Work Text:
They stay in Zhongli for a while, afterwards.
The King wants them to return to the capital to give their report in person, but Jiang Wenhuan stands his ground, as he always does. "Kun Wu can't travel," he says, "and the people need us here to rebuild their home."
The King's envoy wrings his hands. "Jiang-gongzi, his Majesty understands your dedication to serving the people of Zhongli, and he will favorably consider--"
"Kun Wu can't travel."
The envoy gives Jiang Wenhuan a pleading look.
Wenhuan looks back.
So do Xin Jia and Tao Yingzhong and Wang Yuanji. Yibiao resists the urge to grip his sword in preparation for a more... physical argument, and takes a deep breath instead. It wouldn't do any good, here.
The envoy takes another look at Jiang Wenhuan and then bows his head in defeat.
They stay in Zhongli.
*
Yibiao remembers hearing the Taotie blade tear into flesh, even before he saw Kun Wu fall to the ground. He had been distracted for just a moment, trying to keep an eye on Gongsun Wuyu and waiting for the right moment to strike, and his first thought was: Jiang-xiong is going to kill me.
He probably would have deserved it.
He's looking at Kun Wu now, at his pale lips and the thick bandage around his middle. The jars of medicine next to his bed. His jaw clenches, and he has to will his mouth open to speak. "I failed you," he says, barely able to keep his eyes on Kun Wu's face. It's been difficult since the first day they met. Too familiar. Not right. "I failed the heirs' camp."
Kun Wu shakes his head at him, a gentle smile lifting the corners of his mouth. "It wasn't your fault. Don't beat yourself up over it." The smile widens a little as he glances at Wenhuan. "I lived, didn't I."
Yibiao wants to punch him in the face.
"We all knew the risks going in," Wenhuan says, completely unable to take his eyes off Kun Wu's face. His own problem, since day one. "We made this choice together."
Maybe he could punch both of them.
Finally, Wenhuan looks up at him. "We couldn't have gotten the information we needed without you gaining her trust. At least now the Taotie army knows who they were serving." He grits his teeth, looking back at the bandage. "Let them tell the King what he's wrought. We're done."
He'd never tell Jiang-xiong this, but it pains Yibiao to see him like this. Worn down and bitter and grieving. It shouldn't be in his nature. He grew up so loved.
"Have you heard from your brother yet?" Yibiao asks him quietly.
"Not yet. But Donglu is far from here, and he's still recovering. So the journey will take a little longer."
"Maybe he could have stayed--"
"Someone has to keep the people of Donglu safe. And the healer said if he keeps taking the antidote every day, he should make a full recovery." He looks like he wants to say something else, but then he just presses his mouth shut and exhales.
Shifu.
Yibiao nods awkwardly and turns, and then looks at Kun Wu again. "I'm sorry," he says, the words clumsy in his mouth. He leaves before they can say anything back.
The truth is, he did consider it. He sat down in the courtyard and read about the Elixir and thought about everything Gongsun Wuyu had said to him. Hadn't she been right? Who did he have left in this world? Only the promise of a better future, with a person who was bright and kind and too brave for her own good. He would make sure she'd get to live again.
Except, it wouldn't be a life, would it.
He had held Yiyao's limp body in his arms, had felt all life drained from her so completely, it made shivers ripple through his own body. He had felt death's presence. The icy shock of it.
Nobody could come back from that.
She's everything you've got left, Gongsun Wuyu's voice echoed inside his head. You owe her this chance.
He clenched his jaw and closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, the delicate blossoms in front of him were swaying in a light breeze, and for a moment he thought he could smell the galsang flowers again.
Such a beautiful place. How could it be evil? How could it be sinful?
E Shun was still haunting him. Even here. Even now. "You would break her heart," he said, sitting across from him at the table, dressed in white and so pale in the moonlight.
Yibiao closed his eyes again, but the voice didn't stop. He never knew how to make it stop.
"You know better. You know it's wrong. You know that madwoman cannot be trusted--"
"What does it matter!" he shouted, feeling so full of despair, it threatened to rip him open. "What does it matter anymore!"
"It matters to me! You killed me, and it matters to me."
For a moment, they just looked at each other. Then Yibiao blinked, and he was alone again. E Shun was gone, and he had taken the mad grief inside Yibiao with him and just left him with the clear night air and the moonlight and the flowers on the table. The ever present misery that had dulled into a distant ache over the years. Regrets upon regrets.
He couldn't bring himself to add another.
He sat there for a long time and then he went to find Jiang-xiong.
*
They settle into a routine in Zhongli.
Jiang-xiong barely leaves Kun Wu's side at first, but then starts joining them more frequently on their trips into town, or for their shared evening meals. Once Kun Wu feels well enough to receive guests, people start dropping by to see General Kun Ze's boy, to share memories and bring food and thank the heirs' camp for their help.
He's recuperating in separate rooms from the rest of the camp, and soon everyone starts referring to it as the Kun Residence, the way it fills up with small tokens of gratitude from the people of Zhongli. Kun Wu is appropriately embarrassed about it. Quietly happy, the way you are after endless hardships, when the world is finally kind to you again.
Yibiao wonders if Jiang-xiong will move into the actual Kun Residence too, once the heirs' camp disbands, or if he will convince Kun Wu to come to Donglu with him. Everyone seems reluctant to go home, after everything they've been through, but they can't stay here forever.
Eventually, Yibiao will have to return to Libei.
He knows he should think of it as his homeland, but in truth he had always felt like a stranger among his own people. An outcast, with no place in the Chong bloodline, and no family on his mother's side to turn to. And then E Shun had appeared out of nowhere and forced his way into Yibiao's life, and finally given him a home. With E Shun by his side, the grasslands were vast and free and full of promise. Like he could finally breathe.
He feels something similar here, in this strange country, with his brothers and the people they've chosen to protect.
It's still not the same.
*
Xin Jia, for his part, thought it would be a good idea to teach one of the child beggars near their quarters how to play betting games with the merchants passing through town. Then he had to show all of the boy's friends as well. Then his friends brought their little siblings, because Xin Jia had food, and also knew some fun stories involving roulette games.
"It's math!" he told Jiang Wenhuan when he found Xin Jia surrounded by a group of children in the courtyard one morning. "I'm teaching them math!"
"Those are dice."
"And there are numbers on them."
"We've learned addition and subtraction," a girl in a worn-looking cloak supplied with a bright smile, and Jiang Wenhuan stared at her.
"Told you," Xin Jia said smugly.
Jiang Wenhuan looked at Yibiao. "And you?"
Yibiao just shrugged at him.
"He doesn't trust me either," Xin Jia said accusingly. "Keeps hovering nearby and doesn't even help."
Yibiao rolled his eyes. "You need help teaching children how to count?"
"I'll leave you to it then," Jiang Wenhuan said, seemingly more at ease now that he knew Yibiao was keeping an eye on Xin Jia. "Please don't turn the children of Zhongli into gamblers."
"I would never!"
"I wouldn't worry about the children," Yibiao muttered, but he could tell Jiang-xiong's mind was already elsewhere. His eyes kept straying to the Kun Residence, as if Kun Wu's wounds would reopen if he was left alone for five minutes, and he needed Jiang Wenhuan's constant fussing just to stay alive.
Who knows, maybe he did.
Yibiao had seen the blade push into his flesh.
There were so few ways to come back from that.
*
The day before E Shun went back home, Yibiao's father decided to make his life a little more miserable in the way only his father could, for reasons Yibiao couldn't even guess at. He can barely remember anymore what specific act of cruelty had made him storm out of the tent, just to get as far away from them as possible, but he remembers the blind rage he felt when E Shun stepped in front of him to stop him in his tracks.
"You can't keep running away from them forever," he insisted, a fire in his eyes, and Yibiao wanted to shout at him to shut up, it wasn't this easy, but he couldn't form any words. He just wanted to scream.
"Go away," he gritted out, even though he knew it wouldn't do any good.
"No," E Shun said, predictably, getting even closer to Yibiao to stop him from leaving, and Yibiao felt caged in and bruised and so full of anger, he raised his fist with a shout, managing to stop himself just before he could actually hit E Shun.
E Shun didn't even flinch.
"Not like that," he murmured, his face inches away from Yibiao's. "Leave another bruise nobody else can see."
Yibiao just breathed heavily into the sliver of space between them--exhale, inhale, exhale--and then he grabbed E Shun's wrist and dragged him towards their horses.
It felt good to be riding over the grasslands in the moonlight, E Shun's whooping laughter in his ears as he tried to keep up with Yibiao, the wind cool against his skin, and the tightness in his chest finally unravelling. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. It was suddenly so easy.
They rode for a good while, until they arrived at some gently sloping foothills and Yibiao jumped off his horse before it had even come to a full stop. E Shun was still laughing, or laughing again, a little breathless as he stumbled into Yibiao's arms, his eyes sparkling even in the darkness.
"You going to let me win one of these days?" he said, as if Yibiao would ever.
"In your dreams," Yibiao told him, and when E Shun threw his head back in laughter, Yibiao kissed his throat, hot and open-mouthed, and then licked the sweat off the side of his neck until E Shun twisted to catch his lips.
He had never felt anything as perfect as kissing E Shun, his lips so soft against his own, the smallest noise escaping his throat when Yibiao slid his tongue into his mouth. Perfect, perfect. So perfect it almost made him angry again, so he kissed E Shun harder, pulled him close and dug his hands into his robes, until E Shun had to break the kiss to gasp for air, more laughter falling from his lips. Delighted. Happy.
"I yield," he said, his eyes dancing. "You don't have to fight me."
Yibiao kissed him again.
He can't remember now what his father had said or done, or how exactly his brother had tried to make him feel less than; what punishment they had devised on that particular day to make Yibiao regret his birth, once again.
He remembers: how E Shun had pulled him deeper into the foothills and up the slope. How he had taken off his bright outer robe to lay it on the ground. How he offered himself without shame or hesitation. How soft his skin was underneath Yibiao's rough hands. His smile. The sounds he made. The marks Yibiao left on him, with his teeth and his hands, and how hot they felt when he dragged his tongue over them.
Everything that had ever felt good in his life, condensed into the feeling of E Shun's hands gripping his own in the soft grass.
The next day, E Shun was gone.
Ten days later, the first letter arrived.
*
"You know, if I didn't know better," Wang Yuanji says, standing beside Yibiao to watch today's math lesson, "I'd think Xin Jia wanted to open a school, not a gambling hall."
Yibiao just nods at the row of children in front of Xin Jia. "Future employees."
Wang Yuanji laughs. "Playing the long game, our Xin-xiong." He claps Yibiao on the back and then goes to join the others who are helping to prepare supper.
"Xin-xiansheng," one of the smaller girls pipes up. "What's a general amnesty?"
Her brother elbows her in the side. "I told you."
"I want to hear it from Xin-xiansheng."
"What did your brother tell you?"
"That all the criminals are freed from prison."
"That's right."
The girl's eyes widen. "All of them?"
"That's what general means." Xin Jia takes his writing stick and draws the characters into the ground. "General. Amnesty."
"I heard Lao Wu say the King should have just sent some rice and flour instead of emptying his prisons." The boy puffs himself up and deepens his voice as much as he can, which isn't very much. "They'll fill up again in no time."
The children giggle.
"A-Li, what did I tell you about eavesdropping," Xin Jia says, giving the boy a pointed look.
"To not get caught and tell you anything interesting first--"
"Shush!"
The children giggle again, a few of them glancing at Yibiao to see if he'll reprimand Xin-xiansheng.
Yibiao cuffs Xin Jia lightly, just because the children like it and he's in a good mood. "Should I tell Jiang-xiong you're turning the youth of Zhongli into your spies?"
"I wouldn't say spies."
"The murderers too?" the little girl pipes up again. Apparently it took her a minute to process all this new information.
"The murderers too," Xin Jia says. "Everyone."
"Some of them might have had a good reason," Yibiao says, starting a murmured discussion among Xin Jia's class.
Xin Jia slaps his arm. "What Chong-xiong meant to say," he tells the children, raising his voice, "is that everyone deserves a second chance."
Yibiao hits Xin Jia back, out of principle.
"Like, for example," Xin Jia goes on, undeterred, "if you were in trouble for lying to the King, but you contributed to the victory over the evil forces plaguing the realm--" He pauses to give Yibiao an entirely unnecessary look. "Now thanks to the gen-e-ral am-nes-ty," he points at the words on the ground, "you won't be executed anymore."
"You can be executed for lying?" a boy from further back says, his eyes wide.
"Only if they catch you," Yibiao says flatly.
The children nod in unison, mollified.
Xin Jia glares at him. "I'm telling Jiang-xiong you're corrupting the children of Zhongli."
Yibiao shrugs.
"Why are you even still here?" Xin Jia hisses at him. "Nandu is that way," he says, pointing in the wrong direction. "Have you forgotten how to ride a horse?"
Yibiao growls at him. "None of your business."
"What's in Nandu?"
Yibiao glares at Xin Jia, who in turn gives A-Li an apologetic look. "Nothing we have time to get into right now."
"Just teach them some math," Yibiao grits out, and then turns to leave, raising his arm in a half-wave when the children call out to him to stay. "Listen to your Xin-xiansheng," he says without looking back, and against his better judgment.
What does Xin Jia know.
Sometimes things just aren't as easy as they seem.
*
There's a banquet in his honor, but he can't make out the faces of the guests, and he can't hear what they're saying. It's just noise. A hunk of meat on a plate. A jug of mare's milk wine. A sword gleaming in the candle light.
It doesn't belong to you.
He takes it, and the hilt fits his hand perfectly. It's perfect. He's earned it. It's his.
Nothing belongs to you. Nothing will ever belong to you!
He lashes out with a roar, all the desperate fury inside him channeled into his blade, and when he looks up, E Shun is staring at him, wide-eyed and unblinking.
Chong-xiong.
He pulls his sword out of E Shun's chest and blood comes spilling out, an endless gush of red that fills the space they're in, until Yibiao is wading in it, until it reaches his waist, until he's drowning in an ocean of red.
A hand grabs his just as he's about to be swept away and pulled under.
Don't ruin yourself for them.
If he holds on to the hand, he won't drown.
Mere ants, attempting to topple a tree. You're wiser than they are.
He manages to open his eyes, but everything is red, he can barely see through the haze, he knows E Shun is dying, Kun Wu is dying, there is so much blood, but if he can just hold on, if he can swim up--
You killed me.
He wakes up, retching from the acrid taste in his mouth. Gasping for air.
Pale light is coming in through the windows, and he's sweating under his blanket. Beside him, Xin Jia and the others are still asleep.
The first step outside shocks him awake, the crisp winter morning making his breath fog and his eyes water. A different kind of cold from the winters up north, but reminding him of home all the same. It feels good against his skin.
He finds Kun Wu outside the Kun Residence, his eyes closed and his face raised towards the few snowflakes floating in the quiet of the early morning.
Yibiao sits down beside him.
The moment stretches on.
Finally, Kun Wu turns his head to look at him.
Yibiao knew right away that he wasn't E Shun. It was unsettling how much he looked like him, when everything else about him was so wrong. He felt like E Shun was taunting him, even from afar. Making him contend with this imposter, instead of facing Yibiao himself.
And then he learned the truth.
"I didn't think the scar would fool you, you know," Kun Wu says softly. "But I felt I had to try anyway. Give it my all."
"Stupid."
Kun Wu huffs out a laugh. "Well, in hindsight. Yes." He looks up at the heavy sky again. "Doesn't matter. There's a real one beside it now."
Yibiao clenches his jaw. "I'm responsible for both of them."
"No," Kun Wu says, frowning at him. "No, I'm responsible for both of them."
"Not this again."
"What?"
"We chose this. We knew the risk. It wasn't your fault." Yibiao lets out a frustrated noise, then tries to rein in his anger. It always bubbles up so easily. There is so much of it inside him.
"I think," Kun Wu says carefully, "you're apologizing to the wrong person."
"He doesn't want to hear any of it either," Yibiao says with a jerk of his chin over his shoulder, and Kun Wu laughs, the noise startling a bird that had been pecking for seeds nearby. It flutters away.
"Not him," Kun Wu says, then shifts to fully look at Yibiao. "Come on, Chong-xiong. Say what you want to say."
It knocks the breath out of Yibiao, how much it sounds like E Shun. The arrogance. The teasing lilt to the words. The easy familiarity.
"Don't--" he growls, but Kun Wu is still looking at him.
So close to the real thing. So close.
Not him.
"Can you say it?" Kun Wu prompts gently.
He can't.
It's all wrong.
He gets up. "Tell Jiang-xiong--" he starts, setting off towards the stables. "Whatever you want. I don't care."
"I'll tell him you've come to your senses," Kun Wu calls after him, and when Yibiao turns around, his grin looks so much like E Shun's, Yibiao can't help but smile back at him.
He'll have to pack a few provisions and bring a cloak, but it shouldn't take long to get those things. He can be on his way before anyone else wakes up.
For the first time in a long time, the world feels vast again.
*
It takes him half a day's ride to realize that after spending so much time following a trail of clues left by a madwoman to lead them all to their deaths, he is finally traveling towards a destination of his own choosing. He can't even remember the last time he got to make that choice.
He didn't get to make a lot of choices in his life, if he thinks about it.
He wanted to prove himself to his father by becoming the strongest warrior in the land, and then he won the Hero's Blade without ever winning his father's approval.
It was still his own choice. His own accomplishment.
Everything else he ever wanted was taken from him. By his father. His brother. By Gongsun Wuyu.
By his own helpless anger.
At least that one he can still get back.
He tucks the pressed flower more securely into the folds of his robe and, for the first time in a long time, allows himself to feel hope.
*
He arrives at the Marquis's mansion just after sunset, and finds someone to take care of his horse before striding towards the front door. Lao Bing is there to meet him before he can even announce his presence, a warm smile on his face. "Chong-gongzi. It is good to see you again."
Yibiao nods in greeting. "Can I see him?" he says, finding it difficult to follow proper etiquette after his journey. "Please," he adds, watching the indecision on Lao Bing's face. It was such a long ride. Such a long three years.
"It is quite late, Chong-gongzi," Lao Bing says.
A maid appears behind him, stopping in her tracks as she recognizes Yibiao. She averts her gaze almost immediately, but Yibiao still notices the way her eyes widen a little at the sword on his back. The way she positions herself a little more firmly between Yibiao and the inner rooms of the mansion. The thin line of her mouth.
He could feel Lao Bing's unshakable loyalty to his young master when he came to find Yibiao in Dongwu, and he can feel the same thing here, in E Shun's home.
At least, during all this time, E Shun has been loved.
Yibiao unclenches his jaw. "I want to talk," he says, his voice rough, and then he slowly reaches back to take off his sword. For a moment he's at a loss, but then Lao Bing steps forward and Yibiao hands him the leather strap, as if it was the most normal thing in the world to just surrender his weapon to a stranger. Lao Bing sags a little under the weight.
"Please," Yibiao says again. "Can I see him?"
There's an almost imperceptible nod from Lao Bing, and finally the maid curtseys at Yibiao and motions at him to follow her.
Yibiao realizes he isn't ready. He isn't ready at all.
He had a whole journey to prepare for this, but when the door quietly clicks shut behind him and he is finally alone with E Shun, he cannot think of a single thing to say.
E Shun always did the talking for both of them.
He is so pale. He looks tired, and Yibiao has never seen him tired before. He has never seen him anything but brash and self-assured and full of life.
He swallows. "Are you cold?"
E Shun just nods at Yibiao, his eyes glittering in the candlelight, and Yibiao crosses the room and throws his arms and his cloak around him, feeling clumsy and helpless as E Shun lets himself be pulled close.
"What took you so long," E Shun whispers against his shoulder, and there's so much sorrow in his voice, Yibiao's knees buckle under the weight of it.
"I'm sorry," he says against E Shun's stomach, his arms still wrapped tightly around him. This is where the scar should be. It must still hurt. "I didn't know--"
I didn't know you were dying.
I didn't know you were looking out for me all this time.
I didn't know you saved me from myself.
I didn't know how to not be angry.
"I was stupid," he says, on his knees in E Shun's bedroom, and he almost wants to laugh at the simple truth of it. So many ways he could try to explain himself to E Shun. So many ways he could apologize. But what is there to say? "Can you forgive me?"
E Shun slides his hand over Yibiao's cheek, so cold against Yibiao's travel-flushed skin, and Yibiao lays his own hand over it without thinking. Turns to press his lips against E Shun's palm, slow and gentle like he rarely was with him in Libei.
E Shun takes a breath, his exhale a tremble in the quiet of the room. "I will tell the kitchen to prepare supper for you," he says softly. "We'll eat and drink."
Yibiao nods against his palm, feeling it warm up in his grasp. E Shun's other hand carefully brushes over his hair, coming to rest against his shoulder.
They stay like this for a long while.
*
Yibiao wakes up slowly, becoming aware of the world in stages. The quiet of the room. The soft bedding he's lying on. The warm body pressed against him.
They're both naked under the heavy blanket. It was the easiest way to warm E Shun up.
Maybe if they don't leave the bed, E Shun will never be cold again.
Maybe he isn't entirely awake yet.
There's a knock on the door and they both wince, E Shun stubbornly pulling Yibiao's arm tighter around him.
"Your medicine, young master!"
E Shun sighs. "Leave it by the door!"
There's a pause, and then the soft sound of a tray being put down. "Do you need anything else, young master?"
"Breakfast," Yibiao calls out, clamping his hand over E Shun's mouth before he can protest. "You're too thin," he tells him in a determined whisper. "You need to eat more."
"Yes, Chong-gongzi," the maid replies through the door, and then it's quiet again.
"You'll have to let me go," Yibiao murmurs, his forehead pressed against E Shun's shoulder. It's really awfully warm under the blanket.
"Why?"
"Your medicine."
"Don't need the medicine."
Yibiao just looks at him.
"I'm not cold anymore."
"Please," Yibiao murmurs, brushing his lips over E Shun's skin. "The servants will think I'm keeping you from--"
"Oh, fine," E Shun says, loosening his hold on Yibiao's arm. "Be quick."
Yibiao smoothes the blanket down around E Shun before he goes to get the tray, and the whole time E Shun just watches him, as if he's still making sure Yibiao is really here. As if he's still dreaming.
There's a teapot on the tray, as well as two bowls and a plate of fruit. Next to it, the small bowl of murky brown liquid. Yibiao sets everything down on the small table next to the bed and then joins E Shun under the blanket again.
"To help with the bitterness," E Shun says softly, nodding at the fruit. "It doesn't, but it makes Bing-shu feel better." He smiles, then sighs and starts sitting up. A dry cough shudders through him, and Yibiao stills him with a hand on his shoulder.
"Do you remember," he says, pushing himself up on his arm, "your first cup of mare's milk wine?"
E Shun makes a face, and Yibiao reaches out to run his fingertips over the scowl, smoothing it away until E Shun is just looking at him again.
He's always found it difficult to be gentle. Until recently, not a lot of people ever gave him reason to.
"I helped you, didn't I?" he tells E Shun. "To get you used to the taste."
E Shun's eyes widen. "Chong-xiong."
He tries to steel himself, but he still can't help the slight wince when he empties the bowl into his mouth and the bitterness hits his tongue. He lets it sit there for the length of a breath, tasting all of his shame and all his regrets with it. Then he bends down to run his thumb over E Shun's lips.
E Shun is staring at him, and Yibiao has to give him a nod before he remembers to open his mouth.
His hand stays where it is, cradling E Shun's jaw as the liquid trickles from his own mouth into E Shun's. He watches him swallow, wiping away a few stray traces with his thumb before kissing him.
How could he ever tell him? How sorry he is. How badly he wanted his own brother dead, and how badly he needs E Shun to stay alive. That a hundred lifetimes wouldn't be enough to make up for the last three years. That he has to try anyway.
"We can share the bitterness," he murmurs instead, feeling E Shun's arms tighten around him.
"So you're staying?"
"Yes."
"How long?"
Yibiao pauses. He hadn't really thought about that part. He just arrived last night, didn't he. "Until you're well enough to ride to Libei with me."
E Shun smiles up at him, a slow, brilliant thing that lights up his whole face. Almost the way Yibiao remembers it. "Will you let me win this time?"
"In your dreams."
E Shun pulls him close, his eyes dancing, and Yibiao kisses him again, washing the shame away with the taste of that smile.
Home, finally.