( He grunts, protests for the sake of tired comedy when Qingshan makes light of his bony hip or the dip of his hidden abdomen. He grows in size every day, and in consequence, such that the grunt becomes a hand lifted and set upon Qingshan's head, fingers stroking through hair when his human son snuggles his face into Wei Wuxian's clothing, and the rabbit sleeps, calmed under Lan Zhan's healing touch. )
He loves me best as furniture.
( He says, adding in as much of an arch tone to his voice as he can drum up with a half smile and a brief closing of his eyes. They slit open again not long after, lips twitching at the corners until he's left smiling into a chuckle, sounding lower than usual. Qingshan frowns at the disruption of his perch, nuzzling his face in harder and making his own tired babbling, a litany of complaints that start and end with why are you two like this.
Or perhaps just, stop moving, I want to sleep here, not on a wagon made of ribs and diaphragm.
Oh, but that chuckle is for Lan Zhan's words, and Wei Wuxian turns his head, better to look sideways and askance at Lan Zhan where he's perched, great white heron healing the same creature he'd tried to tell Wei Wuxian to allow, in mercy, a swift ending. Perhaps he'd be better as that kind of ruthless soul, but he thinks it's a tempering between them. Both can be ruthless, at differing times, or coinciding ones. Neither of them walks unstained by their choices or less bright for the fact they've also been shadowed, to differing degrees.
Playful, tired, distracting himself from the haunted worries of what lurks beneath that stone and beneath that temple and surrounded by the energy richness of those waters, over who made four paper-thin human constructs of holier men to hold an unholy power, one that threatened the sanctity of souls, that sought to unbind them from the reincarnation cycle, if the soul is pushed too hard, if it shatters.
Yes, playful, to avoid those thoughts, which will intrude again soon enough. )
Spending time in anyone's company, influence runs both ways. But don't worry, don't worry, Lan Zhan, I haven't forgone the art of conversation, just the non mumbled kind.
( In fact, ending in a mumble. He blinks, lifts his head to look both at the mop of black hair that is Qingshan, and then the large ball of white fur that's the oversized rabbit burden, in its most healing form. )
We've inherited a rabbit.
( They've stumbled directly into a problem, but the rabbit is innocent of that, as is the child. The rabbit child. This child sized rabbit. Or is he? He lets his head thump back, deciding that's tomorrow's problem. )
Or turned into moons. Seems poetic, if impractical.
( He shifts his arm, patting... the far side, all the unclaimed parts of a platform bed he's not even gracefully tried to occupy past the minimum. He's on the bed, the small lives heaped by and on him are there too, and what completes this comedy but the only one with a strict bedtime and his well behaved sleeping position being given the tiger's share? )
All for you. Wait, I'm mumbling chattier answers—Lan Zhan, we saved... at least half the bed for you! I hope rabbits don't kick when they sleep. Qingshan does, I think he's feeling more growing pains again... we'll need to find him a minder before we go back.
( Another pause, and then squinting up at Lan Zhan. )
Are we going back?
( Tomorrow, that is. In an immediacy, and without backup; are they not calling for a night hunt and its confusions, from either Gusu Lan or Yunmeng Jiang, but ah. Jiang Cheng having restraint when it smacks of curses of a perversion not often seen, of a manipulation of energies that might well be trapped and contained instead of redirected, perverting even what Wei Wuxian himself practises in the grand scheme of frightening things...
... Yes. Lan Zhan can make that call. Wei Wuxian, left to his devices, would puzzle through it, letting himself be the bait. He sighs out another inconsequential, less mumbled statement: )
Jade rabbit.
( Not the one at his hip: the one that had been protecting this confused child, in pain and terror and agony and meant for more of the sacrifice. The Jade rabbit. One who gave all of themselves, elevated after death to a second life.
no subject
He loves me best as furniture.
( He says, adding in as much of an arch tone to his voice as he can drum up with a half smile and a brief closing of his eyes. They slit open again not long after, lips twitching at the corners until he's left smiling into a chuckle, sounding lower than usual. Qingshan frowns at the disruption of his perch, nuzzling his face in harder and making his own tired babbling, a litany of complaints that start and end with why are you two like this.
Or perhaps just, stop moving, I want to sleep here, not on a wagon made of ribs and diaphragm.
Oh, but that chuckle is for Lan Zhan's words, and Wei Wuxian turns his head, better to look sideways and askance at Lan Zhan where he's perched, great white heron healing the same creature he'd tried to tell Wei Wuxian to allow, in mercy, a swift ending. Perhaps he'd be better as that kind of ruthless soul, but he thinks it's a tempering between them. Both can be ruthless, at differing times, or coinciding ones. Neither of them walks unstained by their choices or less bright for the fact they've also been shadowed, to differing degrees.
Playful, tired, distracting himself from the haunted worries of what lurks beneath that stone and beneath that temple and surrounded by the energy richness of those waters, over who made four paper-thin human constructs of holier men to hold an unholy power, one that threatened the sanctity of souls, that sought to unbind them from the reincarnation cycle, if the soul is pushed too hard, if it shatters.
Yes, playful, to avoid those thoughts, which will intrude again soon enough. )
Spending time in anyone's company, influence runs both ways. But don't worry, don't worry, Lan Zhan, I haven't forgone the art of conversation, just the non mumbled kind.
( In fact, ending in a mumble. He blinks, lifts his head to look both at the mop of black hair that is Qingshan, and then the large ball of white fur that's the oversized rabbit burden, in its most healing form. )
We've inherited a rabbit.
( They've stumbled directly into a problem, but the rabbit is innocent of that, as is the child. The rabbit child. This child sized rabbit. Or is he? He lets his head thump back, deciding that's tomorrow's problem. )
Or turned into moons. Seems poetic, if impractical.
( He shifts his arm, patting... the far side, all the unclaimed parts of a platform bed he's not even gracefully tried to occupy past the minimum. He's on the bed, the small lives heaped by and on him are there too, and what completes this comedy but the only one with a strict bedtime and his well behaved sleeping position being given the tiger's share? )
All for you. Wait, I'm mumbling chattier answers—Lan Zhan, we saved... at least half the bed for you! I hope rabbits don't kick when they sleep. Qingshan does, I think he's feeling more growing pains again... we'll need to find him a minder before we go back.
( Another pause, and then squinting up at Lan Zhan. )
Are we going back?
( Tomorrow, that is. In an immediacy, and without backup; are they not calling for a night hunt and its confusions, from either Gusu Lan or Yunmeng Jiang, but ah. Jiang Cheng having restraint when it smacks of curses of a perversion not often seen, of a manipulation of energies that might well be trapped and contained instead of redirected, perverting even what Wei Wuxian himself practises in the grand scheme of frightening things...
... Yes. Lan Zhan can make that call. Wei Wuxian, left to his devices, would puzzle through it, letting himself be the bait. He sighs out another inconsequential, less mumbled statement: )
Jade rabbit.
( Not the one at his hip: the one that had been protecting this confused child, in pain and terror and agony and meant for more of the sacrifice. The Jade rabbit. One who gave all of themselves, elevated after death to a second life.
Ha. Ha. Haaaaa. )