the thread may stretch or tangle but it will never break
by Rose Thorne
Disclaimer: I don't own anything associated with The Untamed, and make no money writing fanfiction.
Chapter Eight
Sex is awkward and messy and quite enjoyable. Lan Wangji can't find it in himself to mind the inelegance of their joining, as their missteps leave Wei Ying breathlessly laughing, their bodies tangled in ways that are sometimes accidentally erotic.
He's quite certain, with practice, they will become more proficient in time. He rather looks forward to the process.
Wei Ying falls into a sort of half-asleep daze, worn out, but he stirs the moment Lan Wangji touches him with the wet rag to wipe at the mess they made, murmuring about the chill and squirming a bit. With a bit of qi, he warms the water in the basin and resumes his ministrations, adhering to Wen Qing's suggestions on sexual hygiene.
His zhiji is vocally displeased with the need to vacate the sleep mat, which also has a bit of a mess on it, but he cooperates enough. Both of them, he knows, will need to bathe properly in the morning.
When Lan Wangji finishes, he folds the old, ratty blanket and spreads it over the freshly-cleaned and slightly damp mat, then pulls two soft white inner robes from his qiankun pouch. He knows better than to try to wrestle Wei Ying into zhong yi—their activities have worn him out—but he bundles him into the garment, tying the ribbons before donning his own. He leaves his forehead ribbon wrapped around Wei Ying's wrist, where he had tied it when he released his hair from the braid.
He makes Wei Ying drink water and has some himself before he pulls him back to the nest they have made of his travel mat and blankets.
"Aiya, Lan Zhan," Wei Ying murmurs as he lays him on the pallet again and pulls him close. "So good. How is it we didn't do that years ago."
Lan Wangji can feel the tips of his ears heat, though not as they might have those years ago. And not now with mortification, but with arousal. Fortunately, his body is not quite ready for more activity, though he isn't sure Wei Ying will be awake for it much longer anyway. He tucks the blanket around them snugly.
"Clearly a mistake," he murmurs instead, and gets a breathy giggle against his collarbone in response.
"Mm, clearly. We could have been doing that every day."
"Every day," he agrees, combing his fingers through Wei Ying's loose hair. "Mark your words, Wei Ying."
"Every day. But try not to wear your poor husband out too much," is the softly slurred response.
He expects Wei Ying to fall asleep almost immediately, but suddenly he's giggling again.
"Wei Ying?"
"Ah, just thinking of A-Yuan's question."
Lan Wangji can't help his huff of amusement. The child, far too young to understand the matter, had innocently asked them during the little banquet the remnants held for them if they would be giving him brothers and sisters.
As it turned out, A-Yuan was of the belief that all married couples had babies, and since Lan Wangji and Wei Ying were now married, it logically followed that they would as well.
They left Wen Qing to field that particular question. From the look on her face, she did not appreciate it.
"Ah, we can make a good faith effort," Wei Ying chortles. "Every day."
Lan Wangji is again reminded of Wei Ying's claim of birthing A-Yuan. He had not, then, expected to find himself here, now. But seeing Wei Ying walk toward him in the market had been like watching the sun emerge from behind a cloud.
Wei Ying's breath evens as he falls asleep, but despite hai shi having passed, Lan Wangji allows himself time to enjoy the feel of his body against his own, separated now by thin fabric.
He had mapped each of Wei Ying's scars when they had disrobed, touching each and remembering the words he had spoken in the cave, of scars being proof one once protected someone.
The surgical incision down his abdomen, the Wen brand… those Lan Wangji knew about. Faint lash marks on his back, not completely healed when he had gifted his golden core, he learned were an attempt to protect Lotus Pier, freely taken from zidian to try to appease the Wens. The scar on his waist, a stab wound from his staged fight with Jiang Cheng when he seceded from the clan, another attempt to protect YunMeng Jiang.
Not all of them are from protecting others. A scar on his arm from falling from a tree before he formed his golden core. The scars from the dogs on his legs. Even one that he just doesn't remember, one he's had so long he must have gotten it before the death of his parents.
The touching of his scars had morphed to mapping the contours of his body at some point, just to hear the involuntary sounds that spilled from his lips, sounds Lan Wangji enjoyed wringing from him. He had reveled in watching Wei Ying fall apart beneath him, his body spasming, his eyes blown out, his face contorted in bliss.
He wanted to hear those noises, see his face, feel his body like that every day.
Now, Wei Ying asleep in his arms, flush against him, Lan Wangji never wants to let him go. This possessiveness is dangerous, is the sin of his father. But where his father had taken his mother to Cloud Recesses and hidden her away, he would follow Wei Ying wherever he wished to go, would never cage him.
He leans his head against Wei Ying's and breathes his scent in, musky sweat and spice and sex, then lets his breathing match his zhiji's until he, too, fades into sleep.
Lan Wangji wakes, shockingly, after mao shi. Perhaps it should not shock him, given the strenuous activity of the previous night and his time thinking after hai shi, but it is the first time he can recall waking late in quite some time.
He is not in Cloud Recesses, he tells himself, but Burial Mounds, and the sun has not yet started to spill into the cave.
Wei Ying is sprawled half-atop him, his thigh brushing Lan Wangji's groin in a way that is arousing, and he works to gently extricate himself. His move to rise is aborted when Wei Ying groans softly at the movement, the sound carrying a note of pain.
"Wei Ying?"
"Mmm, I'm okay. Little sore."
Wen Qing warned them of that—not simply that the novelty of penetration might hurt, but that they would use muscles in different ways. Although Lan Wangji had concerns about causing Wei Ying pain, he had insisted, so he had been particularly careful with the preparation.
Wei Ying had not complained at the time, but he often kept his own pain silent, and they had been in the midst of rather pleasurable activities that could have inspired him to ignore it.
"Where?" Lan Wangji asks, his voice insistent, as he leans over him.
"Lower back. Muscles." Then Wei Ying flashes a grin. "I'm definitely feeling last night, but that's pleasant."
Lan Wangji tries and fails not to remember Wei Ying's comment about his size the previous night; he had never had occasion to do something as crass as compare to others in that manner, and he hadn't particularly thought his zhiji was deficient in that area himself.
Instead he uses his qi to warm his hands, shifting around to urge Wei Ying to lie on his stomach, and places them at the dip above his buttocks. The pleased moan the warmth draws from Wei Ying sounds filthy and beautiful, and Lan Wangji silently recites the Lan principles in an effort not to respond with action.
Wei Ying murmurs sleepily and ultimately falls back to sleep. He covers him with the blanket, settling in the lotus position beside his sleeping husband.
His husband. He will never tire of that fact.
Lan Wangji should meditate, but instead he watches Wei Ying sleep, maps the contours of his face with his gaze. Wei Ying is objectively beautiful. In sleep his expression is slack, lacking the smile that had enamored him at the gate of Cloud Recesses, even before their duel.
He may not have spared him a glance back then, if not for the accurate diagnosis he had whispered to his brother, that the afflicted Lan disciple was not dead, but under a spell, a diagnosis he gave with barely a glance.
Genius barely begins to describe Wei Ying, for so often those who have genius fail to possess the creativity to do anything with it. Wei Ying possesses that, and has experienced the sorts of tragedies that required use of both.
What he does not have, Lan Wangji has come to understand, is a sense of self-preservation, something he must have enough of for both of them if he is to keep his husband safe.
He manages to meditate for about a quarter shichen before Wen Qing loudly announces that breakfast is ready from the mouth of the cave, clearly deciding discretion is the better part of valor in case they are naked or otherwise occupied.
Lan Wangji wakes Wei Ying gently, with soft kisses, and they prepare for the day, dressing and braiding each other's hair. He braids his forehead ribbon into Wei Ying's, and thinks perhaps that is where it now belongs.
This could have been longer, but it would have broken the mood of the chapter. Kind of a soft interlude.
