Chapter Text
Nie Fuyun paced in front of the small storehouse, only stopping whenever someone came to her and asked after Nie Huaisang, forcing her to make excuses for his disappearance. Just as she was getting worried enough to consider breaking the door, it opened again. Lan Xichen and Nie Huaisang stepped outside side by side. Both of them looked as exhausted as if they’d fought an army of fierce corpses, but while Lan Xichen at least seemed to have gained a sense of calm from their conversation, Nie Huaisang appeared ready to crumble if anything more contradicted him.
Seeing Nie Fuyun, Lan Xichen smiled at her, which couldn’t hide the redness in his eyes.
“I’m sorry for borrowing your sect leader,” he apologised, as if it hadn’t been Nie Huaisang who’d dragged him away in there. “I now return him to your care.”
He glanced at Nie Huaisang who said nothing but weakly nodded, as if words were too much effort. Lan Xichen sighed.
“I will see you later, Huaisang.”
He lingered a moment more, but when Nie Huaisang remained silent, Lan Xichen left. Nie Fuyun should have asked him if he was still coming to the wedding, if he knew where to spend the night, but she was too worried by the state Nie Huaisang was in to care about anything else.
“Father,” Nie Fuyun whispered, low enough that only Nie Huaisang could hear.
He stared at her, and his already red eyes filled with tears. Nie Fuyun frowned, fearing she’d made a mistake calling him that, but her father quickly smiled at her. It was a perfectly cheerful smile, one that even reached his eyes in perfect imitation of sincere joy, and yet it couldn’t stop the tears from flowing. How many times had he smiled like that without anyone noticing it was fake?
Nie Fuyun leaned closer and pulled him in a hug tight enough to crrack bones. It wasn’t enough to erase whatever pain had overcome him, but it was all she had to offer. She half expected her father to deflect with a joke and tell her she was too big for this, but Nie Huaisang remained silent and hugged her back, clinging to her with something bordering on desperation. He seemed terrified that she’d disappear if he let go. And she would, in a way. They didn’t have much time left together.
“Father, can I… can I spend the rest of today with you?” she shyly asked. “I… I want… while I still can…”
“Silly child,” Nie Huaisang hiccuped, fighting sobs and holding her closer. “Of course you can.”
There were still details to finish setting up, guests arriving, so Nie Huaisang was busy for the rest of the day. Nie Fuyun never left his side, remaining just a step behind him as he did everything he had to do. When evening came, Nie Huaisang arranged for them to have dinner alone in his room. The elders were shocked and tried to object, but Nie Huaisang ignored them, and reminded them he was still their sect leader, still someone they ought to obey.
Nie Fuyun had little appetite, and neither did Nie Huaisang. Still he encouraged her to eat, and she realised he’d served all of her favourite foods. It nearly made her cry. He’d really watched her more closely than she could have known, enough to know such details about her.
“You’re really like Da-ge,” Nie Huaisang mused when he saw her favour a certain dish, the only one she could really swallow while so emotional. “He loved that too. He could have made himself sick eating it, I think.”
Nie Fuyun hesitated, and put down her chopsticks. It had bothered her earlier, when Lan Xichen had compared her to her late uncle. But coming from Nie Huaisang, who never spoke of his brother if he could avoid it, it was something different.
“Do you… ever miss him?” she asked.
“Every day, every moment,” Nie Huaisang sighed. “We didn’t always get along, but even when we fought, even when I drove him mad, he was still there for me.”
“Do you think he would have liked me?”
Nie Huaisang stared at her, eyes wide with surprise, as if he couldn’t understand the question was even needed.
“He did,” he replied with such assurance it soothed Nie Fuyun's heart. “Da-ge scolded me so much when I came home with you in my arms, but he made sure you had everything you needed, and he sometimes asked me about your progress. I think he knew, really. Of course he knew. He’s the only person who could tell when I kept secrets.”
“Then… why didn’t you just tell him the truth?”
Nie Huaisang grimaced, and poked at the food in front of him with a chopstick.
“It was easier that way,” he admitted. “I was a very foolish person back then, I didn’t like to deal with problems. I knew if I told him you were my daughter, we’d have arguments about how I came to have you, about what to do with you. But it wasn't the only reason. Even as a toddler, you showed signs that you’d be a better cultivator than me, so the elders might have pushed Da-ge to adopt you and make you his heir. That’s why… I didn’t tell him, but he never asked either, you understand? There was so much pressure on him to be a good heir when he was young, and then he became Sect Leader so early… I think he avoided the topic so we wouldn’t have to inflict that on you. That way, you got to grow up freely.”
It wasn’t something Nie Fuyun had given much thought. There was no official heir in the Nie sect, and none of her peers had ever been singled out to carry that weighty title. But Jin Ling and Ouyang Zizhen complained about all their duties a few times on Night Hunts, and the Lan cousins also had to meet many expectations, being sufficiently high up in their own succession line. It sounded dreadfully boring, and Nie Fuyun was somewhat glad she’d been spared that part of being her father's daughter.
“Tell me about him,” she asked Nie Huaisang. “Tell me about my uncle.”
Without surprise, he quickly shook his head.
“I’m not sure I can… it’s still not easy for me…”
“ Please, father, tell me about him,” Nie Fuyun insisted, reaching over the table to take his hand. “Tell me about my grandparents, too. Tell me about everyone . If I have to leave, I want to take something of them with me. Tell me.”
“I can’t say much,” her father warned, moving his hand so he could cling to hers. “My father and mother died when I was young, my grand-parents too.”
Still, what little he remembered, he shared freely. Giving up their neglected meal, they sat on a sofa and Nie Fuyun put her head down on her father’s shoulder, the way she’d seen other children do with their parents, the way she'd dreamed of doing with someone back when she still thought herself an orphan. She learned about her grandfather, fierce enough that even the mighty Wen Ruohan trembled before him and had to eliminate him. About her grandmother, gentle and delicate, who had died too soon to leave her son any memories but those of warm hands and a warmer voice. Then there were her great-grandparents, distant memories, but Nie Huaisang still took his tea like his grandfather taught him, and his most precious fan was something he’d found in his grandmother’s room some years after she’d passed away.
Above all else, Nie Huaisang spoke of his brother.
Nie Mingjue had been honest and principled, the sun in his brother's life. Nie Mingjue had been stubborn and unbending, an annoying pest who never gave up. He had loved this food and hated some other one. He couldn’t distinguish good poetry from bad and was even worse when it came to music, but those who knew him all agreed he’d been a skilled painter back when he had time for it, and it was him who had taught Nie Huaisang to enjoy that art.
Throughout the night Nie Fuyun discovered her family, sometimes with surprise, other times with a sense of understanding. Even though most of these people had died long before she was born, hearing about them made her feel like she finally belonged.
As the approaching dawn coloured the night sky, Nie Huaisang also told her about the two of them. The love he’d felt when he’d first held her in his arms. The temptation to leave his sect so he could raise her himself, quickly followed by a realisation they would soon have starved because he had no skills from which to make a living. The pain he’d felt seeing her grow in her wetnurse’s arms instead of his own. The many times he’d thought of coming clean to his brother, only to hesitate as Nie Mingjue’s health worsened. The fear, constant and inescapable, plaguing his waking moment, ruining his dreams, making it impossible to sleep, every time he thought of what would happen if Jin Guangyao discovered his slow work to avenge his brother, and how much worse it would be if his link to Nie Fuyun was noticed as well.
“He’d killed children before,” Nie Huaisang reminded her. “His own son too, for all I knew. I couldn’t risk you. I could lose anything, anyone, but not you.”
Nie Fuyun huddled closer, trying to comfort him. She hoped to never understand that sort of terror, but she could accept it now. It hadn’t been just an excuse. Laying against him that way, she could feel the way Nie Huaisang’s heart started madly racing every time he mentioned the man who killed his brother, the tension in his body, as if years after Jin Guangyao had died, the fear lingered.
“I’m safe now,” Nie Fuyun whispered. “You don’t have to worry anymore, I’m safe, and I can defend myself.”
“Not against everything.”
He didn’t mention her future in-laws, but she understood anyway. In a new house, her position wouldn’t be as good as it had been in the Unclean Realm. Sect Leader Ouyang was thrilled with the wedding, but maybe his wife wouldn’t be, and she could make Nie Fuyun’s life a complete hell. These things happened.
“Zizhen is nice,” she remarked. “He really is. So… at least, he’ll be there.”
Nie Huaisang hummed, unconvinced.
“Do you like him?”
“I’m not sure,” Nie Fuyun replied, certain her father would know it if she tried to lie. “I’ve never really thought about it, until I saw him again today. But I definitely don’t dislike him. I think once we know each other better, I’ll really like him a lot, maybe more than like him. I just wish… I think I’d like him more if I didn’t have to leave home.”
Nie Huaisang hummed again, this time in agreement, and kissed her hair. They didn’t say anything more after that. Nie Fuyun might have even fallen asleep, safe in her father’s arms for the first time since she was a newborn.
A knock on the door broke the spell. Dawn had finally arrived in spite of them, and Nie Fuyun had to get dressed for her wedding. She clung to her father as long as she could, but the knocking never stopped. Eventually, Nie Fuyun had to leave her father’s embrace and get up, comforted to find Nie Huaisang equally reluctant to let go.
There were not many women in the Nie sect, although some disciples were married. They’d all gathered to turn Nie Fuyun into a pretty bride, and complained at length when they realised that she hadn’t slept at all. Still, the dark circles under her eyes were nothing that makeup couldn’t fix, and she was blessed with naturally nice hair, and her robes were so beautiful it would distract from the rest. They were less sure about her veil, knowing it belonged to Nie Huaisang’s mother. Since they believed that Nie Huaisang might have had an improper relationship with this poor orphan girl who was now escaping to another sect, one distant cousin offered to let her use a different veil if she felt more comfortable that way. Nie Fuyun firmly refused.
She would wear her grandmother’s veil, even if she couldn’t claim it as such.
Aside from that particular moment, much of the morning passed as a blur. Nie Fuyun also hardly paid attention to most of the traditional games, though she noted that Ouyang Zizhen had brought cakes and money to bribe the other disciples into giving her away, enough of them that she heard some boys laugh that he needn’t have spent so much.
“I’d give even more,” Ouyang Zizhen had solemnly replied. “I don’t know her worth to you, but I know her worth to me.”
Under her veil, Nie Fuyun blushed. Saying things like that… even if the circumstances were bad, how could she not have liked her future husband?
She let Ouyang Zizhen lead her to the ancestral hall, to kneel before ancestors she finally understood to be hers. Side by side, their families around them, the young couple prepared to take their first bow. They started bending their knees in unison...
“A moment!” Nie Huaisang suddenly exclaimed. “This is… this is wrong. I cannot allow this to happen.”
Nie Fuyun turned to look at her father, although the veil masked most details. Behind him, she could barely discern the elders’ horror, convinced as they must be that their foolish sect leader would finish ruining his reputation. Other guests were merely curious or amused that the infamous Headshaker would once again show his indecision.
“There is something about Nie Fuyun that must be said,” Nie Huaisang went on, his face crimson, as if this particular topic were too much for his usual self control. “It has always been said that she is an orphan, a child I found somewhere and brought to this sect on a whim. But it couldn’t be further from the truth.”
Nie Fuyun couldn’t breathe. After all these years, after he’d shown her how much it terrified her, surely he couldn’t really…
The fear was still there, she could tell. Nie Huaisang was shaking like a leaf, but he took one look at her, and seemed to find the strength he needed.
“Nie Fuyun is not an orphan,” he announced. “She is my natural daughter, my last remaining family, true heir to the Qinghe Nie sect. Not only that, but her other parent is either one of two sect leaders, or a hero of the Sunshot Campaign. She is not some orphan girl, and I will not give her away as such.”
He paused and took a deep breath, shaking worse than ever, on the verge of tears, and looked toward Nie Fuyun’s fathers, who all four happened to stand together not far from him. Lan Xichen looked particularly startled to find out he’d guessed wrong after all, but dared not comment on it. In fact nobody dared to say anything, until Jiang Cheng broke the silence.
“ What do you mean, two sect leaders?” he scoffed. “I can guess the other one, but in my case there’s a mistake. I’m pretty sure I’d remember something like that.”
Nie Huaisang laughed nervously. “Well, that certainly answers an old question of mine.”
“If he won’t claim her, I don’t mind doing it,” Wei Wuxian chimed in. “This is a pretty cool daughter you have, Nie-xiong. Mind sharing her a bit?”
He turned to his husband, and to the assembly’s shock, Lan Wangji nodded.
“She would make any father proud.”
Whispers ran among the guests. Nie Fuyun could already tell that wild rumours would be started that day about the Yiling Patriarch doing orgies, but she didn’t care. She was too busy quietly sobbing now that these two amazing men found her worthy of being claimed, even in such circumstances. Sensing she was overcome with emotion, Ouyang Zizhen discreetly took her hand to offer some support. A good thing he did, too, because it was Lan Xichen’s turn to step forward.
“I would be proud as well to call her mine,” he stated, trying to catch Nie Huaisang’s eyes, failing to do so. “And if we cannot tell whose child she is, it is fine also. A third of such a daughter is no small joy to have.”
Poor Ouyang Zizhen gasped as his hand was squeezed too hard. He didn’t complain, though, and didn’t try to escape either, remaining next to Nie Fuyun, as if he didn’t mind supporting her through this.
After the initial shock of these revelations, voices spread among the assembled guests. Loudest of all were the Nie elders. These people, who had pushed so hard for this wedding, were now questioning whether it should happen.
“What do we do now?” one asked. “This ceremony, this marriage… what’s good enough for a disciple isn’t quite what a sect leader’s daughter deserves.”
“ Should there even be a wedding? If she is Nie zongzhu’s heir, we can’t let her leave for some random sect. Anyway, didn’t she always say nothing happened back then, and it was a misunderstanding? Maybe there needn’t be a wedding at all…”
For the first time since this started, it was Ouyang Zizhen’s turn to nervously squeeze his fiancée’s hand, worried that his luck was turning. But he didn’t protest, didn’t say that she’d already been promised to her and couldn’t be taken away. Instead, he turned to Nie Fuyun with a sad smile.
“What do you prefer, in the end?” he softly asked, just that one question, as if that was all that mattered to him.
Ah, it was really impossible not to like him, Nie Fuyun decided. She’d started liking him when she had no choice but to stand at his side. Now that she could be rid of him… she still wanted to stay with him, even more so than before.
“I don’t want to lose my dad,” she whispered to him. “But I also don’t want to let go of you. Is that wrong?”
“ We can make it work,” Ouyang Zizhen whispered back, then raised his voice to be heard by everyone. “What if I were fine with marrying into the Nie sect instead?” he loudly asked. “Would that be allowed?”
The elders started nodding, satisfied with that option, but sect leader Ouyang was outraged.
“I can’t let my only son leave like that! I need an heir too!”
“Well, you have my sisters,” Ouyang Zizhen cheerfully replied. “Pick one of them. You always say they’d have made for more dutiful sons than me, anyway! They won’t always be running off with Jin zongzhu, like you say I do. And they won’t speak well of Wei Wuxian, like I do. And anyway, jiejie is a better fighter than me, I’ve never beaten her yet. And…”
“Enough of that already,” his father ordered. “None of the girls are half as insolent as you, that’s for certain.”
It wasn’t quite agreement on his part, but it was good enough for the young couple. Nie Fuyun pulled back her veil now that it was unnecessary, and smiled at the young man who was still her fiancé, now by choice. Ouyang Zizhen smiled back at her, and she decided that he was really quite handsome, much more so than any other boys their age.
Her veil gone, everyone seemed to accept that the wedding was truly cancelled. A few people were muttering, trying to decide whether they should leave or not.
“Is it still fine to eat all that food and drink all that wine, even if there was no wedding? We don’t want it to go to waste, right?” Wei Wuxian mused in the tone of a man who thought he knew the answer, but worried others might be stupid.
There was some debate about that, but the whispers died down when Lan Xichen came to stand near Nie Huaisang, his face bearing an air of gentle determination.
“And who’s to say there won’t be a wedding today?” he asked, looking at Nie Huaisang.
Nie Huaisang scoffed, and hid behind a fan.
“You’re not serious.”
Lan Xichen smiled at him with such warmth and affection that it was almost embarrassing to look at them.
“Why not? It’s not the worst way I’ve asked you to marry me, you have to admit it.”
“It’s not,” Nie Huaisang conceded with a nervous giggle. “But surely… after everything else…”
“I’ve told you before, I spent all that time hoping you’d come back to me. I’m tired of waiting now, and I’m reaching out instead. Nie zongzhu, marry me.”
“And if we have another misunderstanding like before?”
“We won’t. I won’t let you get rid of me so easily. Marry me, Nie Huaisang.”
“This is insane. You know what I’ve done, what sort of a man I am.”
“I know, and that’s why I’m asking. Marry me, Huaisang.”
“But… I… It’s not that I don’t want to… it’s… we don’t know if it’s an auspicious date for us!”
This last objection made Lan Xichen hesitate, although his expression remained determined, as if that comment might delay his plans but not change them.
“Oh, it’s actually a good date for you today!” someone intervened.
To Nie Fuyun’s shock, that announcement came from right next to her. Ouyang Zizhen blushed as everyone looked at him.
“Ah, well… I heard that you two used to be close…,” he mumbled, glancing at Nie Fuyun. “And this sort of thing, it’s a hobby of mine because my sisters often ask me to calculate auspicious dates for them and their crushes… and I was too nervous to fall asleep last night… and I’d seen your eight characters some years ago when my mother was trying to think of a husband for my oldest sister… so I did the calculations tonight, and I found it funny that today would be the most auspicious day possible for you two to get married… and… and…”
As he trailed off, Nie Huaisang suddenly burst out laughing.
“I can’t fight against that!” he exclaimed. “Ask again, Zewu-jun.”
“Marry me, Sang’er?” Lan Xichen whispered.
Nie Huaisang grinned, looking the happiest that his daughter had ever seen him.
“ I will ,” he proudly announced. “I think it’s a terrible idea, but I’ve missed you all my life, and if the heavens want it, it will be so. Yunyun, may I have my mother’s veil back for a moment?”
She ran to his side, and offered the veil to her father. He took it and pressed a kiss to her cheek.
“I always knew you were the best thing that ever happened to me,” he told her, quickly covering himself in the veil. “Alright, let’s get this over with. Xichen, let’s take our bows before you realise your mistake and change your mind!”
After this, the rest of the day passed as a blur. Nie Fuyun would later remember that she cried when her father took his three bows with Lan Xichen. People told her the food was delicious, but she hardly ate anything, because she was so busy chatting. Mostly with Wei Wuxian, who was delighted to maybe have a child and kept saying she looked like Lan Sizhui, no matter how many times Lan Sizhui himself reminded him it was impossible. Next to them, Lan Wangji seemed content. If Wei Wuxian insisted that Nie Fuyun looked like his previous body, Lan Wangji agreed. If instead he said she looked like Lan Wangji himself, agreement was as easily secured. Jiang Wanying called them both stupid for it, but according to Jin Ling, his uncle was just happy to be arguing with Wei Wuxian, and maybe a little sad after all that he didn't also get his share of a daughter after all. But Nie Fuyun doubted that last part, and suspected it was Jin Ling himself who was disappointed he didn’t have a secret cousin hidden away in Qinghe.
Above all else, Nie Fuyun later recalled Ouyang Zizhen’s hand in hers the whole time, and the joy on her father’s face every time he saw Lan Xichen as his side and remembered this was his husband now.
Stupid as her plan had been, Nie Fuyun was glad she’d sent those letters, and brought her family together again.