Work Text:
Qing Jing Peak was the second-best peak in Cang Qiong Sect, so, of course, Shen Jiu had wanted in. Never mind his hatred of writing; never mind the indisputable uselessness of the four arts. Second best was second best.
Yue Qingyuan, who had made any hope of Qiong Ding Peak irrelevant, once again continued to fail his expectations and had only managed to get him into the third-best one.
Wan Jian Peak was less of a mountain and more of a volcano, what with the furnaces and the forges and the fumes.
The. Constant. Fucking. Fumes.
“That’s a nice fan you have there, shidi,” Wei-shijie said, mouth quirking at him.
The motions of his left hand, which just so happened to be holding a black fan, increased rapidly in both speed and violence.
… Wei-shijie didn’t have the decency to notice that he was trying to make the smoke drift up her nose.
Wei-shijie was both Shizun’s daughter and the disciple who had taken him around the peak when he had first entered the sect, seven years ago.
She was also the only person on the peak and possibly in the sect he could bear to spend more than a moment next to. Although she had a younger brother, who was around Shen Jiu’s age, he was something of a social butterfly, which just meant, fortunately, that he was rarely on the peak he was supposed to be on.
If Shen Jiu wanted to keep his post as head disciple, it was essential to stay in Wei-shijie’s good graces and, by extension, Shizun’s.
So he couldn’t scowl at her, no matter the temptation.
Instead, he had to listen to … this.
“Did Yue-shixiong,” she said, her voice lowering in awe—an awe that he was, he realised, fingers tightening around the fan, going to have to get used to hearing next to that name, ever since the whispers about the Battle of Bailu Mountain had spread, “did Yue-shixiong really give it to you?”
The fan snapped in half.
So what if he had?
It was broken now, obviously, but, in any case, what difference did it make, the things that Yue Qingyuan had given him?
There was a time when Shen Jiu would have given everything to hear those words—a time when those words would have been wealthy with memory—a time when Yue-shixiong would have been heavy, holding, as he had assumed it would, exactly the same meaning as Qi-ge.
It would take time to become used to this new weightlessness of the words, shorn of all significance—for all that it had been seven years, and he still hadn’t—
“… so Yue-shixiong heard your fan was broken,” the An Ding Peak disciple in front of him stammered, interrupting his train of thought, “and he got you another one?”
It had only been two days since the incident.
Shen Jiu’s eyes narrowed. The boy’s hand, which was holding out yet another black fan, this time, made of bamboo instead of paper, shook in the air between them. “How did he hear that?”
There was a prolonged pause in which the An Ding Peak boy cleared his throat studiously and examined the ground, Wei-shijie whistled idly while she stared at the sky, and Shen Jiu seriously contemplated throwing them all off the mountain.
Eventually, Wei-shijie cracked, the silence getting to her, and coughed pointedly. “Shidi, news travels so fast across the peaks—,” she began, in her Shizun’s Daughter Knows Best tone.
Fortunately, Shizun had told him about how Wei-shijie had spent days practicing that tone as a child—Wei-shijie had dropped by near the end of that conversation and had promptly dragged him away, loudly disclaiming her mother’s words, Shizun laughing all the while—so he wasn’t fooled by it.
Shen Jiu turned to her. “You told him,” he accused, flatly.
“I told him,” she admitted, without a hint of guilt. “I had to, shidi! Yue-shixiong asked me to!”
“So if he asked you to jump off a cliff—,” Shen Jiu began.
“Then I’ll know he’s been possessed and take him to the sword testing station to make him walk past Hong Jing,” Wei-shijie said, triumphantly and entirely accurately.
… Damn her.
“Oh, and Ma told me she wants you in the forge again,” she continued, blithely, as if her mother wasn’t also their shizun. “Something about coins?”
Damn her!
Sometimes, Shen Jiu bitterly thought about how everything would have been easier at Qing Jing Peak. The time lost to him wouldn’t have mattered so much on Qing Jing Peak: hands were all anyone needed for the four arts, apart from a working memory, and Shen Jiu had learned to control himself enough that the trembling no longer overtook his fingers, even when the lingering ache from the damage to his bones made it all the way to his wrists.
It was an entirely different matter to hold a hammer on Wan Jian Peak and, each time, hope that it didn’t land on his own hand.
When he had entered the sect, already too old at sixteen, Shizun had given him a billet to beat a shape into; she had only looked approvingly at the angle of his arm at the end, never mind that the hammer he held was wavering erratically by where it rested in his lowered hand, his muscles still jumping madly.
“Hm,” she had said. “I won’t have to set you to chopping wood with the younger disciples.”
Shen Jiu had managed not to shake with the wave of relief brought by this assessment, only managing a jerky salute in response.
(Under Wu Yanzi, he had cut several things down, wood being the easiest and least animate among them. It made him—the junior disciples were too loud. He didn’t like the idea of being near them.)
“Come here,” Shizun had said, then.
The Peak Lord of Wan Jian Peak had a low, deep voice that easily carried over the sounds, however loud, of swordcraft; it was impossible to disobey it.
Sitting down obediently next to her, Shen Jiu had stilled utterly when she took his arm, which was still twitching, and bent and rotated each and every joint he had, from the wrist to the shoulder blade and then over and across to the other arm until the last wrist rotation.
… Somehow, it had made the spasms stop.
He had then been given strict instructions to incorporate the exercises into his daily routine, sent to Qian Cao Peak to collect what he had thought was an excessive amount of various medicinal balms but was, according to the young woman who pulled out a pre-prepared pouch upon his arrival, apparently just ‘the standard monthly medical kit for Wan Jian Peak disciples’, and had then started his training as a smith.
Even then, seven years on, something about the forge still made his steps slow down as he made his way to where Shizun was standing and sighing over—
… was that a sword made of ruby?
Shizun grimaced at his questioning glance. “Ceremonials,” she said, in tones of deep gloom.
“Shizun is very practical,” Shen Jiu said, in an attempt at sympathy.
Noble commissions for ceremonial swords, with the most common request being for ones crafted from a single, pure piece of jade, often came to Peak Lord Wei—who was not a famed swordsmith for nothing—and had to be accepted for the reputation and profit that the end result would bring to Shizun as well as, by association, to the sect.
However, Shizun was also a master swordswoman and despised the idea of crafting a sword that would never, ever, see any use. Her no-nonsense nature couldn’t abide the thought.
A black cloud hung over Wan Jian Peak every time a commission made its way to the mountain.
Personally, Shen Jiu didn’t get it. He could see the value of ceremonials. Commoners wouldn’t know enough to not fear a sword that was, for all intents and purposes, useless; in any case, it was something you could sell and make good money as well as a good name for yourself from the sale.
Wan Jian Peak might not have been his first—or even second—choice, but there was something to be said about the riches that passed through it.
There was also something to be said about the gold and the silver. Not to mention the bronze, and the steel and the iron …
… If he had been secretly trying to figure out how to cast coins for his own use, that was nobody’s business but his own.
Except, apparently, it was also the business of his shizun, who had brought him here to bring it up.
“You’d be better off trying to make spirit stones,” she told him, not unkindly, while Shen Jiu tried, and failed, not to flush from shame and anger. “Cultivators’ currency, and less chances of criminal charges for private casting.”
“Yes, Shizun.”
“Head up, boy, it isn’t a bad skill to have,” she said, briskly. “Just be more careful.”
Shen Jiu’s eyes flicked up, and caught the glimmer of concern in hers.
… Something in him quieted, however reluctantly.
“Yes, Shizun,” he said, again, and the conversation became a lesson as she started questioning him on what he could tell about the make of the ceremonial sword.
There was also something to be said about how warm the forge was, compared to the outside world. It almost eased the ache in his bones.
Around Five Years Ago
Yue Qingyuan had become the head disciple of Qiong Ding Peak long before he had battled Tianlang-jun; this had only served to fan the flames of his fame even further. Yet another reason that Shen Jiu had wanted Qing Jing Peak was because the peak lord had no successors: he would have found a way to snatch the title of head disciple for himself as soon as possible, cultivation be damned.
Wan Jian Peak, in his mind, had two complications, who he called Wei-shijie and Wei-shixiong, respectively.
It had then been somewhat of a surprise to him when he was given the title right after he had drawn Xiu Ya.
(For all his bitterness, for all the back-breaking labour that had been, and was still, required of him, for all that he had yet to form his golden core … Shen Jiu struggled to not to feel soothed when his line of sight caught the snow-white light of Xiu Ya. Still, he preserved; it was easy enough for his solace to sour—all he had to do was remember the sting of Cheng Luan at his throat.)
Once he had been made head disciple, Peak Lord Wei’s two children came to congratulate him and then exchanged confused glances at his own confusion.
“Shidi,” Wei-shijie said, slowly. “Peak lords have to do paperwork.”
Shen Jiu paused.
That … did explain it, actually, for her. Wei-shijie was even more single-minded than her mother; she specialised in external alchemy and was already known for having mastered the transformation of mercury into silver. (Shizun had been very proud. Shijie had practically glowed with it. Shen Jiu had been horribly jealous for days.)
But—
Wei-shixiong shook his head at him before he could say anything. “I wouldn’t get to travel so much,” he said, easily, and paused. “I can still manage the sword testing station, right?”
Although he was far more outgoing than his sister and his mother, Wei-shixiong also had that streak of single-mindedness, albeit somewhat diluted. It helped that, instead of a craft, the focus of his interest was directed at Hong Jing and all the stories about evil spirits and demonic possession that surrounded the mystical sword.
“… yes,” Shen Jiu said, then, experimentally, “I’ll put you in charge of all affairs that might relate to Hong Jing.”
Wei-shixiong cheered.
“What will you even do if Hong Jing does unsheathe?” Wei-shijie said, exasperated. “You’ve never even seen it happen!”
“I’ve heard all the tales!” he argued.
“So? What do the tales tell you to do if Hong Jing ever sounds the alarm?” she said, skeptically.
“Inform Shen-shidi, of course! Jie, have you already forgotten that he’s the head disciple now?” Wei-shixiong said, beaming at them, slinging a triumphant arm around his sister, who rolled her eyes; wisely, he didn’t try and touch Shen Jiu.
Shizun still hadn’t, at the time, given him his new name along with his title, as he had heard was traditional.
That happened three days later, after he’d found the nerve to ask Shizun about her deliberations, only for her to then ask him what he wanted.
“It is going to be your name,” she said, at his glance of surprise. “This is just the welding. Being is in the wielding.”
“It’s still Shizun’s right to decide,” Shen Jiu pointed out, carefully keeping from shifting on his feet, regardless of how uncomfortable with the bizarre direction of the conversation. He hadn’t heard of any protocol for this.
It was irritating; what was the point in having interrogated every head disciple he could lay his hands on about how their names had been given if Shizun wasn’t going to follow proper etiquette?
“Teaching is thankless,” Shizun muttered, obviously ill at ease with the entire notion. “I’m not one for literary whats-its.”
Allusions, Shen Jiu thought, immediately, but bit it back. “… perhaps Shizun could confirm her choice with the peak lord of Qing Jing Peak?” he tried.
“Ah, yes,” she said, straightening up and paging through the pile of papers in front of her, scowling slightly. “Shixiong gave me a list.” Finally, she found what she was looking for. “Here, he’s even given examples of what not to use—I’m not that hopeless, I know how names work.” She scowled at the paper, then cleared her throat. “Qingqiu.”
“No,” Shen Jiu blurted, without thinking, and then flinched away from his show of disrespect, automatically raising his arms to cover his face from a strike.
… It never came.
There was a long, silent moment.
This time, Shen Jiu couldn’t keep from shifting, as he awkwardly lowered his arms, not daring to look up.
“Never mind shixiong’s list,” Shizun said, brusquely, putting the piece of paper aside. “How about … Qingjian?”
…
… apparently the Qing Jing Peak Lord hadn’t been exaggerating about Shizun’s aptitude.
Shen Jiu looked up, trying not to stare at the woman who was the lord of Wan Jian Peak while being, also, possibly, illiterate.
“Clear … Sword?” he echoed, briefly sketching the character in the air while somehow keeping his voice from trembling—whether from laughter or from shock, he didn’t know; either way, everything about this situation was becoming hysterical. Surely … surely, this was too obvious, even for the Peak Lord of the Thousand Swords Peak?
Shizun paused, realisation dawning, and then looked horrified.
“I meant the character for mirror!” she squawked.
Oh.
If he hadn’t been holding on to his control so tightly, he would have laughed out of the sheer relief of knowing that he had been waiting for the sting of a cut that wasn’t going to come.
“This disciple understands,” Shen Jiu said, gravely, managing to keep a straight face.
“He does?” Shizun said, suspiciously.
“He is but one sword among many—,”
“You little brat—,”
“—undeserving of Shizun’s regard—,”
“Watch your words, or I will make it Qingjian!” she threatened.
Something weirdly warm settled in him at her affected annoyance.
... Did he have a fever?
He would have to check in at Qian Cao Peak later.
It was some time after the Battle of Bailu Mountain, long after Shen Jiu had been recognised as the head disciple of Wan Jian Peak, that Shizun approached him again. He put aside the design for the bronze sword, inlaid with turquoise, that he’d been working on.
“How well do you know your Yue-shixiong?” Shizun said, in that abrupt way that she had.
Caught-off guard by the topic, he said, “I know him best,” automatically, instinctual habit immediately overriding basic common sense.
Then, paling, even though Shizun wasn’t the sort to take needless offence, he hastily lowered his eyes and amended his words. “That is—this one has known Yue-shixiong—,” since I knew what knowing was, “—since we were both very young, Shizun.”
He looked up, after a moment of silence, and was surprised to see a conflicted expression on Shizun’s face.
It looked all wrong. Shizun wasn’t the sort to be conflicted.
Ma has a mind like a knife, Wei-shijie had told him, a little while after he’d been made head disciple but couldn’t quite cast the doubt he was carrying away. It cuts only one way, shidi.
It was strange, how that had helped, at the time.
Shizun opened her mouth and then closed it, evidently trying to decide on something.
It was entirely uncharacteristic. Shen Jiu had the bizarrest urge to drag her to the sword testing station to have her checked for possession—but then Shizun spoke.
“That boy talks a lot to you during the Annual Twelve Peak Martial Arts Meeting,” she said. “Every year.”
Shen Jiu twitched, entirely uncomfortable with the notion that their interactions during those meetings had been observed.
“… yes, Shizun,” he said, since she clearly expected some sort of response.
What was he supposed to do about it? He had never encouraged Yue Qingyuan’s ceaseless chatter. It wasn’t as if he could tell the vaunted head disciple of Qiong Ding Peak to shut the hell up in public, no matter how tempting it might be.
“Tell me if he ever talks to you about Xuan Su,” she said, abruptly, “and never spar with him.”
Before Shen Jiu could even finish feeling outraged and, then, bewildered, much less figure out how to voice anything aloud, Shizun left.
Did she think he couldn’t spar with Yue Qingyuan?!
Shen Jiu paused.
Although he hated to admit it, it was … possibly … true that he wouldn’t win a spar against the Xuan Su Sword. Then again, at least neither would Liu Qingge—
… but Liu Qingge hadn’t ever sparred against the Xuan Su Sword, specifically. No one in the sect had. Yue Qingyuan had only ever drawn his sword once thus far, and that had been against Tianlang-jun.
Shen Jiu hadn’t even needed to go anywhere to confirm what had only sounded like a rumour; his martial siblings were only too happy to bring it up whenever possible. Even for the likes of Cang Qiong Sect, the Battle of Bailu Mountain wasn’t a small matter to boast of.
… Why had Shizun asked to know if Yue Qingyuan talked about Xuan Su?
He frowned, going through what he remembered of their conversations. It was usually at those meetings—but, no, Yue Qingyuan always stuck to the most asinine topics during those meetings. He would ask about inanities like food or clothes—as if he couldn’t feed and clothe himself, as if he was some sort of child who needed his help, for all the good he had ever done Shen Jiu!
Fortunately, Shen Jiu had learnt to tune the man out during those meetings; otherwise, the implications would have sent him into a rage.
Had they ever even discussed swords, since Shen Jiu had entered the sect … ?
Yue Qingyuan had complimented Xiu Ya, he remembered that.
“Xiu Ya,” Shen Jiu had said, briskly, in response to his questioning glance, hoping to cut their exchange short as quickly as he could.
It was really a pity he couldn’t use Xiu Ya on him.
Unfortunately, he would have to wait for the other to leave or figure out some inconspicuous way of chasing him off—after all, Wan Jian Peak was his peak, and he couldn’t leave it.
“Xiu Ya … it suits you very well, shidi,” Yue Qingyuan said.
Shen Jiu graced this with a nod, cutting short any other compliments the man might have attempted.
He wasn’t wrong, this once, but he had said all that needed to be said. Xiu Ya did suit him very well.
Yue Qingyuan’s expression was unreadable as he looked down at the sword, glance flicking from his own to it.
Shen Jiu would have been able to read his face flawlessly once, but he couldn’t tell what he was thinking now. It couldn’t have been grief—what did the Xuan Su Sword have to grieve, looking at Xiu Ya?
As he watched, that strangely sorrowful expression seemed to shift to something more settled. Shen Jiu didn’t know what emotion he was looking at, but the boy—the man—seemed to be steeling himself for something.
“Xiao Jiu—,” he began.
Shen Jiu recoiled. “Don’t call me that!” he shouted, unable to bear it, turning away swiftly, and missing how Yue Qingyuan’s determination immediately gave way to hesitation and, at last, again, resignation.
Why did he always have to ruin everything?
There was nothing for it. He had to test it, Shen Jiu realised.
It took some planning, but he managed to arrange matters so that he happened to be crossing the Rainbow Bridge at the same time as Yue Qingyuan, who—as anticipated—immediately stopped at the opportunity to talk to him, seemingly delighted when Shen Jiu acquiesced to remain present.
He answered his questions perfunctorily, completely used to the one-sided rhythm of their conversation. Shen Jiu’s eye was drawn, this time, to Xuan Su, lying sheathed as it always was at Yue Qingyuan’s side.
He looked at it now with the eyes of a smith, instead of just as another cultivator.
What would it look like?
Ever since Shizun had raised the question, ever since he had been reminded of everything people said about Xuan Su, ever since he had realised no one in the world had seen Xuan Su unsheathed except for the peak lords who had attended the battle—he needed to know.
It didn’t matter how much he hated Yue Qingyuan for not being Yue Qi anymore. It didn’t matter how long he had been waiting for an explanation. It didn’t matter that he had yet to receive one. It didn’t matter that he might never receive one. None of it mattered.
Shen Jiu was the only person who knew who Yue Qingyuan had been, who he had become and who he really was.
He was the person who knew him best—even if that knowledge was to be regretted—and his knowledge of the man had to hold true. The truth of it was what mattered.
The truth of it was all he had. So it made no sense for Tianlang-jun to have seen Xuan Su when Shen Jiu himself hadn’t. All the things he had been as Yue Qi, all the things he had discarded to become Yue Qingyuan—Yue Qingyuan’s newfound arrogance couldn’t be borne just like that.
It wouldn’t be borne, he promised himself, studying Xuan Su as if he could see through the hilt just by staring at it.
Summer had almost made it to the mountains. There was no wind in the air around them, and both of them stood on a solitary spot on the bridge, with no other disciples in sight. Quiet noon slept undisturbed in golden shadows surrounding the bridge, the sun shining over their heads.
There were no sounds to be heard anywhere near the two of them except for the breaths that neither of them could help but take, which suddenly seemed laboured and loud in the silence.
Louder still, the longer he listened and looked at Xuan Su.
If only it wasn’t for the sound of their breathing, he could have sworn he could hear something.
That wasn’t impossible.
Swords sang, sometimes, to skilled smiths.
Shizun had said he might reach that level of skill someday.
Shen Jiu decided to stop breathing for a while, just for a brief moment, because if he focused his spiritual senses on the sword, its hilt as black as ink …
He could almost hear—
“… shidi? Shen-shidi? Xiao Jiu!”
—had he heard howling?
Light-headed, he looked up at Yue Qingyuan, who had caught him by his shoulders from when he’d apparently fallen on him.
“I told you to never call me that,” he said, breathless for more reason than one, and—“The sun’s too strong. Excuse me, shixiong,” he said and, then, although he would never admit to it, pushed himself off and fled, trying to tear himself away from the hold that the other had on him.
Not only did he not know what the damn sword looked like, he also didn’t understand what had happened.
Hating Yue Qingyuan for being an imbecile, hating Xuan Su for being the imbecile’s sword, hating himself for being the imbecile’s imbecile, and hating everything about the situation for its inconceivable idiocy, Shen Jiu swiftly made his way through the scant books there were on Wan Jian Peak again—smiths loathed writing down the secrets of their trade, guarding them jealously from theft—and then, despising the necessity but succumbing to it, the few books that Qing Jing Peak had on swordcraft.
There were the usual stories of mystical swords that sang during the making, telling the smith what to do and then going on to be wielded in legends of glory, etc., etc. There were other, fewer, stories about sagacious smiths recognising blessed or cursed swords at first sight, usually because of said blessing or curse.
… Could it be a blessing or a curse?
It fit those stories, didn’t it; he had looked at it, had felt dizzy and deafened. Normal swords didn’t hypnotise people into not breathing. Normal swords didn’t threaten people’s hearing, either. That sort of thing would be to Yue Qingyuan’s advantage in a duel, wouldn’t it?
… But why would Shizun be worried about a blessing?
“Has something gone wrong with Xuan Su?” he asked her after seven days, admitting defeat.
There was only so much stories could do!
Shizun looked at him. “There has always been something wrong with Xuan Su,” she said, carefully, with a pronounced air of caution.
What?
“I don’t—Shizun, I don’t understand.”
Shizun, who had always answered his questions before, only shook her head, but her eyes looked at him with urgency.
He hesitated—and then inclined his head. “I’ll find out,” he said and, at her expectant gaze, gritted out, “even if I have to … ask. Him.”
Shizun said, unexpectedly, “This teacher knows,” and then, briefly, rested a gentle if calloused hand on his bowed head.
… The disciples on Wan Jian Peak were, as a rule, clever with body language, if not with the four arts. Their crafts necessitated it. There was, after all, always at least one fire at any time on the peak, and explosions were not a rare occurrence. Smiths faced all sorts of strange injuries, and swordmasters developed all sorts of strange tics; it was no surprise, then, to have a peak full of people who were all over the place. Some preferred to latch on to people; some preferred to stand apart from people. Although misunderstandings still ran amok, general understandings were usually found.
Shizun, for her part, stood apart, except for those occasions when she was turning someone’s wrist to have them hold a hammer at the right angle or shifting someone’s posture to get them into the proper position for a swing—but these were the distant, automatic corrections of a master, and it was difficult to mistake them for anything else.
For some reason, the barely-there press of her palm made Shen Jiu’s eyes burn.
He kept his head lowered. Shizun patted his head once, twice—somehow making what should have been, by all rights, an unused and awkward motion graceful—and moved away quietly.
Shen Jiu had focused on swordcraft; it was time to ascertain facts. This time, he went through the sect’s records; after cornering that waste of space masquerading as a head disciple, Shang Qinghua, who pushed an entire armful of papers at him with a genuinely baffling air of sweaty, terrified eagerness, he surrounded himself with the records and searched for Yue Qingyuan’s.
… There was nothing.
There was, in fact, a glaring lack of records for someone who was—arguably—going to be the most important figure for the future of the entire sect.
Someone had removed them, he thought, staring sightlessly into thin air. For some reason, someone—the sect leader, probably, since he was Yue Qingyuan’s shizun, or another peak lord—had gone through the records of the sect and made sure that nothing about Yue Qingyuan could be found.
… Was it some sort of bizarre protocol of protection for sect leaders?
Shen Jiu did some more digging—but, no, there was a ready amount of material on the incumbent sect leader, both before he had become the sect leader and afterwards. In fact, there was too much of it, Shen Jiu thought, unsurprised but disturbed as he cast aside an old order for a disciple whip.
Had he … no, that was impossible. Yue Qingyuan was the head disciple.
The sect leader wouldn’t let a hair on his precious head be touched.
Then why has he erased him from the sect’s history? an irritating voice murmured, at the back of his mind. How does that protect him, when everyone already knows Yue Qingyuan’s name?
… There was nothing for it, Shen Jiu realised, grimly. If he wanted to know—he was going to have to talk with Yue Qingyuan again.
How difficult could it be? The man was always prepared to talk with him. Shen Jiu could use that. It would be quick, if everything went according to his plan: like quenching a blade and tempering it, only if you had to, before laying it aside.
Really, all Yue Qingyuan had to do was unsheathe Xuan Su.
Then, Shen Jiu could be done with it, and him.
To his complete lack of surprise, Yue Qingyuan readily agreed to meet him—he had been careful kept the wording of his invitation vague, asking to meet first on the Rainbow Bridge.
“Wei-shijie,” he said, before he left. “If you wanted someone to tell you something they didn’t want to tell you … how would you do it?”
“Can I give them something in exchange?” Wei-shijie hazarded, ever the alchemist, without looking up from her book.
“Thank you, shijie,” he said, and nodded at her distracted smile before leaving for the bridge.
Yue Qingyuan was standing there, infuriatingly regal and put-together. Shen Jiu put his frustration aside for the moment; it was easy, for once, because of the doubts the past few days had raised.
The wondering expression on Yue Qingyuan’s face tested his resolve, as did the gentleness behind the question he asked upon seeing him: “Does shidi want to move from the bridge?”
Shen Jiu nodded sharply. “I need a spiritually powerful place where neither of us will be overheard,” he said.
Yue Qingyuan blinked, taken aback by the specificity but not—yet—unwilling. “What would shidi suggest?”
“Shixiong should already know,” he snapped, inclining his head towards his intended direction. “Wouldn’t the Lingxi Caves be best? Shizun’s already gotten us permission.”
Because he was watching Yue Qingyuan, this time—careful not to let his eyes stray, too soon, to the sword strapped at his side—, he noticed the slight stiffening of his shoulders and wondered at it.
Was this overkill?
He remembered the man’s odd silence when—before, the last time he had been in the caves.
Still, the books had been clear: there were three best places for a smith to study a sword. One, at its place of origin. Two, with the current wielder at hand. Three, in a place of spiritual power.
The rock wall on Wan Jian Peak on which every disciple’s sword hung was many things, but a place for conversation was not one of them.
Shen Jiu was hoping for the third—once they had made it to the caves, he could get a hold of the sword and chase away the master; if not, the second would have to suffice.
“Xi—shidi,” Yue Qingyuan said, amending his words hastily at Shen Jiu’s cold glare, once the two of them had found a stone platform to sit on—still quite close to one of the paths that led to the outside world, since they weren’t truly aiming for seclusion—“is this about—what is this about?”
“You’ve brought it up,” Shen Jiu said, evenly. “You want to call me Xiao Jiu? I’ll allow it, once, but you have to promise to do something for me before in exchange.”
Yue Qingyuan stared at him, his brown eyes wide. “What?”
Shen Jiu’s lip curled. “I’ll tell you after you give me your word. It shan’t take long at all—I won’t waste shixiong’s precious time,” he added, unable to help either himself or the bitterness that seeped into his voice.
At least it got a satisfying flinch.
“I—shidi, I’m sorry, I don’t understand,” Yue Qingyuan said.
This again?
“Keep your apologies,” he snapped. “Do I have your word or not? If not, we’re done here,” and he made to rise.
It did the trick. “No!” Yue Qingyuan said, reaching out; his hand faltered before Shen Jiu had to dodge his grasp. “I promise. You have my word. What do you want me to do?”
He really was a fool—Shen Jiu thought of the other exchanges he had prepared in advance and refrained from rolling his eyes.
“Unsheathe Xuan Su,” he said, briskly. “I want to see it.”
Yue Qingyuan went utterly pale.
He didn’t unsheathe Xuan Su. “… shidi,” he whispered. “I—,”
He stopped short, for some reason.
Shen Jiu stared at him, unable to believe that he was being denied even this, even now, even after everything.
“So that’s all your word’s worth?” he said, and laughed once, staccato and short. His hands had started shaking, again, of their own volition. “It’s really nothing?”
He should have expected this—he should have seen it coming.
He hadn’t.
“You can’t even give—you can’t even do this much? If I’m so worthless to you, why even keep up this fucking charade? Are you afraid I’ll tell everyone where we came from, so they can know how worthless you actually are? What is it, Yue-shixiong, are you trying to make sure Xiao Jiu really is gone when you call for him?” He laughed harder. “Is that it? Let me reassure you!” His tone had become relentlessly mocking; he was struggling to speak through his scorn. “Don’t worry, shixiong—Xiao Jiu’s dead. You let him die!”
There was a roaring in his ears, one that had steadily increased along with the volume of his voice, overriding anything Yue Qingyuan might have said in response, but—he realised, having shouted himself out, the haze of rage clearing from his eyes—the noise wasn’t his. It had really started halfway through his rant.
It was Xuan Su.
Yue Qingyuan had unsheathed Xuan Su.
Shen Jiu refrained from covering his ears at its never-ending drone but couldn’t stop from wincing at the radiant swordlight. Carefully, his own hysteria forgotten, using a hand to shield his eyes, he managed to look at the source.
Xuan Su was steel through and through, not a trace of decoration or—as was so common—silver or gold inlaid anywhere along its length. It warped the very air around it; no wonder he had struggled to breathe. The cave had suddenly become unbearably windless, like a humid morning, threatened by a storm, yet without any hint of rain, and all because of one man’s sword.
It was difficult to see the man himself, eclipsed as he had been by the blinding ray of his sword.
Blinking a few times, Shen Jiu suddenly realised that Yue Qingyuan had slumped over his side, face going grey while Xuan Su lay between the two of them on the stone platform in a silver pool of its own light.
“Get up,” he demanded, putting his examination of Xuan Su aside for the moment; getting no answer for once, he moved to Yue Qingyuan’s side, shaking his shoulder, then lifting his wrist to take his pulse. Alarmed at the faltering, faint flicker that he found, he shook the man again. “What’s wrong with you now? … Yue Qingyuan? Yue Qingyuan!”
Yue Qingyuan opened his mouth to reply—and coughed instead, blood dripping past his lips and past Shen Jiu’s hand on his shoulder.
He tried to speak once more but could only cough.
Behind them, Xuan Su’s swordlight shone brighter and brighter with every bloody breath.
… Even Shen Jiu wouldn’t deny the evidence of his eyes.
“Sheathe it, you fool,” he hissed; when Yue Qingyuan made no move—couldn’t?—he moved, grabbing the sword himself and freezing, briefly, when he found himself in the eye of the storm.
The howling coalesced into one clear note.
Xuan Su sang—
—new hands held it—it that had never been wielded by one so weak—a new strength that was nothing to its own strength—it that had never been unsheathed by the unworthy—a new soul that was nothing to its steel, steel, unmatched steel—it that had never found unity—not today, not tomorrow, not the year after tomorrow—there could be no unity here between soul and sword—there would be no unity here between soul and sword—better a life—better its life—better his life—better his life than the helplessness of his hopes—better his life than this agony of being alone—better his life than the remembrance of those ruins—better his life for his—
—and Shen Jiu slid it back into its scabbard.
“Care to explain?” he said, after a while, ignoring the ashen pallour of the man’s face and the corresponding lurching of his stomach.
It was unrelated.
He had probably eaten something bad for breakfast.
The two of them were still in the Lingxi Caves. Yue Qingyuan had frantically shaken his head when Shen Jiu had made to move them to Qian Cao Peak, so the two of them were still sitting on the stone platforms in silence—like idiots.
There was blood on the cave floor now. There had been blood on the cave walls.
Shen Jiu had condescended to allow Yue Qingyuan to lean on him to recover. It wasn’t comfortable. Yue Qingyuan’s jaw was too sharp on his shoulder, and the man was too broad to really rest on Shen Jiu’s narrow frame.
At his question, the man winced and turned his head away.
Entirely fed up, Shen Jiu slapped him.
Yue Qingyuan looked back up at him, eyes wide and guilty, raising a hand to his cheek, where a handprint was already blooming.
“Explain,” he snapped.
There was a pause, then, “I’m sorry. I—shixiong failed you.”
“I know that already,” he said, incredibly tempted to hit him again. How was it possible for one man to be so obtuse? “Why is Xuan Su tied to your lifespan?”
“I—I didn’t pursue the Way of Unity of Man and Sword properly,” he managed and then came a flood of words: “I wanted to be strong—I was too impulsive—I wasn’t strong enough—,”
Shen Jiu said, abruptly, after some more unbearable stammering about a qi deviation and the Lingxi Caves, “The Sect Master—what did he do afterwards?”
“Shizun had to revise the records to repair our reputation,” Yue Qingyuan said. “I crippled the sect.”
Yue Qingyuan really was a fool, Shen Jiu thought, with cold, crystal clarity. His shizun, the sect leader, had abandoned him thrice-over: first to Xuan Su, then to Tianlang-jun and at last to the merciless future of being a sect leader. He knew, now, the source of Qi-ge’s silence—shame, shame and more shame, a sly snare of silence that had successfully sworn him to secrecy.
This—this changed the complexion of things. Not everything. But it changed things.
“I could make you another sword,” he mused, thoughtfully, and smirked at the sharp intake of breath that followed his words.
“You could?” Qi-ge said, head snapping up to stare at him with wondering awe, and he had missed it, he had wanted it, he had wanted that want—
“No,” and, into the forlorn silence that followed this, “I will—a better one—one that you can actually use.” Pause. “I’ll even let you spar with me,” he added, generously.
Inlaid with gold, he thought, instead of silver, because how better to have it contrast with the moon-white shine of Xiu Ya; he would make it sunny gold on black, black, black, similar to how the shade of Qi-ge’s skin, always been browner than his own, shone distractingly against his dark robes.
Qi-ge’s crestfallen expression was charming, but the one he was wearing now wasn’t so bad, either.
“Yes—,”
“I’ll make you better.”
“Make me,” Qi-ge—well, begged, really, what else could you call that, so he did, he benevolently wrapped his arms around him and drew him down, delighting in his desperation, wanting it to sink into his skin, “Xiao Jiu, you made me—,”
“Made you what?” Shen Jiu prompted, when nothing followed.
Yue Qi swallowed; he could feel the movement of his throat against his palm and, then, the shake of his head.
He frowned at being denied, again and now of all times, when—“Oh,” he said, slowly, savouring the sweet, sudden, startling success of it—of knowing, once again, at long last, everything there was to know of this person—“I made you.”
It hadn’t been a question, but Qi-ge nodded against his neck anyway.
... Shen Jiu decided not to hold it against him this time.
He was in a forgiving mood.
He had been standing before the walls of a vast gate, knuckles raw, broken and bleeding from banging on its immovable stone, only to see them swing wide open before him, a window to a world that had awaited him and him alone.
“I’m not done yet, Qi-ge,” he whispered.
It wasn’t a promise. It wasn’t even hope. The two of them were too old for those things; those things had long since passed both of them by. It was just a fact.
Qi-ge gave him another foolish smile. It wasn’t one of Yue Qingyuan’s smiles, faint and restrained and fake. It was a crooked grin that showed too many teeth, the broad beam Shen Jiu had treasured—had made sure no one else ever felt the warmth of—as a child. “That’s good,” he said, and—hm.
“You don’t want me to be done with you,” he accused.
“No. Xiao Jiu should take his time with me,” and the audacity—the brazenness of—the—the something-ness of those words made him fluster and slap again at the man, who only melted more in his arms.
Shen Jiu absently touched a shoulder, just to confirm that it was still as broad and muscled as it looked.
... it was, even as the skin yielded, with a pleasing full-body shudder, to the press of his hand.
“I’ll take however long I want with you,” he said, and meant I will never be done with you.