( The bride, her screams, her ailing. A lifetime of exorcism has taught Lan Wangji to sooner question the pace of the universe, before its dance steps.
He is — not besieged by the bride turned animal, by her screeching. Another claimed her affections, and though Lan Wangji has held numerous enemies at sword's end, they have often lent him the ethical courtesy of seizing first. Now, he watches a red-shrouded woman encircle her... intended in a manner comedic, more hops and twirls and the early death of a table than honest chase. He thinks, a better man might help.
He thinks too, a better man might lend aid to the bride.
But then they are together, orbiting one another, the groom and Lan Wangji on one side of a tapestry-clad courtesy screen, while the bride hisses and claws at another — and he wonders why, for all the wit of her, who has fooled an entire marital procession — for all that, the fox does not know to simply... look to the side, and instead attempts to peer her snout through painted silks.
When, seeing them side-by-side and near-huddled, she starts to conspire that they are — promiscuously aligned — and Lan Wangji, cold sweat glistened on his nape, turns tentatively to behold his... beau. )
We are. ( This, then, is what the circumstance demands of him, to lend this man's survival, on this hour. A lie, a cruel lie, unkindly. He affixes the beam of his gaze on the man's face and travels it down his chest, to his wrist unbound by Lan paraphernalia. ) Not... at liberty?
no subject
He is — not besieged by the bride turned animal, by her screeching. Another claimed her affections, and though Lan Wangji has held numerous enemies at sword's end, they have often lent him the ethical courtesy of seizing first. Now, he watches a red-shrouded woman encircle her... intended in a manner comedic, more hops and twirls and the early death of a table than honest chase. He thinks, a better man might help.
He thinks too, a better man might lend aid to the bride.
But then they are together, orbiting one another, the groom and Lan Wangji on one side of a tapestry-clad courtesy screen, while the bride hisses and claws at another — and he wonders why, for all the wit of her, who has fooled an entire marital procession — for all that, the fox does not know to simply... look to the side, and instead attempts to peer her snout through painted silks.
When, seeing them side-by-side and near-huddled, she starts to conspire that they are — promiscuously aligned — and Lan Wangji, cold sweat glistened on his nape, turns tentatively to behold his... beau. )
We are. ( This, then, is what the circumstance demands of him, to lend this man's survival, on this hour. A lie, a cruel lie, unkindly. He affixes the beam of his gaze on the man's face and travels it down his chest, to his wrist unbound by Lan paraphernalia. ) Not... at liberty?
( ...his is not a mouth carved for untruths. )