inbox | eastbound

[downswing]

lan wangji
missives | encounters

Comments

[downswing]

Excuse him as you wish.

[weifinder]

Of course I will, we all do for family. But just in that.

( and several other things, okay, he knows his husband is no better with his family, they're both like that )

[downswing]

And yet we see no need to make Zewu-Jun excuses.

[weifinder]

Zewu-jun suffers enough in the reflection of his mistakes. Would you enjoy the kindness of the truth of his own ineptitude, hand in hand with the rest of the righteous cultivation world?

His heart is large. His trust, likewise. That I was not the one to betray him, or you as you'd perhaps imagined, doesn't make the hurt less for the one who did. Your uncle is wiser in how he parcels out his heart, the lions share to you and your brother. He holds the world in greater suspicion. He is, in many ways, the wisest of us all, and the most willingly blind in others.

Is that bad? Or is it human?

[downswing]

( Is ineptitude the name of faith? Shall we inflict bloodstain of fault upon the victim? )

Take sword.

[weifinder]

( Yes. )

No.

[downswing]

Craven.

[weifinder]

Bamboo bends while remaining upright.

[downswing]

You injured my brother's dignity.

[weifinder]

Would you rather I lie to you.

[downswing]

My brother.

[weifinder]

Lan Zhan.

Just recall all you've said of mine.

[downswing]

Then take sword for him.

[weifinder]

No. Because I care for you both, deeply, and I'm not blinded to the faults or strengths of you as stars within my night's sky.

[downswing]

My faults are not my brother's.

You speak too freely.

[weifinder]

No, his are his own.

You can always divorce me, you know. You'd have to do it six times for it to stick, but it's possible.

[downswing]

Or spell your tongue.

[weifinder]

And kiss my bleeding, torn mouth after.

1/2

[downswing]

Crime, punishment, amends.

[downswing]

You are a child.

Positioning me between two equal loyalties, to enjoy when my step fall towards you.

1/2

[weifinder]

Yes. As are you.

But I don't ask, or demand, division.

[weifinder]

If you prefer lies, so be it. Whatever pleases.

( ... aaaand then he was done, off on a task of his own making, as so many were. )

[downswing]

We have death and grief between us.

I cannot fit dishonesty.

[weifinder]

( having worked on a few talismans he wants to test next chance he has, he reads this. rubs his face. )

I'm not always going to have pleasant things to say. Not even out of spite.

Lan Zhan... I care for your brother. He's a good man, as much as he can be. He always strives toward broader considerations. He was made to see his blindnesses in a soul fracturing way. I understand. I've been there.

I don't speak to disparage him. I acknowledge, and accept. Can you understand that?

[downswing]

( He can. He does. Heart wind-withered ruin. A curse upon their house.

And he is silent for the better part of a half-shi. Grief borrowed. )


Paint your mouth red.


( Peace. )