Whumptober 2020 "Don't say goodbye", Abandoned, Isolation
Everyone talks about how snow shines in the moonlight. How you can travel through it without having to light a torch. The disciples of GusuLan whisper about hot drinks and snowball fights in your ear like it's a big secret. Wei Wuxian supposes it seems to be, seeing as how the rules outlaw almost every kind of fun.
No one talks about how snow is just as dark as the Burial Mounds on a cloudy, moonless, lightless night.
Wei Wuxian presses his hands tight against his ears. Leaning forward over his knees, his hair falls towards the snow. It's too quiet. The birds singing from the trees earlier have all gone to their nests. The crunching snow beneath his feet muffled itself before the sound reached his ears, and now he can't even force himself to hear his own heartbeat.
It doesn't snow in the Burial Mounds. It doesn't snow in the Burial Mounds. The words refuse to fall from his lips- why is it so hard to talk when there's no one to listen? Wei Wuxian shivers as the wind cuts through his robes.
He likes to pretend those three months in the Burial Mounds were just constant attacks and screaming, especially when Lan Zhan pries after a bad night. It helps him forget that the most horrifying moments of those three months were when the attacks paused and everything went so quiet he could feel his ears straining to hear something, anything.
He shouldn't have offered to collect herbs from the back mountain by himself.
A strangled sob escapes his throat- that won't do, makes everything worse, only sound he could make in those never-ending SILENCES. Lan Zhan took the juniors on a nighthunt, and Wei Wuxian isn't allowed on nighthunts yet because he hasn't cultivated his core enough and Grandmaster Lan still doesn't trust him even though he would never hurt the juniors.
You would never have hurt Shijie either. He shakes the thought away.
He couldn't have asked Lan Zhan to stay in Cloud Recesses with him either. The juniors adore their Hanguang-jun, and it would have broken their hearts if he had chosen to stay behind. But the Jingshi is too quiet without Lan Zhan, and he just wanted to be helpful. He doesn't like not having a task; he feels more like an unwanted guest than a true member of the Cloud Recesses.
Time doesn't exist in the Burial Mounds. Resentful energy blocks the sun, and it's impossible to see anything more than an arm's length away. The wind cuts through cloth easier than Wen Qing cut into his dantian. Without his core, he has no hope for staving away the cold. It's quiet now, but it's only a matter of time before the dead begin screaming again. Do you want revenge Wei Wuxian? Let us in, let us help, how dare you refuse us!
They're horrific. He hates them, but he loves them. Anything to break the never-ending silence-
"-going to catch your death of cold. How foolish are you, Wei Wuxian?"
Breath rushes out of Wei Wuxian. He shivers and pulls against the hands holding his wrists in a vain attempt to wrap his arms around himself. GusuLan robes glow in the night, he notes, staring at the pale blue robes with delicate embroidery. He swallows and croaks, "Grandmaster Lan?"
Lan Qiren harrumphes. "Good to see some sense is rattling around inside that head of yours." He pulls Wei Wuxian to his feet, sighing loudly when he stumbles. "Where are the herbs?"
"In," Wei Wuxian licks his lips. The wind continues to chap them. "In my qiankun pouch." Looking around, he finds the midnight blue pouch sitting half buried in the snow beside him. He almost topples over picking it up.
Lan Qiren nods sharply. His brows settle in the familiar glare that Wei Wuxian expects from him. Yet, as he pulls his arms against his chest and leans against Lan Qiren who doesn't do anything to stop him, it doesn't seem so angry now.
"Grandmaster Lan?"
"What is it?"
"Can you…keep talking? Please? It…it helps."
A beat of silence, and Wei Wuxian wonders if he'll have to chatter the old man's ear off in order to break the dreadful quiet. He'd rather not. After a day of barely speaking, it takes time to remember how to talk. He noticed that when Wen Qing would drag him from his cave to eat with everyone.
"Do you know how many rules you broke with this stunt, Wei Wuxian?"
Wei Wuxian smiles a bit. No, he thinks, but I bet you're about to tell me.