But for two Spirit-trapping Pouches tucked carefully into his robes, Song Lan stood alone on the mountain top, stars glittering in the moonless night sky.
One Spirit-trapping Pouch carried gentle strength, a soul spirit that had grown over the years. What had once been shattered had mended, strengthened, and filled his heart with guarded hope. Enough that he had once returned to BaoShan SanRen, for guidance.
That he carried the shattered spirit of one who had been theirs, that he saw with that man's eyes, had earned him his second tolerated entrance. His forced silence, ashen skin, and blackened veins, had heralded him as a dark messenger to those who stayed, that it was perhaps wisest not to venture down the mountain, to the world of mortals and violent ends.
He left with what he needed, and also with a banishment spell upon him. He would not be allowed to return, under any circumstance, nor guide another there.
Though he still walked the world, he was not alive. Had not been for a very, very long time. With him, two shattered spirits slept and slowly healed.
One was a cultivator, his friend Xiao Xingchen. Gentle, kind, determined Xingchen, who had meant nothing but good, and at the end, had been so beaten, so trapped, that he had taken his own life and shattered his spirit so that he could not be made into what he, Song Lan, had been made into: a fierce corpse.
The deepest of night had arrived. Winds whipped up and down the mountain peak, his robes snapped to the dark night's song.
He pulled Fuxue from one of the two scabbards slung on his back. Brought forth his dark energy, a frosted black glow that had not altered with his death and return to the non-living. He cast a containment spell, stabbed Fuxue into the center, to hold. Not capture, but to hold, maintain.
Next, he pulled Shuanghua, the sword also responded to his touch because he carried with him its master, Xingchen. Shuanghua lit the night with a pure white glow. He slid the blade into the earth, a whisper of metal on metal as both blades resided in the same spot.
One to hold, one to call.
With a wave of his fingers, the containment barrier hummed with a faint sound of falling snow crystals. Another wave of his fingers, and both swords sent forth energy, welcoming, encompassing, and he took Xingchen's spirit pouch from his robe, bowed his head, and untied the string that held it closed.
Soul spirit energy drifted outwards.
(Come, Xiao Xingchen, you are safe. I am Song Lan. Return to me.)
He sent the message spell into the swords, a one-time gift from a disciple who had thought kindly of Xingchen. Like a whisper across water, he heard himself, his own voice, reverberated through the swords, the last time he would ever hear his own voice make human sounds.
The spirit flowed free, swirled above the swords, solidified, formed a topknot, hair, face, cloth covered where his eyes had once been. Solemn set to the mouth, a billowing waterfall of black hair, white-robed shoulders and down and down until booted feet settled on the sword hilts. And then a side step into air, and he drifted to the ground.
Xiao Xingchen stood on top of the mountain, in the night. The black edge of his robes danced against the snow white fabric, glowing in the light of their swords.
"Shuanghua," Xiao Xingchen whispered, reached a hand to the hilt of his sword, a finger resting lightly on the pommel. "You called." This time, had he his own eyes, Xingchen would be looking directly at Song Lan.
Song Lan felt his body do something he hadn't known it could do. He trembled. He could not answer.
"Fuxue," Xiao Xingchen said, his voice soft, but steady. He touched a finger to Fuxue's pommel. He knew Fuxue, knew well its master. "Song ZiChen?"
Song Lan walked the three paces that separated them, each finger-width of space marking off years of waiting, years of sorrow, years of guilt.
He knelt on one knee before Xingchen. Gave his blind friend that show of subservience. This close, his trembling stopped, and his calm returned. Xiao Xingchen was here.
Lightly, Song Lan took Xingchen's hand. Not unexpectedly, Xingchen startled, ever so slightly, and pulled his hand free, a slip of featherlight warmth against his own ashen skin.
He did not move.
"I have been fooled before," Xingchen said.
Song Lan felt moisture on his cheek. Blinked in surprise. He did not know that he could cry. Still, he did not move. Not even to wipe away the tears. He only looked up at Xingchen, drank in the sight of his long-lost friend. Half afraid to believe this was real, and yet…
And yet, it was not real yet. They must still cross the final barrier.
"I have known an enemy who pretended to be my friend," Xingchen said, and returned his hand to Song Lan's.
He lightly closed his fingers around Xingchen's hand again. Watched Xingchen's face closely.
Xingchen titled his head down, "But I have never known anyone as quiet as Song ZiChen. Are you he?"
This was what he waited for. An invitation to answer. With Xingchen, he had only touch. He turned Xingchen's hand palm up, and with his finger, wrote, =I am Song Lan= He gave his birth name to Xingchen's use of his courtesy name.
"Song Lan could speak when last we—" Xingchen faltered. His hand trembled. His memories were possibly tangled.
Song Lan had not been able to speak the last time they met, but that had been when Xingchen died. He might not remember. Better, if he did not.
=I have been changed=
"How?" Xingchen whispered. "How do I know this is you after— after—"
Song Lan growled. A reflex, his temper. Wished immediately he could take it back.
Xingchen pulled his hand free and with the other hand, brought Shuanghua to bear between them, the sword's glow brilliant. Xingchen, newly returned, was at full power, could greatly damage him. Could kill him again. He bowed his head.
Shaunghua had long since come to an alliance with his corpse energy. He did not know if it would remain so once the sword was in its true master's grip.
Nor did he know how to solve this riddle for his friend. He had no knowledge of what the vile one had learned of their history in the years spent abusing Xingchen.
This time, the sword did not strike.
"In my travels, I have heard the stories of our shared history, Song ZiChen. People once talked of my return to BaoShan SanRen's residence with you, when you were blind and near death. What no one knows, but for Song ZiChen and I, was of a songbird with a melodious voice."
He lifted his head, brows furrowed. The years had been many, but there was no songbird that he could recall. (Please, I did not come so far to be destroyed by a faulty memory.)
"This bird stole something. What was the bird's name and what did it take?"
He had still been blind then, with Xiao Xingchen's eyes, but not yet healed. That had taken longer than Xingchen had stayed. But he remembered. He'd been furious and dismayed. They were both blind and he had lost his hairpin. A crow cawed at the window, and he'd been so ill-tempered, he'd thrown a piece of food at it. The bird cawed, and they both heard the ting of something hitting the floor. Investigating, he found his hairpin beneath the window. They had reached the simplest conclusion: the bird had taken his hairpin from beside his sick bed, and then left it in favor of the bite of food.
=hairpin= he wrote. And =crow not good singer= He hoped Xingchen remembered the same way he did.
Xingchen smiled. "Hairpin and crow. Indeed. It was not a songbird. Please forgive my deception."
Song Lan knew who Xingchen guarded against: the vile one and those like him. A brutal thing to have learned. =Your safety always first. Nothing to forgive.=
Tension flowed from Xingchen in a near-palpable wave, and he settled lightly onto both knees before Song Lan. He placed Shuanghua onto the ground beside them.
Xingchen took Song Lan's hands in his own. "Song Lan, what has happened to you?"
Another test, this one for Xingchen to pass. Their common enemy, the vile one, had tricked Xingchen into killing Song Lan, and that led to the vile one bringing Song Lan back, to be controlled, to spend years killing the living, the innocent. Xingchen did not need to know this. Xingchen had enough sorrow to bear with the murders he'd committed while being tricked by the vile one, his blindness used as a weapon against him.
He wrote =Tongue cut out. Made into fierce corpse.=
Xingchen stiffened, pulled his hands back the tiniest amount, and stilled. He swallowed. Small drops of blood seeped into the bandages where his eyes had been. Tears from wounds still unhealed years after Xingchen had dug out his own eyes and given them to Song Lan. "I… I…" But he could not finish.
=Xiao Xingchen, I am sorry. Was not your fault.= Before their complete downfall, he'd lashed out in anger and pain and blamed Xingchen. He'd been ugly to Xingchen, had driven Xingchen away, to his greatest shame and deepest sorrow.
Blood spread wider. Xingchen trembled.
=Please. Please.= Anxious now. Worried. =Forgive me.= He had been wrong, so wrong, and in his fury had said vicious things. Those had been the last words he had spoken, could ever speak, to Xingchen.
"I forgive you," Xingchen whispered. "Yours was only the error of words, at a time of great pain, and I forgive you." Two droplets of blood seeped from the bandages.
Xingchen slowly removed one hand, raised it toward his bandages. His fingers shook. Emotion. Pain. Memories, most likely. They shared a history of loss and pain far greater than Xingchen's sight and his tongue and their lives.
Song Lan reached up, wiped the twin trails of blood from Xingchen's cheeks before they stained his robes. Song Lan cleaned his fingers on his own black robes. Xingchen preferred his robes be untainted and orderly.
Xingchen captured Song Lan's hands, held tightly. "I—. Song Lan, will you please forgive me? For the roles I unwittingly played?"
The vile one had destroyed the Baixue Temple to strike at Xingchen through Song Lan, and it had worked; and later, Song Lan's death.
=Not your fault. Cannot forgive what does not exist.=
"Please, Song Lan. Say the words if you can mean them."
Stubborn. Xingchen had always been stubborn. Though he had claimed that in this, they were two of a kind. Like-minded.
=I, Song Lan, forgive you, Xiao Xingchen, of all you ask forgiveness for.= The streak of righteousness forced him to add =Xiao Xingchen is innocent=
"Thank you," Xingchen said. He smiled, the movement faint, but there, "It is good to know that you have not inwardly changed."
=Do you know that you have been gone long?=
"Some, yes. Though my memory seems vague on the matters most close to… to now." The blood smears were no longer increasing. Blood no longer dripped free.
Xingchen's brows drew down, a hand raised toward the bandages, as if the motion had been painful. Xingchen smoothed his brows, appeared calm. Xingchen's hand drifted back down to again clasp Song Lan's hand.
The time of transition was nearing the end. The most terrifying moment came next and he hurried it, because he was afraid. =I called you forth from the Spirit-trapping Pouch. My spells are nearly done. Xiao Xingchen, will you stay?=
Xingchen looked briefly confused. Perhaps he had written too quickly. Perhaps Xingchen was not sure of his answer.
"If I agree to this, Song Lan, you must meet my condition."
(Please don't send me away, Xingchen.) But if Xingchen asked it, he would do it. He would do =anything=. And again =anything=.
"Song Lan, stay with me until we are done with this world."
His dark future gained light. He wrote carefully, clearly, =Always. I, Song Lan, will stay with you, Xiao Xingchen.=
"I hold you to your promise, Song Lan. I will stay."
Xiao Xingchen raised a hand and with a motion, removed the spells, they were that much in tune, still.
He stood first, gave Xingchen a hand up. Was loathe to let their hands unclasp. With his free hand, he sheathed Fuxue. Pulled Shuanghua's sheath from his back, and pressed it into Xingchen's free hand.
"I will hold your hand again. More, perhaps, than you will care to," Xingchen said with an easy smile, "But for now, let me borrow my own for a moment, please."
Reluctantly, he let go. (But I just got you back.)
Xingchen laughed, a soft, gentle sound that did much to patch his aching soul. "Your very touch, how you released my hand, tells me that you are sulking."
(True.)
Xingchen sheathed Shuanghua, settled the sword over his shoulder. Reached out a hand, palm up. "Song Lan… how long… have you waited?"
With a finger, Song Lan wrote on his palm, =Years=
"How many?"
=Seven=
"So little time? How is that poss—" Xingchen stopped speaking. Waited as he wrote on Xingchen's palm again.
=and one Jia Zi= (Seven and sixty years.) But he could not formulate a thought to fully encompass that lonely time when he was not strictly alone.
"Oh. Song Lan…"
He turned his hand, clasped Xingchen's in his, gave a tug with his hand, and started walking. They were unlikely to reach the base of the mountain before dawn.
Xingchen walked beside him. They did not make ten paces before he said, "Song Lan?"
He paused. They would not get far if he kept stopping to talk. The sensation was strange. Few people would speak with a fierce corpse, even among the cultivators, though he had some bit of appraisal with them. Even fewer were the ones for whom he would write in the dirt.
"Why did you growl earlier?"
=Not want you speak the vile one's name=
"Ah. I thought that might be it. Very well, we will not speak his name. But, is he gone?"
=Dead by the hand of Lan Wangji of the Lan Clan= He would tell Xingchen later of the part A-Qing played, and that he carried her spirit as well. That would require time and space for heartache. There was much he would need to write.
"Is Lan Wangji still alive? I should like to thank him, if we have cause to cross his path."
=Alive. We have all paths before us.=
"I see. Then, is there a reason you are in such a hurry to get off this mountain?"
=Night ghouls, village not far=
"Can we reach it before dawn?" His tone suggested Xingchen knew this answer.
=No=
"I thought not. Let us rest, hasty one. My journey was not entirely restful."
That alarmed him. Somehow, that translated through their touch.
"No, no, not to worry. I only mean that I am tired now and would not mind resting for a bit."
=Sorry. I forget sleep.= Or others' needs. He would remedy that oversight starting now.
"Do you… do you sleep?"
=Yes. Not often.=
"Ah. I believe I shall require more than you. I hope this does not upset you."
=Together. No upset if together.=
Xingchen yawned. "Ah, apparently I am more tired than I thought. My apologies."
=I find place. No apologies to me.=
"Common courtesy, Song Lan. You should not deny me that."
"Uhh." A deep grunt. Noncommittal.
Xingchen smiled, lifted his chin and turned his face into the breeze.
He stared at Xingchen, startled. Since losing his tongue, he made reactional noises when he fought, sometimes growled at the living, but he had never before used his voice as if he could speak.
Xingchen was lost in whatever thoughts he had, a faint smile still on his lips. And his neck so bare…
He stepped close, ducked his head, pressed his lips against Xingchen's neck, kissed lightly.
Xingchen sighed, fit against him, wrapped arms around him.
He pulled Xingchen even closer. Kissed again, breathed in Xingchen's fragrance. He smelled as he always had, of new summer, fresh and light with a touch of cedar.
"I have missed you," Xingchen whispered on a warm breath.
. . .
Later, Xingchen said, "I have another question."
He pressed his forehead against Xingchen's shoulder. Again? It had been so long since he'd shared thoughts with anyone. It was both welcome and exhausting.
But Xingchen was waiting. He finally slid his hand to Xingchen's. =What?=
"How did I regain my body?"
Ah. That. That was a good question. =Your eyes. I have them.=
"And that was enough to bring back the rest of me?"
=Self-evident=
"Interesting."
=More interesting tomorrow= Truth was, he would answer all night and all day and another night if that was what Xingchen wanted. But Xingchen needed sleep.
The rough ground felt perfect with Xingchen against him. He used his body to block the breeze. They were still high on the mountain, and while the cold had no effect on him, Xingchen felt it.
He slid his finger against Xingchen's palm, wrote =this motion means sorry=. He made a fist inside Xingchen's cupped hand, twisted just so. ==Sorry==
"Mmm, do that again."
==sorry==
"'Sorry', yes, that works well. But it's a silly word to put into a motion. We'll change it later to something you will use often."
==sorry==
"Oh. Song Lan, why are you sorry?"
He opened his fist, wrote on Xingchen's palm, =You are cold. I forgot warm robe. Food.= He'd been so focused on the task at hand, he hadn't seen past it.
He'd been afraid to see past it. In case he failed. But he had not. And now he felt foolish.
"Song Lan, you warm my heart. The least I can do is warm the air. But in a moment. Right now, I am enjoying the sensations."
He kissed Xingchen's neck in response. Yes. He understood that. Like-minded.
Xingchen kissed his hand and finally drifted off, his breaths smooth and steady. His body warm. His presence made the world seem less cruel.
Song Lan didn't sleep, but he rested. He felt alive.