( He's fought free, hands back out, and then there's Lan Zhan managing to tuck him away again without so much as a stray suggestion of otherwise. Wei Wuxian tries pushing at the blanket and his husband's arm, shaking his head.

There's a truth caught between the three of them, a sickness of the soul. He knows Lan Zhan feels it, the ache of which like is calling to like. Will know further still, as people pass in the milling crowd, there is not one sensation the scales permit, passing along where eyes don't see the rot underneath.

Lan Zhan may be blessed with that realisation, even as Wei Wuxian worms one arm free again, pushing against his husband and gesturing to Lethe, who lifts head high enough to avoid his seeming flail. )

Magnus has the eye that sees. This feels, and it lay dormant until I was near Lethe. Until any of us were, which is why Magnus looked. Why he saw. None of the loaned dragons are the same. They all live, in appearance and in visible truth.

( Why did the dragons despair? He does not, will not, wonder. )