Smoke thicker than paint filled Wei Wuxian's lungs. Distorted flashes of light and rumbling like thunder surrounded him. People shouted incoherently. Somewhere, a child screamed…

"Wei Ying."

He woke with a start, spluttering and choking on nothing. Every inch of his body seared with white hot pain.

"Shh," Lan Zhan soothed as he ran his hand up and down Wei Wuxian's back. "You're all right."

Wei Wuxian wanted to be nonchalant and reply with a cheery 'of course I am', but he couldn't find the air to answer. So, he sat still and focused on counting blades of grass to take his mind off the heat that was melting him from the inside out.

"Where is A-Yuan?" Wei Wuxian asked when at last he could breathe a little better.

"Outside with the others," Lan Zhan said. "They're getting ready to go into the city."

The thought of entering the Wen's residence again made his stomach roil. Wei Wuxian groaned and leaned forward.

"We don't have to do this," Lan Zhan murmured. "We don't have to go where he's strongest. We could wait until he comes to us."

He wished that was true. He really did. But the huli jing had been murdering people to take the power he needed to build such an elaborate lair of Nightless City. If Wei Wuxian waited to face him, he would only grow stronger and he would only hurt more people.

"I can't just run from everything for the rest of my life."

"If you did, I would run with you," Lan Zhan whispered, "to the end of the world even, if I thought it would keep you safe."

Wei Wuxian leaned against him. "I know you would."

"Mn."

Lan Zhan said nothing more. He seemed neither to approve nor disapprove of Wei Wuxian's refusal to leave. He simply dropped the topic and offered him his hand when they left the tent.

Everyone moved gingerly, carrying the wounds of their past. Wei Wuxian watched as Lan Xichen reached up, gasped, and quickly put his arms back down by his sides. Jingyi noticed this too and wordlessly reached up to pull down the tent canvas for him. Lan Xichen gave his disciple an appreciative smile.

Jiang Cheng was looking very green, but he was obviously doing his best to show no sign of weakness. He bent, lifted, twisted, and knelt as if nothing was wrong. However, the sheen on his skin and the tightness around his mouth betrayed him.

When he would set his sight on something more difficult, like lifting a heavy pack, Jin Ling would swoop in to complete the task before Jiang Cheng could get to it. It seemed as if Jiang Cheng was unaware of what his nephew was doing since he didn't tell him off for it.

In general, the boys were having to do most of the heavy lifting to deconstruct their camp and to prepare for the short walk back to Nightless City.

And seeing that did not instill confidence.

Wei Wuxian was usually optimistic in gloomy circumstances, or at least secure in his own abilities. But whether the miasma had fouled his mood or their situation was truly beyond the point of reasonable optimism (maybe both), he wasn't sure they would emerge victorious at the end of the day.

He worried that if it came down to it, they might not be able to protect the boys as much as he'd hoped.

"I should tell the kids to go home again," Wei Wuxian muttered to Lan Zhan.

"That would only start another argument."

"Yes, but if I can win the argument, it would be worth it."

"Do you think that you can?"

Wei Wuxian scowled at him, but Lan Zhan wasn't looking. He was working to pack their bedding away.

"No," Wei Wuxian said sulkily. "I don't think Jin Ling would hear of it."

"Mn."

So he didn't bring it up. He watched Jin Ling and Jingyi clean up most of their camp and then offer to carry bags for the others under the guise that it would keep them free to fight if need be.

Wei Wuxian shooed them away when they offered to help him too. Lan Zhan, however, ignored him when he did the same to him. He plucked Wei Wuxian's things right out of his hands and slung it over his shoulder.

"You don't always have to do that," Wei Wuxian mumbled.

"Mn," was the only response he got.

Lan Xichen led the way back to Nightless City. Out of the four adults, he seemed to be the most well-adjusted to the miasma. But, if he was anything like his younger brother (and he was) then he was also likely to do what was expected of him with stoic resolve. He might have been in more pain than he was letting on.

"Is it worse today?" Wei Wuxian asked apprehensively as he stared at the gate of Nightless City, paint faded from the weather.

"What do you mean?" Lan Zhan responded.

"The fog. It's… worse… isn't it?"

A dense gray cloud covered the entirety of Nightless City. There were times, as the fog shifted and undulated, that Wei Wuxian had to squint just to make out the gate right in front of them. It reminded him very much of Yi City – from the oppressive mist to the goosebumps that ran up his arms.

It was an evil place.

"I'm not sure," Lan Zhan said, brow furrowed.

"I don't like it."

No one else seemed to either. They stood still, frozen by trepidation while gazing at the gate.

There were no birds to twitter in the canopy. No rabbits to scuffle in the underbrush. There was no noise. Not even a breeze.

And yet, a quiet murmur was in the air. A voice that whispered with teasing malice.

What are you waiting for? it said.

Wei Wuxian wasn't sure if the others could hear it. If they could, they didn't show it.

"Tch, we can't stand here all day," Jin Ling said at last, stomping up to the gate and acting as if he hadn't been immobilized like the rest of them just moments ago.

"Wait," Wei Wuxian called. Surprisingly, Jin Ling stopped when he told him to. "We need to be careful."

"Doing nothing and being careful are not the same thing," Jin Ling retorted.

"And you are doing neither."

Jin Ling glowered at him but didn't retaliate.

"We may not be able to see once we go in there," Wei Wuxian said. "It would be best to hold on to one another."

Jingyi and Jiang Cheng didn't seem to like that idea. They wrinkled their noses and stepped away from the others. Jin Ling appeared similarly disgusted.

"I'm not going to hold your hand," he said.

"Then don't," Wei Wuxian said. "There are plenty of other people here for you to choose instead. All that matters is that we don't give the huli jing a chance to slip between us."

"Oh come on!" Jin Ling cried. "It's just too-!"

He cut off as Sizhui walked over to Lan Zhan and took his hand. His eyes were trained on the ground and he trembled in place, but he held tight to him, without embarrassment.

Jin Ling's speech devolved into gibberish. He only shut up when Jiang Cheng took hold of him.

After that, the initial hesitation dissolved and before long, most of them had joined together. Wei Wuxian to Lan Zhan to Sizhui to Jingyi to Lan Xichen…

Jin Ling and Jiang Cheng stood together but apart from the group.

There was hesitation in the two of them before Jin Ling tried to pull them over to Lan Xichen's end. Jiang Cheng stood firm, though.

"No. Take his hand."

He'd spoken without looking at anyone or even gesturing to indicate who he was talking about. But it was impossible to mistake his meaning.

"What?" Jin Ling said, not daring to believe it. "Why?"

"Because I said so. Take his hand."

"I don't-"

"For once, can you do as I say?"

Jin Ling pursed his lips and looked between Wei Wuxian's flummoxed expression and Jiang Cheng's exhausted one.

"Tch."

Before Wei Wuxian knew it, Jin Ling's sweaty fingers had tentatively curled around his. He was too shocked to think of something funny to say to embarrass him.

When he closed his own fingers around Jin Ling's, he found himself thinking of Yanli again.

I would protect him with my life, he thought to himself. I really would.

"Ready?" Lan Xichen called down the line.

Everyone nodded that they were. And so, he led them to the gate. Lan Xichen stood motionless in front of it for a moment, leaving Wei Wuxian to wonder what it was that he was thinking about.

Then, he raised his free hand, pressed it to that peeling paint, and released a burst of golden energy. The doors blasted backward into Nightless City with a deafening bang.

Wei Wuxian jumped. He hadn't expected Lan Xichen to be so… aggressive.

Out of the corner of his eye, he was pretty sure he'd seen Jiang Cheng and Jin Ling balk too.

He waited for the huli jing to race out toward them, all teeth and claws. But nothing happened.

The mist inside the city roiled from the disturbance. The twelve ridges of the Sunscorched Palace were still visible for now, looming over them like the mountains that towered over Yi City.

"Drop any weight we don't need," Lan Xichen said. "Keep medicine, wards, and weapons. Leave everything else."

No one disagreed with him. They were all too tired to carry anything more than they had to.

So they did as he'd ordered and reformed their line before very slowly making their way into Nightless City.

Still, nothing happened.

The plan was simple enough. Xue Yang was likely to want to play with his prey before tearing them apart. They were to encourage this as much as possible.

He would surely use illusions to try to leverage permission to steal their qi. They needed to play along just enough to convince him the illusions were working without giving him the permission he needed. This would wear down Xue Yang's energy reserves. But if Xue Yang grew bored of illusions, they would have to contend with his physical strength, and Wei Wuxian really didn't like their odds for that.

Wei Wuxian didn't like their odds anyway. A suspicion that had been growing in his mind for a long time was now screaming in his ear.

If he was right, he wasn't sure how well this plan would work. It would all depend on how long the huli jing wanted to keep playing his games.

But so far, it seemed he wasn't planning to play at all.

The city remained silent. Wei Wuxian kept waiting. Their quiet footsteps on the stone beneath them echoed across the empty street.

The mist grew denser. And they all instinctively drew in closer to one another.

Once the ground was no longer visible, Lan Xichen's end of the line stopped walking. Who exactly had initiated the stop, Wei Wuxian didn't know. He could hardly see Lan Zhan or Jin Ling on either side of him.

Every part of this setup was very Xue Yang indeed.

"How are we going to find him in this?" Jingyi asked.

"We aren't," Wei Wuxian answered. "We have no choice but to allow him to find us first."

"He'd better do it quickly," Jiang Cheng said. "I don't want to be here all day."

His words were arrogant, but his voice was strained. He, like the rest of them, was now experiencing the full power of the miasma.

Waves of white hot pain kept Wei Wuxian from doing much more than remaining upright. He suppressed the scream building in his chest. Luckily the fog allowed him to bite his lip until it bled without anyone noticing.

Without warning, Jin Ling gasped and stepped backward, almost pulling free from Wei Wuxian's grip.

"What are you doing?!" Jiang Cheng snapped at him.

"Didn't you see that?" Jin Ling asked shakily.

"See what? I can barely see you!"

"Something moved in front of us!"

"I didn't see it," Jiang Cheng said.

Wei Wuxian hadn't seen anything either. But that didn't mean he didn't believe him.

"Ah!" Jingyi yelled. "I saw it too! It's only as tall as my knees!"

Wei Wuxian scanned the gray in front of him.

"There," Lan Zhan said, pulling both of their hands forward so he could point. "It was there."

"I was looking that way," Wei Wuxian said. "Why couldn't I see it?"

Lan Zhan had no answer for him.

Everyone else called out when they saw it, but each time, there was only one witness.

Not until everyone else had seen it first did it finally come to him.

Mere moments after Lan Xichen announced that it had brushed past him, the creature appeared before Wei Wuxian.

Unlike everyone else's encounter, which had been fleeting and poorly visible, Wei Wuxian's seemed to last forever. He was shown far more detail than he cared to see.

A silvery fox sat in front of him, lips pulled back to reveal a mouth full of needle sharp teeth. Its many tails were piled on either side of it – four on the left, five on the right.

It looked too much like a dog.

Wei Wuxian tried to back up, but Lan Zhan held him fast. He couldn't find the words to tell the others what he was seeing.

The huli jing rose and walked closer to him until it stood within kicking distance. But fear had snuffed out any rational thought that Wei Wuxian might have had. It didn't even occur to him to try to kick it.

"N-no," he squeaked. "Stay – stay away from – from me."

"It's all right, Wei Ying," Lan Zhan said. "What do you see?"

The huli jing sat back down and cocked its head to one side. It pulled its lips back even further. Wei Wuxian had never seen a dog show so many teeth at once.

So many teeth…

"How sweet to see you all holding hands!"

He also hadn't ever seen a dog speak – well, not in the human sense anyway.

The others jumped at the sound of Xue Yang's voice. Apparently they could hear him but not see him.

"Have they put you in the middle to protect you?" the huli jing sneered. "Even the children want to protect you? How very brave of them. And how very cowardly of you."

"Point him out to me," Jingyi said hotly. "I'll kick him hard enough to send him straight through the palace!"

The huli jing flicked its ears.

"Lovely sentiment," it said, "if you could see through my m-"

A sudden flash of violet erupted on the left, growing brighter and brighter. At the same time, two gleams of silvery white converged down on where the huli jing sat.

Wei Wuxian saw the huli jing's lips slacken by a fraction moments before all three lights rained down on where it sat, one after another.

Thwap! Clink! Clink!

Just as quickly as they'd come, Zidian, Bichen, and Shuoyue returned to their respective masters.

"Do you still see it, Wei Ying?" Lan Zhan asked.

"No," Wei Wuxian said, staring at the empty spot where the huli jing had been. "It's gone. I didn't even see it move."

Hollow laughter reverberated around them.

"You've sorted out what I am," the huli jing said. "You're sure of who I am. And yet, you refer to me as 'it'. I don't hear you call your corpse the same thing. Seems unfair, doesn't it? And where is your corpse anyhow? I had planned to deal with him first."

Ice slid into Wei Wuxian's stomach.

"Don't play innocent," Wei Wuxian called into the fog. "You've used some other enemy to keep him occupied. You know where he is."

"Uh oh! If you don't know where he is, and I don't know where he is, then I think we need to start asking questions about the people you surround yourself with. Did you put your trust in the wrong friend again? Maybe some advisors aren't as loyal as they seemed to be."

Jin Ling's fingers clenched around his.

"Normally, I would think you were laying a trap for me," the huli jing went on, his voice sounding farther away. "But, I saw how angry you were when they abandoned you."

"They didn't!" Jin Ling shouted.

Wei Wuxian was glad he'd said something. They needed to coax the huli jing to reveal its knowledge or lack thereof about the letter that Luo Qingyang had left behind.

If it knew the contents of the letter, it probably still suspected a trap, since Wei Wuxian certainly did. If it didn't, then any trap that Jin Ling's advisor might have set for it had a higher chance of success.

At least, he was really really hoping that she'd set a trap. It didn't seem like Luo Qingyang to abandon those in need, but what did Wei Wuxian know?

"How do you know they didn't abandon you?" the huli jing asked.

It was at that moment that Wei Wuxian realized his bid for information depended on Jin Ling being wise enough not to give anything away himself.

It was time to start praying.

"She wouldn't," Jin Ling said in a small voice. "She wouldn't do that. I know she wouldn't."

"Just like you knew Jin Guangyao would never betray you?"

As expected, Jin Ling clamped down hard around Wei Wuxian's fingers. Not expected, though, was just how strong he was.

Wei Wuxian bit his tongue and did his best not to dance around in place.

"Keep his name out of your mouth," Jin Ling hissed.

The silence that followed was exceptionally tense. Wei Wuxian kept waiting for the huli jing to start laughing – to start mocking him – but it didn't. Not at first.

It allowed the quiet to fester until…

"Don't you get tired of being betrayed, A-Ling?"

Slowly, as if in shock, Jin Ling sank down to the ground at the sound of Jin Guangyao's voice. Wei Wuxian was forced to step closer to him to keep from being pulled down too.

He'd expected the huli jing to mess with him, but not like this. Laughter would have been kinder.

Almost in unison, Jingyi and Jiang Cheng started to taunt the huli jing right back. It was hard to distinguish who was saying what since they were practically screaming over each other.

"Don't you get tired of hiding?!" Jingyi shouted.

"Show yourself, coward!" Jiang Cheng yelled.

"Some big man you are!"

"I'll rip you limb from limb!"

"-never seen a fair fight in your life!"

"COME OUT HERE AND FIGHT ME!"

Now the huli jing laughed at them.

"How are you going to fight like that?" it asked, still in the voice of Jin Guangyao. "You're all too scared to split up, too afraid to face me alone."

"Jingyi, don't," he heard Sizhui whisper.

"Allow me to make it fair."

The fog crept outward away from them. Lan Zhan and Jin Ling came into view beside him first. Then Jiang Cheng and Sizhui…

The fog pushed back and back until the edges of the outer plaza were nearly in view. Curled corners of rooftops poked out from the gray like claws.

There, a few meters in front of them, legs crossed and hands resting lightly on his thighs, a golden dagger held in each, sat Jin Guangyao.

As they watched, his features grew more pointed, the curve at the corners of his mouth became more exaggerated, and a sickly sweet smell washed over the plaza. In the blink of an eye, Jin Guangyao's visage of subtle cunning had shifted to Xue Yang's casual contempt.

Good. Swapping forms would use energy too.

Though it would have been better to remain in Jin Guangyao's form. Xue Yang and the fox were both considered natural forms for the creature. It would cost no energy to maintain them.

"Now," he said, smirking at their astonishment, "who's going to be the first brave volunteer to fight me? You may use any weapon you choose. Obviously, I will be using these."

He held up the daggers in his hands. Wei Wuxian could just make out small characters on the hilt and blade, but he couldn't see them well enough to read them as Xue Yang waved them around.

"I'd prefer to have your qi," the huli jing said, "but blood is acceptable. Yang energy is yang energy after all. I won't be too picky. Now, who's going first?"

Without pause, Jin Ling leapt to his feet and rushed toward the huli jing, very nearly slipping free of Wei Wuxian's grasp.

When he stumbled backward, still locked in place, he screamed in frustration and pulled as hard as he could, but neither Wei Wuxian nor Jiang Cheng budged.

"Let me go!" he yelled. "I'll kill him! Let me go!"

"Aw, the little one wants to fight me first? How embarrassing for the rest of you!"

"It's going to be embarrassing for you when I tear your head from your shoulders!" Jin Ling bellowed.

Wei Wuxian was a little taken aback by Jin Ling's bloodlust.

But when he considered it more, he really shouldn't have been surprised. Only a few months ago, Jin Ling had run him through when he'd discovered his identity.

This was just who he was – angry, hot-headed, and fierce as a bull.

"If not him, then who?" the huli jing asked, watching with a bored expression as Jin Ling continued to struggle against Wei Wuxian and Jiang Cheng. "You can't fight me like that. You'll have to – oh no, no, not like that either!"

With sharp rasping sounds, both Bichen and Shuoyue had unsheathed themselves again and shot forward.

Again, the huli jing didn't bother to deflect them. It merely vanished into thin air.

They all drew in close to one another, looking around nervously for the demon.

"That's cheating," Xue Yang's disembodied voice said. "I said one at a time."

"And what exactly is fair about you disappearing whenever things don't go the way you want them to?" Wei Wuxian asked. "You're the one who started all of this. You don't get to decide what's fair."

Another pause. Wei Wuxian waited for the huli jing to tell him to go fuck himself.

"How dull," it said.

The fog pulled in once more and the sweet smell in the air faded away. Slowly, the scent was replaced by something else, like that of metal… or perhaps blood.

BOOM!