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The imperial gates to Yiling Forbidden City rose tall and black as night, built from the charred bones of the Yiling Patriarch’s enemies once upon a time when they had still existed. Crows lined scattered along the parapets, their caws echoing in the bleak silence of the burial mounds.
Jiang Cheng looked up at the red flag of the YilingWei Sect, fluttering in the wind struck high on the gates. He exhaled and motioned for his disciples to follow.
The procession was as somber as a funeral, only the clop of their horse’s footsteps, the crunch of the bone shards beneath their wagon wheels could be heard as they entered the gates of Yiling.
The city had grown since the last time Jiang Cheng had come. There were more buildings, more houses, more people now living amongst the walking corpses too. Many sought the path of demonic cultivation and came to this city to apprentice under the Yiling Patriarch—more of them these days than those who joined any other sect. They came hopeful for power and riches, only to find that staying in Yiling Forbidden City meant living with the walking dead. There were as many corpses as those still alive, who worked alongside each other, who were ruled by the Yiling Patriarch.
People walked along the streets, hurrying back and forth, in and out of buildings. Some drove carts drawn by skeletal horses, others drew up blood talismans to sell from their street stalls, and others sold limp lotus pods and plucked pheasant carcasses surrounded by black flies. There were pretty girls standing before brothels who showed a little too much teeth, making eyes at their procession, giggling too long and too high pitched.
Walking amongst the pale faces and hollow eyes, Jiang Cheng thought that these days, it was harder to tell who was living anymore, and who was dead.
A few heads raised as the YunmengJiang Sect procession passed through the city, but no one stopped them as they rode to the palace of the Yiling Patriarch. Only then did a pair of guards stop them, and Jiang Cheng dismounted.
“I’m here to pay tribute,” he said.
The guards, dressed in the black robes of the YilingWei Sect, nodded. One of them spoke. “The Yiling Patriarch is expecting you,” he said. So this one was alive.
Jiang Cheng motioned the disciples driving the cart through the gate and went in himself.
There were forty steps leading up to the throne room of the Yiling Patriarch. He steeled himself as he walked those steps, his heart sinking lower with each step.
He could hear the familiar timbre of his voice before Jiang Cheng saw him. As he came into view of the throne room, he saw the man he’d once called his brother sitting on a great white throne made of human bone, both his legs propped up on one arm of the chair, and his back leaned against the other arm like he was lounging in some teahouse. He was pale, his dark hair falling in waves over his shoulders, and he was smiling up at the man beside him.
“Lan Zhan, feed me,” Wei Wuxian cooed and opened his mouth.
The man standing beside him was once the Second Jade of Lan, Hanguang-Jun, the Lord that held Light. Time had done nothing to erase that cold beauty, the long black hair, the aristocratic face, the black veins that ran up his neck now, the bloodless lips, those pale blank eyes that stared at nothing.
The corpse held an apple up to Wei Wuxian’s mouth, and he bit into it, juice dribbling down his chin as he stared up at him. Wei Wuxian had a smile on his face so like the one he used to wear that Jiang Cheng took a shuddering breath.
Wei Wuxian finally seemed to notice them and straightened up in his seat, swinging his legs down to sit more properly. “Jiang Cheng! You came!” He pushed the corpse of Lan Wangji aside, and it backed up a few steps.
“Of course,” Jiang Cheng said, biting back the urge to shout at him like he might have done once upon a time. “We had to pay tribute, didn’t we?”
Wei Wuxian grinned. “Don’t sound so reluctant,” he said. “After all, how am I supposed to keep everything running without some help?” he said, gesturing around them at this mimicry of a flourishing city.
“You seem to be doing fine on your own,” Jiang Cheng answered.
Thirteen years ago, Wei Wuxian had wiped out the GusuLan Sect and united the cultivation world under his empire of the dead. Everyone knew the Yiling Patriarch had gone mad, though no one knew when it had happened—at least no one left alive.
To keep him in control, or at least as in control as Wei Wuxian could be now, the other sects were forced to pay tribute in treasures and in gold to keep Wei Wuxian’s Forbidden City running, which, in turn, kept Wei Wuxian inside those black gates.
“Come in, come in, let’s have dinner together,” Wei Wuxian said. “I’ll summon some dancing girls for entertainment,” he said. “Maybe you’ll even find one you like since you’re still single,” he said with a wink.
“Dancing corpses, you mean?” Jiang Cheng said.
Wei Wuxian’s eyes lost their glint of mirth. “What’s wrong with corpses?” he said.
Behind him, Lan Wangji moved, and Jiang Cheng automatically felt for Zidian. Once Wei Wuxian had Lan Wangji under his control, no one had stood a chance. If Wen Ning, the Ghost General, had turned from a timid young man to a formidable berserker, releasing everything pent up inside him when he had been alive, then no one had understood the true depth of what Lan Wangji had kept locked inside him all those years he’d been alive. Rumor was that the corpse of Lan Wangji himself was the one Wei Wuxian had sent to destroy GusuLan. He’d done it single-handedly, within a single day. Not one survivor was left.
Wei Wuxian laughed and leaned back. “Hold me,” he said and Lan Wangji’s arms circled around his waist, Wei Wuxian putting all his weight back into him. They looked almost like a happy couple. “Don’t worry, Jiang Cheng, he’s not going to do anything to you,” he said. “As long as you don’t do anything to him.”
Jiang Cheng swallowed hard. The man in front of him, his brother, the one who had caused the death of his parents, of his sister and her husband, was standing in front of him. But like every year before, he was powerless to seek revenge, and powerless to help him.
“If that’s all, we’ll be leaving,” Jiang Cheng bit out.
“Hm, you’re not going to stay? Not even for old time’s sake?” Wei Wuxian asked, though he had already turned and was looking up at Lan Wangji again, reaching up to smooth back a strand of the corpse’s hair with something akin to gentleness.
Jiang Cheng felt a shiver run down his back. “Good bye,” he said.
“See you next year, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said. “Forgive me if I don’t see you out.”
Jiang Cheng motioned for his disciples to follow, and they left the Yiling Forbidden City the way they’d come.
“Was he really your brother?” one of the disciples once they’d reached the bottom of the steps.
Jiang Cheng’s fists clenched. “He hasn’t been my brother in a long time now,” he said. “I’m not sure he’s still human.”
“Wen Qing! Wen Qing!” Wei Wuxian was screaming when Wen Qing rode up to him, urging her horse as fast as it could go. She was already dismounting before the animal came to a full stop.
Wei Wuxian was clutching Lan Wangji’s arm, though the corpse stood straight as a pillar. They were surrounded by a handful of young men in the colorful robes of other sects, each one of them held immobile in place by the corpses that had burst from the ground beneath them. Skeletal hands clutched at their hands and feet, arms of grey flesh locked around their waists, grasped at their necks—a scene she had seen too often in these last eight years every time another young, self-righteous cultivator thought they’d try to play hero.
She ignored the men and went to Wei Wuxian first.
“What happened?” Wen Qing demanded, putting her doctor’s kit on the ground. Wei Wuxian was still holding Lan Wangji’s arm, his pupils so constricted it was a wonder he could see at all. “Where is he...wounded?” She settled on the phrasing.
“Th-There,” Wei Wuxian said. He pulled aside a tear in Lan Wangji’s sleeve and Wen Qing saw a long gash so deep that she could see straight through the pale, bloodless muscle to the bone. “Is it...is it permanent?” he asked. He stared at her the way A-Yuan used to look at her when he was younger, eyes wide and watery, lashes trembling, asking for reassurances after nightmares.
Whichever of those young men had attacked Lan Wangji had done a good job. The skin and muscle were torn clean through.
She sighed. This was never the type of work she’d planned to do when she became a doctor, but when Wei Wuxian had saved her brother and her clan nine years ago, she had vowed to follow him forever. When the entire cultivation world had turned against Wei Wuxian, she and her brother had turned themselves in. But before the execution date arrived, Wen Qing woke one day in her prison to the sound of screaming and the crunch of bodies, and Wei Wuxian had burst in like a whirlwind and grabbed her by the hand. After being starved for weeks, she was weak and stumbling. When she set foot outside, she thought it was another of her nightmares, the air so heavy with blood mist that the moon had turned red. Hanguang-Jun stood in the center of a field of corpses. He had killed thousands that night, more than Wei Wuxian had ever killed, the biggest massacre in the history of the world, and under that red moon, his once-white robes had been drenched a crimson black like a god of death. When she’d woken again, she was back in the Yiling Burial Mounds and Wei Wuxian was begging her to fix the wears and tears that had come to Lan Wangji’s body that Blood Moon Night.
“Is it permanent?” Wei Wuxian demanded again, his lips pale and hands shaking as he stared between her and the wound.
“He’s dead,” she said to him, the thousandth time she’d said it to him already. “Eventually, his body will still—”
“Can you fix it?” Wei Wuxian interrupted. “You can fix it, right?”
Wen Qing sighed. “I can sew him up as best as I can, but it’ll leave a scar,” she said. “He can’t heal.”
“Do it,” Wei Wuxian ordered. “You can tear the skin off any of them and use them to help repair his if you need,” he said, gesturing to the young cultivators who had tried to attack him.
One of them broke into terrified sobs.
“It won’t come to that,” Wen Qing said. She didn’t look at them, drawing as much attention away from them as she could. It had been eight long years since that night, and yet every once in awhile, there would still be groups of young, ambitious cultivators determined to win honor and fame for themselves by killing the Yiling Patriarch. “Make him sit.”
“Sit,” Wei Wuxian said.
Lan Wangji obediently sat, and Wei Wuxian immediately crouched by him, throwing his arms around his neck. “It’ll be okay,” Wei Wuxian said to him. “Wen Qing will fix you. You’ll be fine.”
Lan Wangji only sat still as Wen Qing began to connect tendon to tendon, skin to skin, pouring all of her qi into repairing Lan Wangji’s body. She had repaired him hundreds of times now. He was too reckless, too strong, and his body had long since lost the ability to heal itself.
It took hours for her to sew him back up. She already knew that Wei Wuxian would never let them return until Lan Wangji was fixed again, until he was sure his companion wouldn’t fall apart on the journey home. She didn’t think about what would happen that day she couldn’t fix him anymore, if one day he sustained an injury even she couldn’t repair. If it wasn’t from an injury, then from time—no matter how much cultivation Wei Wuxian poured into his chosen companion, in the end, Lan Wangji was a corpse and no corpse was free from the laws of decomposition.
She was proud of her work when she finished. Only a thin line still showed on Lan Wangji’s arm when she tied off the last thread. “Done,” she said.
Only then did Wei Wuxian look back down at the arm. He studied it for a minute, and then his shoulders relaxed. “Good,” he said, running two fingers gently down the minute scar. “You can go back home first,” he told her.
Wen Qing paused. “He’s fine,” she said to him. “Those are young kids—they didn’t know—”
“We’ll catch up soon,” Wei Wuxian said, no longer looking at her.
Wen Qing took a deep breath and mounted her horse. She’d tried more in the earlier days, but it had been eight years, and not once had Wei Wuxian listened—not when it involved his Hanguang-Jun. She hadn’t begun riding yet when he reached up and pressed a kiss to Lan Wangji’s white cheek. “Lan Zhan, how about you kill the ones who did that to you, hm? We can’t let them try that again.”
He played a quick shrill phrase on his flute and the corpses holding onto the young cultivators retreated to the ground.
The cultivators had only just started running when their bodies splattered into pieces. Lan Wangji stood still beside Wei Wuxian, having moved so quickly that Wen Qing’s eyes couldn’t follow. A line of blood ran down the blade of Lan Wangji’s sword.
“As efficient as always,” Wei Wuxian said and smiled. “All right! Let’s go home, Lan Zhan.”
Wen Qing said a silent prayer for the young cultivators, hoping they’d have family who would come searching and give them a proper burial.
Lan Sizhui received his courtesy name when he turned seven, quite a few years younger than the usual person. On his birthday, Wei Wuxian called him into the dining hall where the Wen family had cooked up a feast to celebrate. It was one of the few times Wei Wuxian ate with the rest of the Wen clan. Since the night Wei Wuxian had come back to the Yiling Burial Mounds with the “rich brother” who had once given Wen Yuan the happiest day of his life, his Xian-Gege had changed.
But tonight, Wei Wuxian was here, smiling and laughing and letting the Wens hand him jars of Emperor’s Smile, and even offering to cook a few dishes.
Wei Wuxian put down a plate in front of Wen Yuan and wished him a happy birthday. “A-Yuan, I think it’s time we gave you a courtesy name,” he said to him, patting him on the head with that familiar, warm smile. “What do you think of SiZhui?” he said. “Lan Sizhui.”
The Wens sitting close to them went silent. Wei Wuxian wanted Wen Yuan to adopt even a new surname. “Sizhui” meant to remember and long for. And as for the “Lan,” everyone knew who that family name belonged to.
Wei Wuxian smiled at him, waiting for a response. The man who had saved his family, who had saved his life, who had once played with him every day, who had brought him into town where he’d met Lan Wangji for the first time wanted him to take this name.
Wen Yuan smiled. “I would be honored,” he said.
Wei Wuxian’s smile turned a little wider, a little more wistful. “I’m glad,” he said. “Aren’t you glad too, Lan Zhan?” he said, turning to the corpse standing behind him. “Nod,” he said, reaching out to hold Lan Wangji’s hand, his thumb smoothing over Lan Wangji’s knuckle.
Lan Wangji nodded.
Wen Yuan remembered that day still sometimes. The first time he’d accidentally crashed into this man, the delighted smile on Wei Wuxian’s face when he saw him and bragged that A-Yuan was “his.” Wei Wuxian had looked so happy, so relaxed that day when Lan Wangji agreed to have dinner with them. That bowl of soup that Lan Wangji had bought him was the best soup Wen Yuan had ever had. Even though he’d had it again after they’d built the Yiling Forbidden City, after cultivators seeking demonic cultivation started to bring gifts and money, after the sects began paying tribute to the Yiling Patriarch to pledge allegiance to him—none of it had ever tasted as sweet, as satisfying as that one bowl.
That day that Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji had returned to the burial mounds with Wen Qing and Wen Ning, he wasn’t the only one changed. The rich brother who had once filled Wen Yuan’s pockets with toys, who had gently wiped his cheek, who had picked up both himself and Wei Wuxian and flown them on his sword, he was gone. Like Wei Wuxian had told him all those years ago when he asked, after that first and last meeting, he had never come back again.
“We’re proud of you, Lan Sizhui,” Wei Wuxian said, reaching out to ruffle his hair.
Wen Yuan blushed and tried to straighten his hair again. “Thank you,” he said. For the name, for saving him, for the things Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji had given up.
“Young master Wei, I’ve brought dinner,” Wen Ning called quietly at the entrance of the Fumo Cave. It had been two years since Wei Wuxian rescued himself and Wen Qing. A year ago, Wei Wuxian had decided they would begin construction of a city here in the Yiling Burial Mounds so the Wens and the rogue cultivators who had come seeking apprenticeship would have a real place to live.
But though he made sure each of the Wens had their own house, their own shop—whatever they desired for their lives now, Wei Wuxian refused to move out of the Fumo Cave. Even when some of those YilingWei apprentices had begun construction of a grand palace for their overlord, Wei Wuxian would visit in the day and return to the Fumo Cave at night. Seeing this, Wen Ning tried to make the cave more comfortable for him, putting blankets down on the stone bed, hanging up red curtains to give Wei Wuxian some privacy, putting soft rugs on the floor for comfort, making sure red lanterns lined the walls so there would be warmth and light.
And by the glow of these lanterns, he saw the silhouettes of two people on the stone bed.
“Ah, Lan Zhan…” Wen Ning heard Wei Wuxian gasp. He was sitting in Lan Wangji’s lap, moving in a distinctive way. He leaned forward to press their mouths together for a brief moment before he let out a louder gasp, his body arching. He stayed that way for a moment, and then leaned forward again, reaching out to touch Lan Wangji’s face. “Lan Zhan, Lan Zhan, tell me you love me again,” he said.
He received no answer.
“Lan Zhan, please,” Wei Wuxian said.
Wen Ning heard the wet sob that broke out of him. “Lan Zhan, say anything,” he begged. “Tell me you hate me, that you hate this, anything. Anything .”
Wen Ning heard Wei Wuxian cry and then with a sudden violence, he kicked Lan Wangji so hard that the corpse fell off the bed. Still hidden behind the curtain, Wen Ning could see that he never moved. “Fuck you, Lan Wangji! Fuck you!” Wei Wuxian shouted, punctuating each shout with another kick at the corpse.
Wen Ning could no longer keep watching and quickly put down the tray, hurrying forward to stop Wei Wuxian. The last time he’d thrown such a fit, he’d torn a large gash in Lan Wangji’s side, and been completely inconsolable while Wen Qing spent two days fixing the damage.
“Young master Wei! Please stop!” Wen Ning said, pulling Wei Wuxian away for Lan Wangji’s corpse that lay there, staring blankly up at them.
Wei Wuxian became even angrier when he saw Wen Ning. “Even fucking Wen Ning came back!” he shouted, struggling as Wen Ning pinned his arms to his side, trying to keep him from hurting Lan Wangji or himself. “Why could he come back and not you? Where the fuck are you, Lan Zhan? Where are you?” He sobbed openly now, going weak in Wen Ning’s arms. His robes were in disarray, slipping off his shoulders, and his hair was a mess, pouring down his back in black strokes of ink.
Wen Ning finally let him go, and Wei Wuxian dropped to the ground beside Lan Wangji. “Where are you, Lan Zhan?” he cried. “Hold me.”
Lan Wangji sat up obediently and gathered Wei Wuxian into his arms. His face never changed expression, staring blankly at the wall in front of him. Wei Wuxian cried, burying his face in Lan Wangji’s neck. “Tighter,” he begged, and Wen Ning watched as Lan Wangji’s hold tightened. “I miss you…”
“Your dinner is here,” Wen Ning said again, though he knew Wei Wuxian hadn’t heard him, and then turned away and left.
When Wei Wuxian came to, he was in the mouth of a dark cave, sitting on a rock, and Lan Wangji was standing in front of him, blocking him with his whole body.
The silver blade of a sword protruded from the center of Lan Wangji’s chest. A drop of blood dripped from the tip of the sword and splashed onto Wei Wuxian’s hand.
“Lan Zhan?” Wei Wuxian said, staring up at him.
Lan Wangji was looking at him, and he smiled. It was the first time Wei Wuxian had ever seen him smile, and it felt like taking that first step into the freezing water of the GusuLan cultivation pool, like tasting the first drop of the spicy bite of Emperor’s Smile on his tongue, like smelling the first breath of fresh air after the rain, like touching a glimpse of immortality. He was beautiful.
“I love you,” Lan Wangji said.
He let out a cough and blood trickled down from the corner of his mouth.
Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened. “Lan Zhan… Lan Zhan!” he said, reaching for him as Lan Zhan wobbled. “What happened? Why—Lan Zhan—”
“No…” someone said from behind him. “I didn’t mean to—I meant to kill Wei Wuxian!” The sword that protruded from Lan Zhan’s heart disappeared, and in its place, a fountain of blood poured out over Wei Wuxian’s hands, a river of blood staining him black.
“No! Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian said, trying to press his hands to the wound. If only he still had his golden core, if only he could pass him spiritual energy, maybe he could still—maybe he could—
Lan Wangji fell to his knees in front of Wei Wuxian, his eyes never leaving his face.
“Lan Zhan, why did you—”
“I love you,” Lan Wangji repeated, staring up at Wei Wuxian with those golden eyes like a supplication.
Wei Wuxian had seen death so many times by now, too many times, and he recognized the way Lan Wangji’s eyes were blurring over. “No, Lan Zhan, don’t you dare say that to me. You can’t tell me that and die. You can’t die!” Wei Wuxian ordered, pressing his hands to that wound, but the blood wouldn’t trickling between his fingers, dripping to the ground.
“Wei Wuxian, we need to help him.” Lan XiChen was trying to take Lan Wangji away from him.
“Let go of him!” Lan QiRen ordered.
“Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian said, focused only on one. “Lan Zhan, you can’t leave me—”
Lan Wangji took one shallow, stuttering breath. “I love you,” he said—
—and stopped.
“No, no, we need to bring WangJi back to the Cloud Recesses—”
“I’m sorry, it wasn’t my fault, it wasn’t me—”
“Get away from him! Let go!”
Wei Wuxian clutched at Lan Wangji’s limp body. The man he’d met for the first time when they were fifteen, the hours they’d spent in the library together, the times they’d fought together, night-hunted together, the occasional meals they’d shared, the way Lan Wangji looked at him, the happiness Wei Wuxian felt whenever he managed to get a reaction out of him—Lan Wangji loved him.
It was like the last piece of a puzzle box fitting together. In an instant, he could see their lives branching out from here. They could have left this ruined world behind them, retired from the cultivation world together, gotten a small cabin somewhere out in the countryside. He could have work out in the field and hunted during the day, and Lan Wangji could have stayed at home and woven and read and cooked and balanced their accounts. And when they were tired of retirement, they could have gone night hunting together. He could have finally brought Lan Wangji to pick lotus pods like he’d always wanted since he was fifteen, could have finally shown him around Lotus Pier and all the places he’d loved to go when he was young. Lan Wangji would have protected him from dogs and anything else that might ever hurt him. They would have shared a jar of Emperor’s Smile, ordered a table full of spicy dishes, bowed before heaven and earth, and celebrated their happiness. He would have gotten to see Lan Wangji smile every single day. Lan Wangji loved him.
Lan Wangji loved him. And just like Uncle Jiang and Madam Yu, like Jin Zixuan and Jiang Yanli, now the last person who loved him was also gone.
Wei Wuxian began to laugh, hollow and cold. He laughed and laughed, ignoring everything that was being shouted at him, the people trying to pull Lan Wangji away from him, laughing until he was exhausted. And when his voice had finally gone hoarse, he brought two bloodied fingers to his lips, and blew.
Lan Wangji’s eyes opened, blank and pale.
Wei Wuxian pressed their lips together in their first kiss. “Kill them all,” he whispered.