It is a delicate thing, to run a weave of necessities around sensibility. He stalls, but dips the pitcher of his water, inhaling the long, tender, intimate spasms of wafting heat. The infusion after, stale but gently preserved leaf of mint, wilting before Lan Wangji even sinks it. It roils and swirls in maelstrom, a laughing picture of the city, its aches.

"I ask if you will survive your mercy after." Easy, to align with justice, when the costs of kindness don't yet chain the body or weigh the soul. When they have only pretty words and virtues of legend to arm in, and the shine of their shields blinds even the sun.

The consequences come after, in lonely nights of righteous, steadfast indignation, when principles and justice do not warm a burned home or lonely bed. When the price of preserving Rigarda will be writ in blood they will not spill. "Without regret."