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It was the light, flickering against his eyelids, in the dead of night, that woke Nie Huaisang.

“Wei-xiong!” he said, as he opened his eyes to see the Yiling Patriarch, holding a light talisman between two fingers, sitting cross-legged at the end of Nie Huaisang’s bed. He pushed himself up. “Ah—to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

“Just felt like catching up with an old friend,” Wei Wuxian said, with a ghost of a smile.

“Goodness me, you could have sent a note ahead! And perhaps come during the daytime.”

“You know me, Nie-xiong! I keep an erratic sleep schedule. It’s enough to drive a Lan to tears.”

“Mmm.” Nie Huaisang rubbed his face. “Speaking of which, has Hanguang-jun joined you for this visit? Should I have a room made up for you both?”

“Oh, I don’t think that will be necessary; Lan Zhan is back at home. But thank you for the offer, you’re a gracious host.”

Nie Huaisang swung his legs over the edge of the bed and pulled on an outer robe over his sleep clothes, casually knotting the belt, before he used a bit of spiritual energy to light a couple of candles. Wei Wuxian, watching him, let his light talisman go out, but did not move from where he sat. “Can I offer you some tea, Wei-xiong?”

Wei Wuxian appeared to seriously consider it as a question for a moment, before he said, “Why not.”

Nie Huaisang set a heating talisman on an iron teapot, and fetched the set of cups that went with it. Wei Wuxian rose from the bed and strolled around the room, his hands clasped behind his back, as he casually explored Nie Huaisang’s bedroom. He came over to the table, picked up a cup, and made an approving sound at the weight and shape of it, and another at the contrast between the smooth, creamy porcelain inside and the dark, pebbled grey of the exterior, which had been designed to complement the black studding on the iron teapot. “So elegant!” Wei Wuxian said, reaching out, but not quite touching the rapidly heating surface of the teapot, with the hand still holding the cup. “Was this a commission, Nie-xiong?”

“It’s a Nie heirloom,” Nie Huaisang said, “but it’s one of my favorites.” He preened a little. “The cups were a commission. I had them made to match the pot.”

They settled on each side of the table, and Nie Huaisang poured tea into their cups. Wei Wuxian kept turning his cup in his hand, smelling the steam rising from it, but not drinking from it, even as Nie Huaisang sipped from his own cup.

“Oh—is this blend not to your liking, Wei-xiong?” Nie Huaisang asked. “It’s been awhile and I’m afraid I don’t really remember what you like.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine,” Wei Wuxian said, waving a hand, and finally deigned to take a sip. “Delicious.”

“So, Wei-xiong. What really brings you here?”

“Like I said, Nie-xiong, I’m just here to catch up.”

Nie Huaisang slouched comfortably at the table. Why not? He was in his own bedroom, after all. “What’s there to catch up on? Oh! How’s your brother? I haven’t seen Jiang-xiong in a while.”

“Jiang Cheng’s well,” Wei Wuxian said. “I mean, I’m sure he’s a little stressed out right now, but he’s otherwise well.”

“What’s Jiang-xiong got to be stressed out over, right now? Besides the usual,” Nie Huaisang said, with a wry smile. “Sect leader business…always such a headache, it’s true.”

“Hadn’t you heard?” Wei Wuxian said, holding his cup just under his mouth. “Zewu-jun has finally succumbed to his illness.”

Nie Huaisang set down his cup in a suddenly-shaking hand, and kept that hand clenched around its warmth. “I see,” he said faintly. After a few moments, he said, “It’s very kind of you to deliver this news in person, Wei-xiong. But it would have come to me very quickly by itself. Oughtn’t you be with your husband, in his time of grief?”

Wei Wuxian took a sip of his tea. “I like to think that I’m helping Lan Zhan the best way I can.”

“I don’t follow,” Nie Huaisang said blankly.

Wei Wuxian set his cup down, and set a gentle finger on the rim, and spun it in steady circles, slow enough not to spill the contents. “Well, it’s about Zewu-jun’s illness, you see,” he said. “I’ve been helping Lan Zhan and Lan-laoshi go through his personal effects.”

Nie Huaisang tilted his head a little, and smiled, sadly. “Lan Qiren has finally warmed up to you?”

“Mm, especially now,” Wei Wuxian said, looking down into his teacup, still spinning it. “Funny, how these things happen, sometimes…” He brought his eyes up to meet Nie Huaisang’s again. “We found some really peculiar things in the Hanshi.”

Almost against his will, Nie Huaisang leaned in closer. “Peculiar how?” he breathed.

“Cursed objects,” Wei Wuxian said, in a confiding tone.

“Cursed objects…?” Nie Huaisang said. “He was…collecting them?” he hazarded. “That’s unlike Er-ge.”

“I have to agree,” said Wei Wuxian. “Or at least, Lan Zhan and Lan-laoshi think it’s awfully strange and they really knew him best. And you knew him too, and here you are, agreeing as well!”

“Well, yes, it’s not a thing I’d ever imagine Er-ge doing,” Nie Huaisang said, cautiously. “It’s not really a thing the Lan do—collecting cursed items just to keep a hold of them. Confiscating them, yes…but they usually destroy them, or drive the spirit out, if it’s some kind of possession.”

“And yet,” Wei Wuxian said, “Zewu-jun had such a collection of cursed items in the Hanshi, when he died. The physicians said it was no wonder, and that he’d really held on a remarkably long time, given how thoroughly he’d been poisoned.”

Nie Huaisang’s throat dried up at the word poisoned, and it was with numb and leaden hands that he brought his cup of cooling tea up to his lips, and drained it. He somehow set the cup down on the table without shattering the porcelain.

When Wei Wuxian reached out to lift the pot, and pour Nie Huaisang a fresh cup, the tea came out still warm, almost hot, even though Nie Huaisang hadn’t bothered to keep the heating talisman active on the iron pot. (That was the wonderful thing about the cast-iron teapot; it kept the tea hot enough to steam, naturally, long after it might have cooled in another, more fragile vessel.)

“Er-ge was poisoned?” Grief was stirring itself up strong in Nie Huaisang’s heart, a fervent little storm. Da-ge, Da-ge, he thought, but what he choked out was, “Oh, Er-ge…you, too?”

Wei Wuxian cocked his head, as if surprised. “You’re really upset about this, Nie-xiong!”

“Of course I’m upset! Why wouldn’t I be upset?” Nie Huaisang said, his hand pressed across his heavy eyes. He thought there was a very good chance he was going to cry.

“I thought you might have considered it a just punishment for Zewu-jun.”

“What are you talking about, Wei-xiong?” Nie Huaisang asked, anguished. “A just punishment for what? Why would I wish such ill fortune on my friend?”

“For the crime of letting your brother’s murderer go free,” Wei Wuxian said.

Nie Huaisang froze, and then slowly lowered his hand from his face. “What?” he said. “Of course he didn’t—” He swallowed, and closed his eyes again. “Wei-xiong…how is it that you know about that?”

Wei Wuxian breathed out a little hah! sound. “You know, I didn’t know until just now. But it’s true, then?—Zewu-jun helped Jin Guangyao to escape Guanyin Temple. So. Jin Guangyao lives?”

Nie Huaisang jerked his head in a small, stiff nod.

“Goodness. That must really burn,” Wei Wuxian said, and Nie Huaisang realized he’d drawn Chenqing from his belt, and was twirling it in his hand. “It must have offended you tremendously, that after every injury Jin Guangyao inflicted on your family, Zewu-jun chose to help him in the end.”

“Wei-xiong is so curious,” Nie Huaisang said, through a roaring sound in his ears. “It must be this curiosity that led him to the discovery of such an obscure thing, which was meant to never be known.”

“Did Zewu-jun’s betrayal make you very angry? You can tell me! I’d be angry if someone harmed my family like that! I can be so very angry, Nie-xiong; you wouldn’t believe what I’m capable of, when someone hurts the people I love.”

Nie Huaisang opened his eyes, and looked on the Yiling Patriarch’s flute no longer twirling in his hand. Wei Wuxian had laid it flat on the table in front of him, his hand still resting on it, and was leaning over it, his face so close to Nie Huaisang’s face, his eyes dark and glittering.

“How did you know about San-ge’s escape?” Nie Huaisang asked, with dry lips, a dry tongue.

“I told you, Nie-xiong, I didn’t really know, until you told me, just now.” Wei Wuxian held Nie Huaisang’s gaze with his own just a moment longer, a hawk and a mouse, before he sat back slightly. “Zewu-jun mentioned it. In his diary.”

“His...diary? Oh. His personal effects,” Nie Huaisang said, blinking rapidly, trying to shake off the paralyzing effect of those eyes. “You said…that you were helping Hanguang-jun and Lan-laoshi with Er-ge’s personal effects.”

“Yes. The only thing was, I wasn’t sure if it was true or not. Whether he was talking about something that he’d actually done, or something he’d merely wished he’d done. Do you know what it’s like to lose your mind, Nie-xiong? I actually do, a little bit. It was wrenching, that diary; the chronicle of a good man’s descent into insanity. I can think of no one who deserved such a fate less than Zewu-jun. There never was such a kind person, a fair person. But perhaps Nie-xiong disagrees?”

“Did…did he feel bad about it?” Nie Huaisang asked.

“He was absolutely wracked by guilt. Did he feel bad about what, specifically?”

“Did Er-ge feel bad about helping San-ge get away with everything?” Nie Huaisang whispered.

He really did want to know.

“Oh yes, yes he did. It haunted him. Does that please you?”

Perhaps Nie Huaisang ought to lie about this, but he couldn’t, so he nodded tightly, his lips pressed together, his arms pressed close to his body, withdrawing as far as he could from Wei Wuxian’s frightening aura. “Yes.”

“Zewu-jun is dead, and he died badly, in pain, in great suffering. Does that please you, Nie-xiong? Does that bring you satisfaction?”

“Nothing brings me satisfaction, Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang said, dully. “My brother is dead, and his murderer lives free, safe and untouchable in some foreign land. Don’t you think it’s stingy of you to ask me not to find even the smallest bit of solace in knowing that his best friend in the world regretted having helped to make all that happen?”

Wei Wuxian ignored the question, and sat back properly, idly twirling Chenqing once more. He picked up his cup in his free hand, examining it closely. “This really is such a beautiful tea set.”

Nie Huaisang stared at him, and feeling strangely exhausted, said, “Would you like the name of the artisan who crafted it? She’s well-known in Qinghe.”

“How thoughtful—no need, though!” He smiled. Nie Huaisang was getting tired of those vicious smiles. “Nie-xiong, I have a confession to make. Before I came to say hello, I did a little poking around in your treasure vault.” When Nie Huaisang registered no protest at the confession of such a gross overreach, he said, with raised eyebrows, “You don’t mind?”

“Would it matter if I did? You’ve already done it.” Nie Huaisang rolled his eyes slightly. “Well, what did you think of the Nie treasure vaults?”

“I admired your collection of cursed objects, Nie-xiong. So extensive!”

“They’ve just piled up over the years, really. We don’t actually go collecting them either,” Nie Huaisang said, shrugging. “People just send them to us.”

“Some people destroy their cursed objects as they encounter them.”

“Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang said, his lips crooking into a small smile, “you’re one of the only non-Nie alive who’s ever seen our saber tombs. You know that the Nie don’t just destroy cursed things.”

Wei Wuxian actually laughed at that, and it was honest laughter, which almost surprised Nie Huaisang, and reminded him of a carefree time, oh, was it really twenty years ago?

Once upon a time, Nie Huaisang had sat in a room late at night with Wei Wuxian and Jiang Wanyin, and they’d drunk illicit wine, and thrown peanut shells at one another as they gossiped and laughed, so very free, so free of cares. The only thing that Nie Huaisang had feared, back then, was failing his exams, and having to come back to Gusu the next year for yet another round of lectures.

Well. Also, the look on Da-ge’s face, probably, if he’d been expelled for sneaking alcohol in, despite knowing the rules. He’d feared that a little. And also feared Lan Wangji, just a bit, knowing that Zhan-di wouldn’t have hesitated to turn him in for Lan-style discipline, even if that meant a beating with batons, and never mind that they’d known one another since they were small children! Hanguang-jun was very virtuous, and had always been a total stick-in-the-mud.

“Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang said, biting his lip. “When you return to the Cloud Recesses…would you please pass along my condolences to Hanguang-jun? Maybe you could even tell him…that I understand, about all the things that will burden him now. Really, I do understand.”

“I’ll be sure to mention it,” Wei Wuxian said, but Nie Huaisang didn’t think he would.

“You—you don’t have to include the part about how I said I was glad that Er-ge felt guilty, before he died.” Nie Huaisang said, trying not to squirm, and failing. “I mean, I can’t imagine he’d appreciate hearing that. Especially not now.”

“No, he would not.” Wei Wuxian took a sip of his tea, and he seemed a little less sharp-edged. But not….safe, no, not at all safe. Nie Huaisang was very conscious of Chenqing, held casually in Wei Wuxian’s hand. “It’s been difficult for him,” Wei Wuxian said. “Very difficult. Nie-xiong, how much did you know about Zewu-jun’s illness?”

“I knew he was ill,” Nie Huaisang said, watching Wei Wuxian. “It was barely a secret among the sect leaders. I don’t know how successful the Lan were in hiding the details—just because I wasn’t told of them…I wasn’t paying as much attention as I should have been.” He swallowed, and said, “I was very angry with Er-ge. Much too angry to reach out. I suppose I might have—no. I did think that it was only fair, that Er-ge not walk away from Guanyin Temple unscathed. I thought it was right, and that perhaps fate was punishing him a little, by burdening him with sickness.”

He stood, suddenly, needing a moment of distance from all of this, and turned, feeling Wei Wuxian’s sharp eyes on him, feeling that piercing gaze on his back. He went over to his nightstand and snatched up the fan he’d left on it. The weight and shape of it was familiar and comforting in his hand.

Nie Huaisang sat back down across the table from Wei Wuxian, his hand clenched around the fan.

“Wei-xiong, it seems as if you’re saying the cause of Er-ge’s illness might have been these cursed objects he was collecting. Is that why you were so curious about our own cursed items? I’m afraid looking at those probably can’t answer the question of why Er-ge kept and contained his own cursed items improperly, instead of destroying them.” He shook his head. “I’m really surprised by that! Even if the Lan don’t normally keep such things, I cannot imagine Er-ge to be so foolish or ignorant as to think he wasn’t vulnerable to their effects, if they weren’t contained properly.”

“Words like ‘foolish’ and ‘ignorant’ aren’t really the right ones, for Zewu-jun,” Wei Wuxian agreed. “It’s not such a mystery to me, but then, I did read his diary.” He reached over to pour himself a fresh cup of tea. The iron teapot held its heat well, so the tea in the cup still steamed. “Some of the passages are quite memorable. Let me quote it to you.”

“‘After I dressed in them, I began to feel my skin itch and burn, but there was no mark left, when I removed them. Perhaps I am imagining things, now,’” Wei Wuxian recited. “That was in reference to a set of robes he’d received, from some anonymous gifter, over a year ago. You see…Zewu-jun also was not collecting these items. They were, in fact, being sent to him.” Wei Wuxian’s eyes gleamed. Was that a hint of red, at the edges?

“‘Such a headache again today,’” Wei Wuxian continued, after a moment, his gaze fixed and steady on Nie Huaisang again, as if observing his reactions to his words. “‘My mood is low, and feels lower with each day…I admire the carvings on the tray, which is a very fine gift, but I have started to think that somehow it is the emblem of my low mood.’ That’s about a wooden tea tray, of course, from about ten months back. There’s quite a number more entries like that before he apparently understood what was happening. Eventually, he realized, though.”

He stood and paced, as if to heighten the dramatic impact of his delivery. Nie Huaisang was reminded of the Wen indoctrination, when he’d offered to recite the Wen Sect rules, and instead, recited the Lan’s, how he’d paced back and forth there as well. “‘The tea set is cursed; the flute stand is cursed, the robes are cursed’—that was a particularly chilling entry in that diary. But not as much as the one where Zewu-jun wrote, ‘I am haunted, as I ought to be. I am being punished, as I ought to be. I have committed crimes, without being held accountable for them. I will refuse no gifts from the one I have wronged,’ and the poor, discomfited reader realizes that those itching, burning, cursed robes that the diary mentions, the ones he chose to wear, knowing that they were poisoned, were the ones he died in.”

Nie Huaisang was nauseated, listening to this; he could not stop thinking of Nie Mingjue’s own suffering, his slow but terrifying mental decline. Da-ge had been so tormented, before he died. “He…let himself be poisoned? Knowingly? All that time?”

“Perhaps not the whole time. The curses…I think their effects were cumulative, and built slowly over time. The early exposure, before he knew what was happening, may have…warped his later judgment, his reaction to it all, once he realized.” Wei Wuxian held up his tea cup by his face, contemplating it, Chenqing clutched in his other hand “It is an insidious—and effective—method of murder. To make the victim complicit in their own death…”

“Murder,” Nie Huaisang whispered. “You think it was definitely a murder?”

“Poisoned gifts from some unknown sender? I certainly do not think it was death by misfortune.” He regarded Nie Huaisang with that oh-so-sharp gaze. “I’m curious to know your thoughts, Nie-xiong.”

“I think it’s horrible,” Nie Huaisang said.

“You really don’t think it’s a fitting death, for the man without whose aid, Jin Guangyao could not have murdered your brother as cruelly as he did? Without whom, Jin Guangyao most likely could not have escaped, his crimes never to be answered for?”

“Just what are you saying, Wei-xiong?”

“I’m saying that perhaps if Jin Guangyao himself was forever out of reach—unrepentant, unpunished—Lan Xichen might have made an attractive target in his stead. Still here, still a little too trusting, and oh-so-willing to accept his portion of blame, for his friend’s death. You are not even a little bit satisfied by all this?”

Nie Huaisang stared at him. “Are you—are you actually implying that I could have—that I would have murdered Er-ge? That’s insane. Why would I do that? What would even be the point?”

“For revenge?” Wei Wuxian said, raising his eyebrows. “It was a good enough reason before.”

“Harming Er-ge would have brought no satisfaction to Da-ge,” Nie Huaisang said, fiercely, almost slapping his folded fan onto the table. “He never, ever would have wanted that. He was spared the burden of knowing Er-ge’s—part in things, but even if he had known, he would have forgiven him. He bore no bitterness towards Er-ge, no anger at all.”

“Yes, and about that,” Wei Wuxian said, holding up Chenqing like he was raising a finger to signal a server at a wineshop. “You might as well know; Zewu-jun indicated in his diary that he wished to be buried in the same coffin as Chifeng-zun. He wrote in his diary, ‘Let these burning robes be a burial shroud to cover us both; they are like enough to the Nie fashion. I have denied Nie Mingjue’s spirit the rightful target for its rage. Let him vent his anger on me, in its stead. Perhaps I can finally bring his spirit peace.’” Wei Wuxian smiled, and once again, it was not at all a friendly smile. “One could almost imagine those Nie-like robes were…a suggestion.”

Nie Huaisang closed his eyes. “Oh, poor Er-ge. He really was lost in his own mind, then, wasn’t he?” he said softly. “You should…tell Hanguang-jun that his brother can be buried wherever he’d like. It won’t make any difference to Da-ge.”

“Why’s that?” Wei Wuxian inquired, and dropped casually back into his seat.

Nie Huaisang opened his eyes, and felt the crushing grief anew, a heaviness all over him, as he always did whenever he was forced to acknowledge this fact. “Da-ge’s spirit was obliterated in Guanyin Temple.”

“What?” Wei Wuxian blinked. “What? How? When? Chifeng-zun—he was only bound into his coffin! He was suppressed, not liberated, it’s true—but his spirit was not, should not have been destroyed!”

Nie Huaisang’s lips twisted, strangely comforted by Wei Wuxian’s open shock. “But it was,” he said. “I’ve long thought…well. It must have been a tremendous comfort to San-ge, to be sure that there was no chance of Da-ge’s spirit following him into exile, and plaguing him once more.”

Wei Wuxian actually fell silent for a couple of minutes. “The Lan…say elimination is the measure of last resort,” he finally said, sounding shaken. “That it should only be used after both liberation and suppression have failed.”

“Yes, it should, I know,” Nie Huaisang said. “Don’t look at me like I’ve grown another head, for knowing it, Wei-xiong. I had to sit through those lectures three times! Even someone as brainless as I am couldn’t forget all of it.” He flicked open his fan to cover his face, resting the paper against his forehead, and sighed with what little breath he could will himself to breathe.

“Do you know how I spend my time these days, Wei-xiong? Every morning, I wake, I dress, and I drink tea. And then I go and sit in a courtyard in the heart of this fortress, alone, and I tend to my birds. Sometimes, people bring me papers there, and I sign them without reading them. I don’t even pretend to read them anymore. When we absolutely have to hold court, I sit in a fancy chair and I’m absolutely useless. I try not to have private meetings at all—meetings like this one, Wei-xiong—but when I do, I’m useless there, too. Everyone knows it. I have neither the skill nor the passion to lead the Nie as my brother did.” Nie Huaisang closed the fan and set it on the table. Looking down, he said, very quietly, “Da-ge would be ashamed of me.”

“Your brother…he loved you very much,” Wei Wuxian said, his voice surprisingly gentle. Nie Husaisang looked up at that, and for the first time since Wei Wuxian had unexpectedly turned up in his bedroom, he saw something besides suspicion in his eyes. Sympathy? No. Pity.

“Those things are not contradictory.” Nie Huaisang ran his fingers down the length of the closed fan. “I’m sorry I’m useless here, Wei-xiong. I—I wish I could help you and Hanguang-jun understand why Er-ge died the way he did. I really do.”

“Nie-xiong,” Wei Wuxian said, slowly, as if a thought was coming to him for the first time, a new thought. “Those cursed objects in your treasure room. Do you have records on their origins?”

Nie Huaisang blinked, and considered it. “We do, but—in some cases, it’s a bit of a mystery. Quite a few in the last year have come here without a clear source.”

“They came here. How did they come here?”

“They were sent to us—well, to me, which is to say, they came to Nie-zongzhu—” Nie Huaisang grimaced “—which is me. I have no idea who sent them.”

“The ones that have come specifically in the last year and a half—describe some of them to me, won’t you?”

“Well, I certainly can’t remember them all, but, um, let’s see,” Nie Huaisang said. “There was an absolutely exquisite full tea set. The tea utensils were all carved ash wood, with an etching of a mountain burned into the handle of each. The porcelain dishes were all cream-colored with a subtle wave pattern on the outside, and the drinking cups had the most beautiful orioles painted on the insides…” He sighed. “It really was a pity about the curse, because I would have loved to use that set! It was like it was made for me! But it was cursed, so,” he shrugged. “Into the vault.”

“Do you remember anything else specifically about the curse on the tea set?” Wei Wuxian’s eyes were bright, in a way that was both familiar and worrisome, to Nie Huaisang, but at least they no longer looked like the eyes of a kestrel sighting prey.

“Well…hmm. Each individual piece of it had its own curse—the aroma cups, the tea tweezers, the spout, and so on—but they only had small curses. We realized, though, that when the whole set was used together, those little curses added up into a much bigger, more potent curse, which I admit struck me as rather clever. Probably not deadly on its own, but—oh.” Nie Huasaing paled. Then he said, “And there was also a set of embroidered robes. Wei-xiong—I never wore them, but—I remember, before we put them in the vault, I did look at them. I mean, I touched them. I couldn’t help it, they were so beautiful; the fabric was so fine—but Wei-xiong, they made my hands burn.” He lifted his hands and stared at them. “Am I going to die?”

“Imminently? Probably not,” Wei Wuxian said, but he put his hand out, and took Nie Huaisang’s hand in his own, examining it briefly, before he shook his head. “There’s no trace of it on you. Just don’t handle them again.”

Nie Huaisang looked up at him. “Do you think—whoever sent those gifts to Er-ge. Do you think the same person has been sending gifts to me?” He shuddered. He brought up his folded fan, and covered his mouth with it. “Or—could they be targeting all the sect leaders? Maybe we should ask Jiang-zongzhu and Jin-zongzhu—”

“Consider the possibility,” Wei Wuxian said to him, “that it might in fact only be you and Zewu-jun. After all—isn’t there a person who might carry a grudge against each of you, for the drastic change in his circumstances?”

There was no question who he meant.

Nie Huaisang didn’t say anything for a long time, staring down at the table. Then he whispered, “You think—that after everything Er-ge did for him—after everything—” his voice trembled “—that he might still have—” He raised his head, and almost snarled, “The ingratitude! And yet. He killed Da-ge, after Da-ge showed him mercy! After Da-ge let him leave the Nie alive, when he could have, should have, executed him for murder. All Meng Yao could ever think of was how he’d been wronged, wronged by the whole world, wronged by this person, by that person, even by people like poor Jin Zixuan, who never meant to hurt him one bit, but somehow did, just by existing.”

From the queasy look on his face, Wei Wuxian was remembering the same moment from that night in Guanyin Temple as Nie Huaisang, the moment when he’d been told the reason why his life had fallen apart, and expected to sympathize with it.

“And I suppose Er-ge did turn on San-ge, after all, didn’t he?” Nie Huaisang said, seething and bitter, like tea brewed too hot, too long. “Er-ge dared to condemn him for his crimes, demanded he face the consequences for them, even wounded him, even threatened his life…how, how naive, to imagine San-ge would just forget about all of that, for the mercy of being allowed to flee wounded and destitute, when just the day before, he’d been a sect leader.” He clutched his hands around his fan so tightly that the wooden frame creaked in his grasp. “Poison worked so well the first time. Why not try it again?” He swallowed hard. “And it worked again. It worked on Er-ge. It could have worked on me.”

“I think…you should be very cautious, going forward, Nie-xiong,” Wei Wuxian said, soberly. “Perhaps Dongying is not too far away to hinder the revenge of a patient man.”

Nie Huaisang shivered.

***

Wei Wuxian was surprised, when he returned to the Cloud Recesses, to find Jiang Cheng, of all people, sitting in the Jingshi, head bent over a book. “Where’s—”

Jiang Cheng jerked his chin over towards the bed.

Sure enough, there was Lan Zhan, on his back, safely snoozing away, his arms crossed over his chest, neatly tucked under the covers. He looked more peaceful, sleeping there, than Wei Wuxian had seen him in nearly two weeks, after Lan Xichen’s condition had begun to deteriorate so rapidly.

“He’s sleeping it off,” Jiang Cheng said, not as quiet as he ought to be, when he was sitting in someone’s bedroom while it was being used for its intended purpose. But then again, it wouldn’t make a difference to Lan Zhan right now, and who was Wei Wuxian, to tell someone off for being noisy in the Cloud Recesses. “Did you know he’s a fucking gremlin when he’s drunk? I practically had to sit on him, until he passed out the second time.”

“Jiang Cheng, why are you here?”

“I wrote to you that I was coming. If you didn’t want me to come, you should have said so.”

Oh, that was right, he had, hadn’t he? Wei Wuxian had forgotten, preoccupied as he‘d been. Well, Jiang Cheng didn’t need to know that. “I meant—here, in the Jingshi,” he lied.

“I promised Lan-laoshi I’d look after your husband, after he got into the booze. He—you know, he just looked like he needed a break.”

That was something of an understatement; Lan Qiren was a sleepwalking wreck, struggling to hold himself together, after his nephew’s death. Wei Wuxian had never imagined he would see his stern, stuffy old teacher weep; now that he’d seen it, he wished he could go back to never imagining it. But somehow, they had become family, through Lan Zhan, and with family, came grief to be witnessed.

Wei Wuxian walked over to where his husband slept, and dropped to his knees, resting his chin on the side of the bed, as he touched the back of his hand to Lan Zhan’s cheek. Lan Zhan did not stir at the touch, but his sleeping breath continued, light and reassuringly even, and Wei Wuxian simply watched him, until his soul was a little less hungry.

Eventually, he rose, and went over to join Jiang Cheng. “Thanks for watching him, I guess,” he said.

“Someone had to, since you went running off only Heaven knew where,” Jiang Cheng said, but there wasn’t any real heat behind the words. He picked up his book and brandished it at Wei Wuxian. “Have you read this? This is fucked up.”

It was Lan Xichen’s diary. His chronicle of suffering, of madness. Wei Wuxian nodded, and didn’t bother asking how Jiang Cheng had found it, when he’d locked it away before he left for the Unclean Realm, full of suspicions and a perhaps a little murder in mind. “Yeah…that would be why I went running off only Heaven knew where.”

“Where did you go, Wei Wuxian? And don’t you dare be vague at me! I have spent most of the past three hours chasing your husband around the back hills of the Cloud Recesses, and my patience is at all-time low.” (Hah! As if Jiang Cheng had ever had any patience to begin with.) “You wouldn’t have left him alone like this if you didn’t think you had a damned good reason.”

“I was visiting in the Unclean Realm,” Wei Wuxian said. “Nie Huaisang was courteous enough to ask after you.”

“Did he? I don’t care.”

“Such a grouchy shidi,” Wei Wuxian said. “Did Lan Zhan drink all of the Emperor’s Smile?”

Jiang Cheng glared at him for a moment, and then said, “He did not.” He produced the bottle, which sloshed invitingly. When Wei Wuxian made gimme, gimme hands at him, he uncorked it, and drank from it directly, first, before he handed it over. “Try to get some of that into your mouth, won’t you? It’s probably the only bottle of alcohol on this benighted mountain.”

“It’s not,” said Wei Wuxian, who knew where the other bottles were buried. He drank from it more carefully than he normally would, though. He was not, at this moment, full of joyful abandonment. “How much of that have you read?” He indicated Lan Xichen’s diary.

“Enough to have questions,” Jiang Cheng said grimly. “Maybe you had some of the same ones. What did Nie Huaisang have to say to you, besides ‘oh, I don’t know, I’m not sure at all’ and ‘how’s your brother’?”

“Lianfang-zun is alive,” Wei Wuxian said.

“Fuck!” Jiang Cheng said, and he got extra-scowl-y. It made Wei Wuxian want to hug him, and maybe press his chin into his hair. Time had worn itself into Jiang Cheng’s face, lines of stress, the creases of a thousand frowns, but Wei Wuxian would never look at his shidi and not remember how cute he’d been at age eight, his thunderous little face broadcasting how he disapproved of the whole world. “You’re sure? I was hoping that was just the crazy-talk in this fucking book.”

Wei Wuxian nodded, and took another swig from the bottle.

Jiang Cheng was thinking, which Wei Wuxian always enjoyed watching. He didn’t say anything for a couple of minutes, but finally, Jiang Cheng said, “We’re going to have to find him. Wherever he is.”

“Dongying,” Wei Wuxian said. “He’s very likely somewhere in Dongying.”

Jiang Cheng said a very vile word, and said, “That’s too far. I can’t take that much time away from Yunmeng.”

“Maybe I can—”

“You shouldn’t take that much time away from your husband. You know it.”

Wei Wuxian did know it; Jiang Cheng was right. He could not abandon Lan Zhan for however many months it would take, not while he was grieving his brother so rawly, and already half-buried in the new burden of sect leader work. He was starting to feel a twinge of guilt over even just two days, to the Unclean Realm and back. And it’d have been longer still, if he hadn’t press-ganged a Lan disciple, to fly him.

“I’ll write to Jin Ling,” Wei Wuxian said. “If there’s any record of how Jin Guangyao set up his escape path, it’ll be somewhere in Carp Tower.”

“Do that and I’ll break your legs, and I really mean it this time, Wei Wuxian!” Jiang Cheng warned him. “We’re leaving A-Ling out of this.”

Wei Wuxian almost wanted to object—but he also didn’t. He bit his tongue.

“A-Ling already had to go through that once,” Jiang Cheng continued. “You don’t know how much it hurt him, to know that his uncle betrayed him. And then Jin Guangyao went and fucking died, on top of it all, or so we all thought—I don’t want A-Ling to find out that his fucking snake of a shushu survived and still has fangs! Not if we’re just going to put him down properly this time.” He took the wine back. “I’ll write to my grandmother. She’ll lend me some spiders. I’ll send those to Dongying.”

“You’ll owe her a favor if you do, Jiang Cheng!”

“She’s family,” Jiang Cheng said. “Everything’s fine, when it’s family.”

“Those Meishan Yu spiders are trained killers,” Wei Wuxian said, trying to steal the bottle back from his brother.

“We’re all trained killers, A-Xian,” Jiang Cheng said, rolling his eyes, and kept the bottle back for a final swig, before he surrendered it.

“You know what I mean. They’re trained to kill people.”

“They are! And you’re jealous because the Meishan Yu spiders are better at something than you are,” Jiang Cheng said.

“Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said, contemplating one of his folded elbows, on the table. The other elbow was out of sight, somewhere to the left. “Why are you here? For real, why are you here?”

“Where the fuck am I supposed to be? There’s been a death in the family. I’m here.”

“You don’t even like Lan Zhan. And now he’s family?”

“What does my liking him have to do with anything? You married him! That makes us family. I didn’t pick him; you did.”

“So…we’re brothers, huh?”

“Isn’t this your next life?” Jiang Cheng wasn’t looking at him. Wei Wuxian also wasn’t looking at Jiang Cheng, but he could feel Jiang Cheng not looking directly at him. “You promised we’d be brothers in the next life. Should I kill myself catch up on incarnations? Or were you planning to break that promise, too?”

“Quit being an asshole.”

“Like I’m the only one! Your husband is a cold, conceited prick—”

“Lan Zhan is the farthest thing from cold, I’m happy to tell you, and anyone with a prick as magnificent as Lan Zhan’s ought to be conceited—”

“—eugh; that’s disgusting—but if I refused to acknowledge family members just because they were annoying assholes, I wouldn’t have any left at all!” Jiang Cheng said.

They sneered at one another, and then Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes extra-hard, and tapped Lan Xichen’s diary. “Forget about it. About this—I thought Zewu-jun was just nuts, when he mentioned Jin Guangyao. But if that part is true…how much of it is actually insanity?” He glanced over at Lan Wangji sleeping on the bed. “Rumor’s a bitch and I don’t like bringing it up, but—there was something weird about Qingheng-jun and the old Madame Lan, wasn’t there? Didn’t they both die in seclusion?”

“Watch yourself, Jiang Cheng,” Wei Wuxian said, softly. He wasn’t wrong, but Wei Wuxian did not like what Jiang Cheng was implying.

Once upon a time, Jiang Cheng might have flinched at such censure from one of his older siblings. He didn’t, now.

When did you stop listening to me?

Jiang Cheng rested his palm flat on the book. “Wei Wuxian, this is not the diary of a sane man. If there was poison in his blood—if there could be such poison in Hanguang-jun’s blood—we need to be prepared for it. If you won’t consider it, should I perhaps be asking Lan-laoshi this question, instead?”

“Don’t you dare!” What a cruelty that would be. “And you’re a fine one to be chattering on about poison, Sandu Shengshou.” That got him a solid glare from Jiang Cheng. “There was poison, yes, but it’s not in the blood.” Wei Wuxian pulled a qiankun pouch off his belt, and withdrew a silver hair ornament from it, and placed it on the table between them. “Does that strike you as familiar at all?”

Jiang Cheng examined it, and poked it with a finger, and then hissed. “For fuck’s sake—why are you still going around with cursed items on your hip? Are you trying to send yourself back to an early grave?”

“Look at it,” Wei Wuxian insisted. He snagged the diary from under his brother’s arm, and flipped to the appropriate page. “‘It is a lovely bauble, a flower of silver and jade, and it seems it was made for me. To don it is to feel the knife sliding into my head. I wonder if this was what he felt.’ And then a few entries below it: ‘my head aches abominably. I cannot fathom why.’ He couldn’t even remember.”

Jiang Cheng stared at the page, and then at the pin, which was indeed lovely, and delicate, elaborate; orchid-shaped, with a silver stem and translucent, carved blue beads for petals. “Did Zewu-jun wear this fucking thing? That really is crazy!”

“He did,” Wei Wuxian said grimly. “He wore it, and he wore a half-dozen such other beautiful objects bearing terrible curses, and used handsome dishes, all crafted in styles favored by the Lan, all bearing curses…Lan-laoshi and I have most of them locked away now, but before Lan Xichen died, his house was full of these things.”

“Were they all in this vein? I swear, this is like the world’s worst courting gift.”

“Mm, a courting gift, maybe. If you were trying to court someone towards death.”

“Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Cheng said, in a strangled tone. “Was Lan Xichen’s death an assassination?”

“It was almost certainly a murder,” Wei Wuxian said.

Jiang Cheng surged to his feet, and began pacing in a tight, harsh, strangely silent stride, around the Jingshi. His hands were clenched behind his back, his back was straight, his head was held low.

“A-Cheng…”

“Who else knows?” Jiang Cheng’s head whipped around towards Wei Wuxian. “Nie Huaisang—does he know? Is that why you were there to talk to him?”

“Until yesterday, I thought Nie-xiong did it!” Wei Wuxian said. “And sit down. You’ll wake up Lan Zhan!”

“Him? He’s sleeping deeper than a baby,” Jiang Cheng said, but after a few more rounds of pacing, he settled back down opposite Wei Wuxian again. “Wei Wuxian, I know all too well that you will let yourself ignore the larger implications of this kind of shit, when it suits you. But I can’t. I absolutely cannot. Do you know who murdered Lan Xichen? I need you to fucking tell me, right now.”

“I have my suspicions,” Wei Wuxian said, lacing the fingers of both hands together, worrying the palm of one with the thumb of the other.

“You said before that you’d thought it was Nie Huaisang. Why? Why would he—” Jiang Cheng stopped, closing his eyes, putting his hand up, like he was trying to ward off an imminent headache. “Wait, don’t tell me. The shit in here about Lan Xichen helping his darling A-Yao to escape—Nie Huaisang found out about it somehow; that’s why he knows Jin Guangyao is alive. And you think he might have murdered Lan Xichen for revenge for that.”

“It was my first thought,” Wei Wuxian said. “And then I had another; I could think of another reason why he might have killed him, perhaps even more potent than the first—it doesn’t matter now, though; I was wrong about it. It’s something that isn’t possible, and never was.”

Jiang Cheng picked up the mostly-empty bottle of wine and saluted him with it. “Let us mark this auspicious day, when my brother admitted he was wrong about something.”

Wei Wuxian wrinkled his nose at him, and only barely resisted the urge to stick out his tongue. “I said it doesn’t matter, didn’t I? And it doesn’t matter! What matters is that Nie-xiong is the less likely suspect.”

“If you think Nie Huaisang is the less likely suspect, that means you think there’s a more likely suspect. Jin Guangyao, I presume?” Wei Wuxian nodded, and Jiang Cheng exhaled slowly through his nose. “Jin Guangyao targeting Nie Huaisang—that makes perfect sense. But Jin Guangyao targeting Lan Xichen? There was no one in the entire damned cultivation world who backed Jin Guangyao more than Lan Xichen.” Sour-faced, he added, “Unless you count Su Minshan, I suppose. I don’t know that I buy it, Wei Wuxian. Why would Jin Guangyao want to kill his sworn brother?”

“Jin Guangyao killed his other sworn brother,” Wei Wuxian pointed out. “Not to mention his blood brother. And his father, and possibly even his own son! And I’m not convinced he didn’t somehow compel poor Qin Su to kill herself—I saw them fight, Jiang Cheng, and I am telling you that that poor woman went from ‘angry and threatening to expose him’ to ‘silently meditative and then suicidal’ suspiciously quickly.”

Something melancholy flickered across Jiang Cheng’s face. “Qin Su deserved better,” he said, his voice a little rough. “The young Madame Jin was a kind person. She was…gracious. A-Ling liked her. He still misses her.”

(Sixteen years, Wei Wuxian thought, was a long time. Some things didn’t ever seem to change at all. And yet who knew what kinds of things might change, in sixteen years?)

Jiang Cheng shook off his little mood. “Jin Guangyao killed to get power and he killed to keep power,” he said. “Would he murder someone just for the satisfaction of it?”

“Weren’t you the one who said we should go to Dongying and put him down?” Wei Wuxian said. “What’s the point, if you think he’s not dangerous?”

“I didn’t say he wasn’t dangerous. He put a garrote on A-Ling’s throat, Wei Wuxian! Of course he’s dangerous, and I want him dead. What I’m asking is if cold revenge is really his style.”

Wei Wuxian had pondered the way that Nie Mingjue had died; the way that Jin Guangshan had died. Each of their deaths had been carefully planned, carefully executed. They’d been slow deaths, cruel deaths, deaths that were meant to taint the spirit, even while they violated the body. Whatever else Jin Guangyao had stood to gain from those deaths, he’d gone to great lengths to inflict suffering, and made sure he was able to watch it happen.

“I think it is,” Wei Wuxian said simply.

Jiang Cheng didn’t really understand revenge. Not the way Wei Wuxian did. Jiang Cheng had, at points, certainly wanted revenge, very badly. But Jiang Cheng was also unimaginatively straightforward about it.

Take Wen Zhuliu, the Core-Melting Hand, who had maimed Jiang Cheng at Wen Chao’s behest. Who had helped Wen Chao to murder Jiang Cheng’s parents, slaughter his sect, and burn his home. For all of that, Wei Wuxian had been planning to make Wen Zhuliu scratch his own skin off in a growing frenzy, until he’d dug festering wounds into his body, and his fingernails had fallen off. Maybe eviscerate himself, while he was at it—see how you like being gutted from the inside out, you dog of the Wen! Wei Wuxian had had plenty of time, feral and frightened and bloody-mouthed in the Burial Mounds, to imagine exactly how he would kill every perpetrator of the Lotus Pier massacre. He had plans for each and every one of them, and he’d carried most of them out, too!

But Jiang Cheng, when he’d intercepted that particular kill, had simply…strangled Wen Zhuliu to death. It hadn’t taken more than three minutes, and yet Jiang Cheng had been entirely satisfied by that, as if the mere fact that he’d used Zidian, his murdered mother’s spiritual weapon, ought to suffice for both irony and payback. Wei Wuxian would never have faulted his passion, but Jiang Cheng lacked both patience and creativity, when it came to revenging himself on his enemies.

“Huh. Well, then, you should watch your back, Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Cheng said, “And watch Hanguang-jun’s, too—assuming you can remove your eyes from his ass—because you two played your part in Lianfang-zun’s undoing, after all, and it was not a small one.”

“And you ought to be careful, too, shidi!” Wei Wuxian told his brother. “Didn’t you also play yours?”

“I suppose I did,” Jiang Cheng said dryly, and then he suddenly smirked.

“What?” Wei Wuxian demanded. “What’s that smile for?”

“Just that—if it was the Headshaker who killed Zewu-jun—you and I wouldn’t have anything to fear, would we? After all, we did what he wanted us to do. We played our parts in his play perfectly, even though we didn’t know we were doing it.”

“Is that what you’re hoping for?” Wei Wuxian asked.

“Not at all,” Jiang Cheng said, his smirk fading. There was a little twitch in his temple that told Wei Wuxian the promised headache had arrived. “It’s better if it’s Jin Guangyao, even if he is the more vicious. If it was Nie-zongzhu—if was him, and if there’s proof that it was him, that the Nie Sect Leader murdered the Lan Sect Leader—Wei Wuxian, it could be civil war. Again. If it was Nie Huaisang, and that fact comes out, I will not be able to stop it.”

***

Three months later:

Wei Wuxian settled at the desk in the Jingshi. It was late evening, fast approaching nine o’clock, but Lan Zhan was still tied up with representatives from Gusu Lan’s tributary sects, just as he’d been all week, and Wei Wuxian did not have hopes of seeing his husband any time soon.

For the first two months, Lan Qiren had been taking as many meetings on his nephew’s behalf as he could. The talk had recently begun to creep around, though, that Lan Zhan was woefully unprepared and unfit to hold his new position. Uncle and nephew had had a painful, stilted conversation, and switched places; Lan Qiren had retreated to handle the paperwork, and Lan Zhan now sat through endless meetings with people he disliked, and had no gift at all for speaking with. Wei Wuxian, of course, could do almost nothing to help either of them, with a reputation still charcoal-stained, and apt to leave black smears on anything he dared to touch.

It was wearing on them all.

Wei Wuxian unfolded Jiang Cheng’s letter a second time, pushing aside a brush and inkstone, to make room for it, and carefully repositioning the lit candle on the desk, so there was no chance of an accidental fire. Although, he thought morbidly, at least if I did set fire to the Jingshi, it’d almost certainly get poor Lan Zhan out of his meeting.

He read Jiang Cheng’s letter a second time.

The spiders have returned from their mission to Dongying, it said. Dongying appears to have been an exciting adventure for them. I am omitting a great many of their less relevant details in this short account, which I mention mainly so that you do not wonder at its brevity.

Too bad. Under different circumstances, Wei Wuxian suspected that might have made for entertaining reading.

Yu C— and Yu H— were able to follow the snake across the sea. The land across the sea is a string of islands, and the snake had slithered across fully half of them, but they were eventually able to locate his burrow.

I should say, rather, that they found his hole. C— and H— have provided me with a thorough and creditable accounting of his movements. On their information, I can tell you with certainty that the snake died and was buried on one of the north islands, just over twelve months ago. The cause of his death was attributed to the wounds he had taken that night in Yunping, which had become severely infected during travel. Enclosed, please find a transcript of the testimony of the doctor called to treat him in his final hours, as well as that of the local magistrate tasked with his burial.

The spiders did find that there were numerous gifts purchased in Dongying and delivered to Gusu and to Qinghe. I have made for you a précis of all the sales orders that the spiders were able to locate, organized by date.

After Wei Wuxian had read this letter and examined that summary the first time, he’d gone and written a letter of his own. He’d written to Qinghe, passing along the news of Jin Guangyao’s demise, sketched in the vaguest of details—this news will of course be of great interest and probable relief, to your mind; this particular serpent will bite no more. Etc., etc.

Still, he’d also written, one item still troubles this humble one. The agents sent to Dongying are certain that the subject of their inquiry died no later than twelve months ago. Curiously, though, several of the items found in X—’s possession appear to have been purchased and shipped from Dongying as recently as seven months ago. Any information or theories you can offer to help illuminate this mystery would be appreciated.

And now, Wei Wuxian held Nie Huaisang’s reply in his hand.

My old friend —

I thank you for your letter. Unlike the last tidings of death you so thoughtfully conveyed to me, I cannot pretend that this news is unwelcome. However, my mind is not totally at ease, hearing it—for of course, I have also continued to be the recipient of unwholesome gifts in the past twelve months. It is very unsettling. I am not convinced that even a dead serpent is harmless, since I am told that a serpent’s venom can linger for a while after death. “A cautious man would be wise not to use his own finger to test the sharpness of such a tooth.” I think it was one of the elders, who told me that? Or maybe a fortune-teller said it. I have no head for such sayings.

I will say that this mystery is perhaps not such a mystery to me as it is to you. Unlike you, I had many long years of acquaintance with G—, and can attest to the thoroughness of his mind. He was possessed of forethought, and had great attention to planning and detail. I assure you it is—I should write, was—well within his capacity to arrange for a revenge that would outlive him, even as he succumbed to blood poisoning. The anticipation of his own death might have made him all the more determined to ensure that his enemies quickly joined him in that state.

I know him. He would not need to be able to turn his head and see the people he hated, trailing behind him, on that slow, grey, road, to take satisfaction in knowing that all they trod it together.

I think for my own part that I will remain wary of fine objects from unknown persons for some time to come, and I frankly advise you to do the same. In fact, I shall be wary of anything too appealing, or too easy. Who knows how enduring this arrangement of his to deliver poisoned gifts to his enemies may prove to be? If it has continued on after his own death, it may continue on after X—’s as well. There could even be other targets yet to be revealed—there were others, after all, who played not-insignificant roles in G—’s undoing, such as yourself and several of those closest to you.

I do not know if you know this, but when I was still a child, my father died under circumstances that were rather confusing to me at the time. I learned many years later that my brother suspected that that Wen Sect Leader—you know the one—was complicit in his death. I believe it had to do with something about sabotage to our father’s spiritual saber. My brother had no proof, though, and to make such an accusation against such an esteemed and powerful sect, when he himself was so young and so new to his own role—well, I suppose that he understood nothing good could come from it, so he held himself in check.

We did eventually get some kind of revenge for it, much later, but it took a whole war and a great many dead all around, to get it, and the revenge wasn’t even ours to savor, after all that, since it wasn’t as if it was just our dead and theirs, in that terrible conflict.

It’s strange that that story came to my mind just now…I suppose it’s just to say I know very well how uncomfortable it is to feel paranoid and suspicious all the time. It seems that sometimes that discomfort is simply the burden of living, if we’d rather not die faster.

Anyway, I say again to be wary of enticing things that cross your path. I have come to suspect that it is very easy to harm someone, when you know what their favorite sorts of things are.

Yours, H—

Wei Wuxian stood up from the desk, and paced all around the Jingshi, which felt painfully empty, with no one in it to be fussed or amused by his restlessness. He took Chenqing from his belt, and twirled it in his hand, restlessly. He thought of the end of Jiang Cheng’s letter, that letter he’d read twice now.

Yes, I know you’ll have caught it; I caught it too. It doesn’t prove anything.

I also know you forget things whenever it’s convenient, so let me remind you what I told you that night in the Jingshi about the consequences of proof, in this matter.

I know what you want, and I understand why you want it. You want certainty and you want closure. You want to protect what you love from every possible harm. You wish for justice, and as always, you wish to be the one who delivers it.

Let me tell you what I want: I want the next sect leader who ascends to his position, whoever that may be, in whatever sect, to do so well into their adult majority, ideally after having received training and preparation for the role sufficient to ensure strong, stable leadership, and above all, to do so in peacetime. Wars, assassinations, and secret murder plots dramatically and publicly revealed are not conducive to this goal. Five times in one generation is enough, damn it.

If it was the serpent, his head’s been crushed already; just don’t take any candy from strangers for a while, and we’ll all be fine. If it was the songbird, he’s already gotten what he wanted, and is unlikely to cause more trouble if left alone.

I strongly suggest that you let sleeping dogs lie.

Wei Wuxian shuddered slightly—did you have to say dogs, A-Cheng?—and sat back down at the desk. He put Chenqing down by the brush, next to the candle, and considered all the things he might do, with the instruments laid out upon the table.

I could write more letters, he thought, eyes lingering on the brush and the ink. There were other avenues to try, other leads to follow. There were many more people to talk to.

Or…he could burn the letters in front of him, in the flame of the candle, at the edge of the desk. He could dig up Lan Xichen’s diary from its second, even more secure hiding place, and burn that, too. Jiang Cheng would probably prefer that.

(Wei Wuxian wasn’t sure if anyone else had seen that diary, besides Jiang Cheng and himself. He certainly hadn’t shown that to Lan Qiren, and he hadn’t shown it to Lan Zhan, either. But he’d also thought he’d hidden it away, when he’d stolen off to the Unclean Realm, that night, three months ago, and he’d been greatly surprised to find it in Jiang Cheng’s hands, when he’d returned.

Lan Zhan had never said why he’d turned to Emperor’s Smile, that night.)

And…and…there are other things I might do as well, he thought, his eyes falling on Chenqing. All kinds of other things.

He could do so many things. He only needed to make up his mind what he wanted to do. So he sat, and he thought. And thought, and thought.

And then Wei Wuxian folded the letters sitting in front of him, and reached across the desk.