in the soil with only his head showing, coaxing him that a little sun and a little watering would make him grow all the faster, and getting a thorough scolding from Wen Qing for his trouble.

Several months passed in this manner, and apart from the world's opinion of Wei Wuxian turning steadily worse, nothing further came of it.

The days Wei Wuxian could leave the mountain were few, for every malevolent, deathly thing across the whole of the Burial Mounds was held down by him and him alone; he could not stray too far, nor stay away too long, yet being restless by nature, a man who could never sit still in one place, he often made his way to the nearest Small Town, roaming about under the pretext of buying supplies. And because Wen Yuan had been cooped up on the Burial Mounds far too long, Wei Wuxian felt it wrong to leave a child of two forever stuck in such a place playing with mud, so one day, going down to shop, he took the boy along.

He had been to this Small Town so many times he knew it like the back of his hand. He sidled up to a vegetable stall, turned the wares over and over, then suddenly snatched one up and said, indignant, “These potatoes of yours have sprouted!”

The vendor braced as though for battle: “And what of it?!”

Said Wei Wuxian, “Knock the price down.”

At first Wen Yuan clung to his leg, but as Wei Wuxian paced back and forth picking over potatoes and haggling, the boy hanging on all the while, before long he could hold no longer — his short arms ached — and he let go to rest a moment; yet in that one moment the press of the crowd jostled him this way and that until he lost all sense of direction. His sight sat low to the ground, and wander as he might, he could not find Wei Wuxian's long legs and black boots, his whole world filled with a throng of dusty, grubby legs in dirt-spattered black trousers, until, ever more lost and helpless, dizzy and turned about, he bumped all at once against someone's leg.

That person wore a pair of boots of spotless, snow-white leather, and having walked slowly to begin with, halted on the instant at the bump.

Trembling, Wen Yuan tipped his face upward — first he saw the jade pendant hung at the waist, then the belt worked with a curling-cloud pattern, then the meticulously even collar, and last of all a pair of eyes the colour of glazed crystal, cold as frost.

This stranger was gazing down at him from on high, his look severe and chill, and Wen Yuan was seized with a sudden fear.

Over at his stall, Wei Wuxian, after picking and choosing for the longest while, decided in the end against the sprouted potatoes — eat them and one might be poisoned, and the man wouldn't drop his price anyway — and earned a scornful sniff from the vendor. But when he turned round, Wen Yuan was gone. He paled in alarm and went searching up and down the street, then suddenly heard the great wailing of a small child and rushed toward it. Not far off, a crowd of idle, meddling passersby had gathered into a shifting ring, heads bent close, whispering and pointing. He pushed his way through them, and his eyes lit up at once.

There, hemmed in by the crowd, stood Lan Wangji, robed in white with Bichen at his back, stiff as a post and, for once, ever so slightly at a loss. A second look nearly knocked Wei Wuxian over with laughter. A little boy had plopped down at Lan Wangji's feet, streaming tears and snot, bawling fit to burst. Lan Wangji could neither walk away nor stay, neither reach out a hand nor speak a word; his face was grave, as though he were earnestly working out what on earth to do.

A bystander, cracking melon seeds, drawled, “What's all this, then? Such a wee scrap of a tyke, howling enough to fright a body to death.”

Another said with conviction, “Got a scolding off his die, I'd wager.”

At the word die, Wei Wuxian, hidden in the crowd, snorted. Lan Wangji's head came up at once. “I am not,” he denied.

But Wen Yuan had no notion what they were saying — a frightened child cries out for the one dearest to him — and so, sobbing, he too wailed, “A-die! A-die, waaah—”

A bystander said at once, “Hear that! Just like I said — it's his die!”

One who fancied his own keen eye put in, “The die for certain — that nose, struck from the very same mould, no mistaking it!”

One who pitied the boy: “Poor little thing, crying so hard — did his die scold him?”

One who hadn't a clue: “What's the holdup up front? Mind shifting aside? My cart can't get through.”

One who scolded: “Doesn't even think to pick the child up and soothe him! Just lets his son sit on the ground and bawl? Call himself a die!”

One who sympathized: “So young — first time being a die, I'd guess. I was the same in my day, knew not a thing; once the wife's had a few more you'll get the knack of it. It's all learned slow, bit by bit—”

One who coaxed the child: “There now, don't cry — where's your a-niang?”

“Aye, where's the niang? The die's no use at all — where's his niang got to?”

In the swelling tide of clamour, Lan Wangji's face grew stranger and stranger.

Pity him: from the day of his birth he had been heaven's own favoured son, every word and gesture the very paragon of propriety, the model among models, never once in his life standing under the pointing of a thousand fingers. Wei Wuxian laughed himself half to death — yet seeing Wen Yuan crying nearly to the end of his breath, he had at last to step out, feigning to have only just spotted the pair of them, and exclaimed in surprise, “Eh? Lan Zhan?”

Lan Wangji's head snapped up; their eyes met, and for some reason he could not name, Wei Wuxian looked away. But at the sound of his voice Wen Yuan scrambled up at once and, trailing two torrents of tears, ran to him and fastened himself back onto his leg. The bystanders clamoured, “And who's this now? Where's the niang? Where's the niang got to — which one's the die after all?”

Wei Wuxian waved a hand. “Off with you, off with you all!”

Seeing there was no more spectacle to be had, the idlers drifted off at last, slow and grudging. Wei Wuxian turned back, gave a faint smile, and said, “What a coincidence. Lan Zhan, what brings you to Yiling?”

Said Lan Wangji, “A Night Hunt. Passing through.”

Hearing his tone no different from before — without loathing, without contempt, without that air of irreconcilable enmity — Wei Wuxian felt something in his chest ease all at once. Then he heard Lan Wangji say, slowly, “…This child?”

With his heart eased, his mouth slipped its tether, and Wei Wuxian said offhandedly, “Mine. I had him myself.”

The tip of Lan Wangji's brow gave a twitch, and Wei Wuxian laughed, “A joke, of course. He belongs to someone else — I just brought him out to play. What did you do just now, anyway? How did you make him cry?”

Lan Wangji said evenly, “I did nothing.”

Wen Yuan, clinging to Wei Wuxian's leg, was still hiccupping with sobs. Then Wei Wuxian understood. Handsome as that face of Lan Wangji's was, a child so small could not yet tell fair from plain, and saw only that this man was not the least bit kind — cold and stern through and through — so being met with such a grim, sorrow-laden look, no wonder the boy had taken fright. Wei Wuxian hoisted Wen Yuan up, jostled him about and teased and coaxed him a while, then, noticing a peddler by the roadside grinning their way in amusement, pointed at the bright, gaudy trinkets in his baskets and asked, “A-Yuan, look over here — aren't they pretty?”

Wen Yuan's attention was drawn over; he sniffled and said, “…Pretty.”

Wei Wuxian asked again, “Sweet-smelling?”

Wen Yuan said, “Sweet.”

The peddler said quickly, “Pretty and sweet-smelling both — buy one for the young master, sir.”

Wei Wuxian asked, “Want one?”

Thinking it was being bought for him, Wen Yuan said shyly, “Want.”

But Wei Wuxian set off in the opposite direction. “Ha, come along, then.”

It struck Wen Yuan like a blow, and tears welled up in his eyes again. Lan Wangji watched coldly, then, unable to bear it any longer, said, “Why will you not buy it for him.”

Wei Wuxian said, puzzled, “Why should I buy it for him?”

Lan Wangji said, “You asked whether he wanted one — was that not to buy it for him.”

Wei Wuxian said, deliberately, “Asking is asking, buying is buying — why must asking always mean buying?”

At this counter-question Lan Wangji was, of all things, left with nothing to say; he glared at him a good while, then turned his gaze onto Wen Yuan. Under that stare, Wen Yuan began to tremble again.

After a moment, Lan Wangji said to Wen Yuan, “You… which one do you want.”

Wen Yuan had not yet gathered his wits when Lan Wangji pointed again at the things in the peddler's baskets. “These — which one do you want.”

Wen Yuan looked at him in terror, not daring to draw a breath.

Half an incense-stick later, Wen Yuan had finally stopped crying. He kept patting at his pocket, which bulged full of the heap of little trinkets Lan Wangji had bought him. Seeing the boy's tears at last dry, Lan Wangji seemed to let out a quiet breath of relief — only for Wen Yuan, his little face flushed, to shuffle silently over and wrap his arms around his leg.

He lowered his head; something extra had appended itself to his leg. Lan Wangji: “…”

Wei Wuxian roared with laughter. “Hahahaha! Lan Zhan, congratulations — he likes you now! Whoever he likes, that's whose leg he hugs, and he absolutely will not let go.”

Lan Wangji took a few steps. Sure enough, Wen Yuan clung fast to his leg with no intention whatever of releasing it, and held on rather tightly at that. Wei Wuxian clapped him on the shoulder. “I'd say don't rush off to your Night Hunt just yet. Here's a thought — how about we go and eat first?”

Lan Wangji lifted his eyes to him and said, in a voice without ripple or stir, “Eat?”

Wei Wuxian said, “Yes, eat — don't be so cold about it. You've come all the way to Yiling and I've had the luck to run into you; let's talk over old times. Come on, come on, my treat.”

With Wei Wuxian half-dragging, half-hauling him, and Wen Yuan hanging the whole while from his leg, Lan Wangji was towed thus into a tavern. Wei Wuxian settled into a private room. “Order, then.”

Pressed down onto the mat by him, Lan Wangji swept a glance over the menu and said, “You order.”

Said Wei Wuxian, “I'm treating you, so of course you order. Have whatever you like, don't stand on ceremony.” As luck would have it, not buying those sprouted poison potatoes meant he had coin to pay. Nor was Lan Wangji one to dither back and forth over declining; he considered a moment and ordered. Hearing him reel off several dishes in that flat, unhurried way, Wei Wuxian laughed, “Not bad at all, Lan Zhan. I thought you Gusu folk never touched anything spicy. Quite the bold palate. Will you drink?”

Lan Wangji shook his head, and Wei Wuxian said, “Still keeping to the rules so strictly, even abroad — worthy of Hanguang-jun. I won't order a share for you, then.”

Wen Yuan, seated by Lan Wangji's leg, laid out his pocketful of treasures on the mat — a little wooden knife, a little wooden sword, a clay figure, a butterfly woven from grass — and counted them over, loath to set them down. Watching the boy nestle and shuffle so close against Lan Wangji that the man could not so much as drink his tea in peace, Wei Wuxian gave a whistle. “A-Yuan, come here.”

Wen Yuan looked at Wei Wuxian, who only the day before yesterday had buried him in the dirt as a radish seedling, then looked at Lan Wangji, who had just bought him a whole heap of trinkets, and did not budge his backside an inch; his face, honest as could be, spelled out plainly: No.

Wei Wuxian said, “Come here. Sitting there, you're in his way.”

But Lan Wangji said, “It is no trouble. Let him sit.”

Delighted, Wen Yuan hugged his leg again — the thigh, this time. Wei Wuxian spun his chopsticks in a flashing whirl between his fingers and laughed, “Whoever's got the milk is the niang, whoever's got the coin is the die. The very nerve of it.”

Soon the dishes and wine arrived, a whole table of warmth and colour, and a bowl of sweet broth Lan Wangji had ordered for Wen Yuan alone. Wei Wuxian rapped the bowl and called him several times, but Wen Yuan still kept his head down, holding the two grass butterflies and murmuring — now playing the left one, who said shyly, “I… I like you very much,” now the right one, who said happily, “I like you too!” — one child voicing two butterflies, lost in his game. Hearing it, Wei Wuxian laughed until his side caught, rocking forward and back. “Heavens above, A-Yuan, where did a little thing like you pick this up — all this I-like-you, you-like-me? Do you even know what liking is? Stop playing now, come and eat. Your new die ordered it for you — good stuff.”

Only then did Wen Yuan tuck his little butterflies back into his pocket, take up the bowl and a small spoon, and sit by Lan Wangji's side scooping at the sweet broth. Before this he had been at the Qishan place of confinement, then moved to the Burial Mounds, and the fare at both was best left undescribed, so this bowl of sweet broth was to him a wondrous delicacy; two mouthfuls in and he could not stop — yet still he had the heart to hold the bowl out eagerly to Wei Wuxian, offering it up like a prize. “…Xian-gege… gege, eat.”

Wei Wuxian said, looking thoroughly gratified, “Mm, good — and he even knows to honour his elders.”

Lan Wangji said, “One does not speak while eating.”

So that Wen Yuan might understand, he said it again in plainer words: “Don't talk when you're eating.”

Wen Yuan nodded hastily, bent his head over the broth, and fell silent. Wei Wuxian exclaimed, “The very nerve of it — what I say takes him several tellings to heed, and what you say he obeys the instant he hears it. The nerve of it.”

Lan Wangji said evenly, “One does not speak while eating. That goes for you as well.”

Wei Wuxian, all smiles, tipped his head back and drained a cup, then turned the wine-cup over in his hand. “You really are… all these years and never a hair of you changes. Hey, Lan Zhan, what have you come to Yiling to hunt this time? I know this place well — shall I point you the way?”

Lan Wangji said, “No need.”

Great clans often had secret tasks not to be spoken of to outsiders, so Wei Wuxian did not press, and said, “It's a rare thing to run into someone I used to know who doesn't shy away from me — these past months have all but stifled me. Anything big going on in the world lately?”

Lan Wangji said, “What counts as big.”

Wei Wuxian said, 'Like, somewhere a new clan has sprung up, or some house has expanded its immortal abode, or a handful of clans have sworn an alliance — that sort of thing. Idle talk, you know. Suibian, whatever comes to mind.'

Since the staged falling-out with Jiang Cheng he had heard nothing of the world's doings for a long while, at most the odds and ends of gossip about the Small Town.

Lan Wangji said, “A marriage.”

Wei Wuxian said, “Whose house and whose?”

Lan Wangji said, “The Lanling Jin Clan, and the Yunmeng Jiang Clan.”

The hand turning the wine-cup went still.

He was stunned. “My shi— Miss Jiang, and Jin Zixuan?”

Lan Wangji gave the faintest nod, and Wei Wuxian said, “When? When is the ceremony to take place?!”

Lan Wangji said, “Seven days from now.”

His slightly trembling hand carried the cup to his lips, not realizing it had already gone empty. A hollowness opened in his chest all at once, and he could not tell whether it was fury, shock, displeasure, or helplessness.

Though he had foreseen it well before leaving the Jiang household, to hear the news so abruptly set a thousand tangled threads and ten thousand unsaid words to choking up in his chest, longing to pour out a thousand li at a stroke yet finding no place to begin. A matter so great, and Jiang Cheng had not even thought of a way to tell him. Had he not chanced upon Lan Wangji today, he might have learned of it later still!

Yet think again — what good would the telling have done? Outwardly Jiang Cheng had already proclaimed to the world, and the clans now all believed his account: that Wei Wuxian had defected from his family, that this man henceforth had nothing to do with the Yunmeng Jiang Clan. Even knowing, he could not go to drink that wedding cup. Jiang Cheng was right not to tell him; had the telling come from Jiang Cheng's own mouth, there was no saying what rash thing he might have done in the heat of the moment.

After a long while, Wei Wuxian murmured, “That cur Jin Zixuan's got off easy.”

He poured himself another cup. “Lan Zhan, what do you make of this match?”

Lan Wangji said nothing. Wei Wuxian said, “Oh — right, what am I asking you for. What could you possibly make of it; you never give thought to such things.”

He drained the cup in one go. “I know — plenty of people say behind my back that my shijie isn't good enough for Jin Zixuan. Ha. In my eyes it's the other way round: Jin Zixuan isn't good enough for my shijie. But it just so happens…”

It just so happened that Jiang Yanli liked Jin Zixuan, and there was the end of it.

Wei Wuxian pressed the wine-cup down hard upon the table. “Lan Zhan! Do you know? My shijie — she deserves the finest man in all the world.”

He slapped the table, a pride glinting through the faint flush of his brow. “We'll make that grand ceremony one that, for a hundred years, every soul who speaks of it will marvel at and praise to the skies, with none to match it. I'll see my shijie wed in full splendour.”

Lan Wangji said, “Mm.”

Wei Wuxian gave a scornful laugh. “What are you 'mm'-ing for? I won't even be there to see it.”

Just then Wen Yuan, having finished his sweet broth, sat on the mat and took up the grass butterflies again. The two butterflies' long feelers had tangled together, and he could not work them loose no matter how he tried. Seeing the boy's anxious face, Lan Wangji lifted the butterflies from his hands, undid the four knotted feelers in two quick motions, and handed them back.

At the sight, Wei Wuxian roused a little from his thoughts, mustered a faint smile, and said, “A-Yuan, don't rub your face against him — there's still sweet broth at the corner of your mouth, you'll soil his robes.”

Lan Wangji drew out a square of plain white kerchief and, expressionless, wiped away the broth smeared at the corner of Wen Yuan's mouth. Wei Wuxian crooned, “Lan Zhan, you really are something — who'd have guessed you'd have such a way with children. Keep being this good to him and he won't be willing to come home with me…”

Suddenly Wei Wuxian's expression changed; from his breast he pulled out a Talisman Casting, and the Talisman Casting was already blazing up, so that scarcely a moment after he drew it forth it crumbled to ash. Lan Wangji's gaze sharpened, and Wei Wuxian shot to his feet. “Trouble.”

This Talisman Casting was the Array Core of a warning array he had set on the Burial Mounds; should things on the Burial Mounds change after he left — the array broken, or the death-energy surging up — the Talisman Casting would burn of itself to warn him that something had gone wrong. Wei Wuxian scooped Wen Yuan up under one arm. “Forgive me, Lan Zhan — I have to get back!”

The things in Wen Yuan's pocket spilled out, and the boy cried in alarm, “Butter— butterfly!” But Wei Wuxian was already carrying him at a run out of the tavern. Before long a white shape flickered at his side: Lan Wangji, of all things, had caught up and now ran abreast of him. Wei Wuxian said, “Lan Zhan? What are you following for?”

Lan Wangji placed the dropped butterfly into Wen Yuan's palm and, instead of answering directly, asked, “Why not ride your sword.”

Wei Wuxian said, “Forgot to bring it!”

Without a word Lan Wangji swept an arm round his waist and bore him up onto Bichen, rising into the air. Wen Yuan was so small that he had never ridden a flying sword before and ought by rights to have been terribly frightened, but Bichen flew so steadily that he felt not the slightest lurch; and with the townsfolk below all craning their necks, struck dumb at three people taking to the sky just like that, the boy only found it novel and thrilling and shouted aloud for joy. Wei Wuxian let out a breath. “Many thanks!”

Lan Wangji said, “Where to.”

Wei Wuxian pointed the way. “This way!”