inbox | eastbound

[downswing]

lan wangji
missives | encounters

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[valeas]

( Emilia almost smiles. )

And I you, Lan Wangji.

( She may not actually succeed in a literal sense this time, but let the record show that she will try finding him and his rotund chickens. )

[downswing]

( Here, he seems intent to laugh — it comes out, instead, like a quiet exhalation. )

...mmm. Mother-like.

[valeas]

( Maiden, Mother, Crone. It means something. )

Protector.

( That was her first impression of him, she thinks. He says so very little, but he was quick to draw his sword at his own risk.

Actions, not words, Wrath would say. )

[downswing]

You... ( He blinks and stirs and blinks again. Recovers himself. ) You are.

[valeas]

I don't know about that.

( A statement perhaps undermined by the narrowing of her gaze in concern. ) What do you feel?

[downswing]

Lasssssssitude. Warm. ( Silence. Then, strained: ) Unanchored. Afffraid.

[valeas]

( Steady, she tells herself. Steady. )

Show me your surroundings, Lan Wangji. I'll do my best to identify them.

[downswing]

( To his shame — his stubbornness — he does not oblige her. Thinks, even husked and reduced and shallowed, he knows the game of her concern, names it: )

Afraid of... haaa... of. Unmooring. Free. Mind too... thoughts. When they... they whirrrrrl. When they, free. I do not know them. Whose they are.