It is his due, Hanguang-Jun come in full regalia, accepting the trivial formalities of hospitality that only Yiling has ever denied him — a scion of Gusu Lan, envoy to Zewu-Jun, official of the sects, now their foremost servant, liege and mouthpiece.
And Wei Ying pours prettily, attentive in the way men accept readily and greedily at teahouses, a learned performance that Wei Ying's sister must have suffered great pains to convey, instant by borrowed instant, gesture by brokered gesture. Let Wei Ying be this: pond-water shallowness in his elegance, fleeting beauty. He has shown himself bloodied and raw long enough at cliff's side, spying the flickered golden sight of his fussing, fumbling, unrepenting nephew, or knelt to beg the dark dregs and embers of Jiang Wanyin's forgiveness. The transition will flatter his forgotten forms, will suit him.
At length, Lan Wangji rewards the care, beholden to bow his back to the appropriate depth and angle, to murmur his thanks as discreetly as a bird's wing touches lake water. He whisks away his sleeve, then receives the tea cup, and sips behind the modesty screen of his other hand, as if he partakes shamefully of the wine vice. Then, politely, "The leaf greens sweeter here."
Flattery, however poorly earned, a great, sweltering fondness in his chest for the morsel of a wrong suffered decades ago, now so poetically righted. It stung you then, he cannot say, gaze kind over the rim of his cup, as he drinks his fill, to the last drop, You still had pride.
Emptied, the cup arrives down with a faint clatter. He stills it with two fingers. "Yiling receives me well. I am humbled."
no subject
It is his due, Hanguang-Jun come in full regalia, accepting the trivial formalities of hospitality that only Yiling has ever denied him — a scion of Gusu Lan, envoy to Zewu-Jun, official of the sects, now their foremost servant, liege and mouthpiece.
And Wei Ying pours prettily, attentive in the way men accept readily and greedily at teahouses, a learned performance that Wei Ying's sister must have suffered great pains to convey, instant by borrowed instant, gesture by brokered gesture. Let Wei Ying be this: pond-water shallowness in his elegance, fleeting beauty. He has shown himself bloodied and raw long enough at cliff's side, spying the flickered golden sight of his fussing, fumbling, unrepenting nephew, or knelt to beg the dark dregs and embers of Jiang Wanyin's forgiveness. The transition will flatter his forgotten forms, will suit him.
At length, Lan Wangji rewards the care, beholden to bow his back to the appropriate depth and angle, to murmur his thanks as discreetly as a bird's wing touches lake water. He whisks away his sleeve, then receives the tea cup, and sips behind the modesty screen of his other hand, as if he partakes shamefully of the wine vice. Then, politely, "The leaf greens sweeter here."
Flattery, however poorly earned, a great, sweltering fondness in his chest for the morsel of a wrong suffered decades ago, now so poetically righted. It stung you then, he cannot say, gaze kind over the rim of his cup, as he drinks his fill, to the last drop, You still had pride.
Emptied, the cup arrives down with a faint clatter. He stills it with two fingers. "Yiling receives me well. I am humbled."
Wei Ying has redeemed himself.