( In motion, the thin peace that had enfolded their moment in the aftermath of chaos exhales and expires, and he smiles, for the child, for Lan Zhan, for the son waiting in hearth-home nearby, for the son waiting li further still. This rabbit child, who shifts and turns and starts to mold into the comfort of Lan Zhan's dirtied arms, once more sliding the scale toward leporine features, as if each inhalation and exhalation a shifting canvas makes.
Perhaps it does, perhaps it doesn't. Perhaps what this child of misfortune needs is what Gusu Lan provides even to the most fortunate of children, orphans taken in by nostalgia and offered safety in places that claimed impossible was only a state of mind.
Clarity, focus. There are other gifts delivered in the cool clinging fogs of Gusu, by the structured strictures of the Lan. Words like Lan Zhan's, a different kind of code, tip him into laughing, a tired roll of amusement that aches without hurting at all. )
Right, right. A daughter next time. I'll consult with the universe, it should be so kind as to provide.
( A smile, a wink, and the path spilling downward for the resolution of the evening: each step gains momentum if not energy, so that they're closer with each moment to their first safely minded Qingshan. They're welcomed with wide, curious eyes, a woman paid well and given to a sleeping child at her heart, curled up next to a cat, lean and muscled, and an older child minding the fire with the distraction of the young upon their arrival.
Roused from slumber, their waiting son rubs at his eyes, and beams, and holds out his arms: a demand with the sleepy presentation of the not fully awake, lapsing into mumbled complaint at his waking state and a burrowing nuzzle of his head against a collarbone, hidden. Asking after lodgings points toward another inn, one closer, facilities less polished, interiors carefully decorated, and bathing tubs of metal and kept warm through the ingenuity of the mortals not so blessed as to live in cultivation's finer tunings of work. Negotiated, three baths, and the child left in another's care for most the day demanding in increasingly less sleepy turn to come with, such that Wei Wuxian brings his nose to their human son's in a bop and nuzzle before turning his face to Lan Zhan, smiling tired and content, knowing tomorrow's mission and at ease with the straightforwardness of it: )
Do you have room for two?
( To mean: do you have the energy, because I'm happy taking him in for splashes and earnest attempts to scrub both of them clean in one small, dedicated radius before his childish attention span wanders away again. It means the shorter soak; and they now number two who need the time, and Wei Wuxian considers he can probably handle both. Or handle them first, to lay to rest, if Qingshan will cooperate in curling up with their rabbit-child and sleep the sleep of the young and growing. )
no subject
Perhaps it does, perhaps it doesn't. Perhaps what this child of misfortune needs is what Gusu Lan provides even to the most fortunate of children, orphans taken in by nostalgia and offered safety in places that claimed impossible was only a state of mind.
Clarity, focus. There are other gifts delivered in the cool clinging fogs of Gusu, by the structured strictures of the Lan. Words like Lan Zhan's, a different kind of code, tip him into laughing, a tired roll of amusement that aches without hurting at all. )
Right, right. A daughter next time. I'll consult with the universe, it should be so kind as to provide.
( A smile, a wink, and the path spilling downward for the resolution of the evening: each step gains momentum if not energy, so that they're closer with each moment to their first safely minded Qingshan. They're welcomed with wide, curious eyes, a woman paid well and given to a sleeping child at her heart, curled up next to a cat, lean and muscled, and an older child minding the fire with the distraction of the young upon their arrival.
Roused from slumber, their waiting son rubs at his eyes, and beams, and holds out his arms: a demand with the sleepy presentation of the not fully awake, lapsing into mumbled complaint at his waking state and a burrowing nuzzle of his head against a collarbone, hidden. Asking after lodgings points toward another inn, one closer, facilities less polished, interiors carefully decorated, and bathing tubs of metal and kept warm through the ingenuity of the mortals not so blessed as to live in cultivation's finer tunings of work. Negotiated, three baths, and the child left in another's care for most the day demanding in increasingly less sleepy turn to come with, such that Wei Wuxian brings his nose to their human son's in a bop and nuzzle before turning his face to Lan Zhan, smiling tired and content, knowing tomorrow's mission and at ease with the straightforwardness of it: )
Do you have room for two?
( To mean: do you have the energy, because I'm happy taking him in for splashes and earnest attempts to scrub both of them clean in one small, dedicated radius before his childish attention span wanders away again. It means the shorter soak; and they now number two who need the time, and Wei Wuxian considers he can probably handle both. Or handle them first, to lay to rest, if Qingshan will cooperate in curling up with their rabbit-child and sleep the sleep of the young and growing. )
I can manage them both first.