( He reaches forward, fingers sliding against the landscape of Lan Zhan's cheek, the incidental brush of hair back and away part of the motion, where his touch traces, lingers, tugs, not painfully, but pointedly, on Lan Zhan's ear.
A tweak of reproach, in what used to be a very painful twisting. Here, only a mockery, because if it moves more, he needs to be ready to fend off his insatiable husband's dalliance with death, both of theirs, in a twisted double murder-suicide, at speed. So reasonable, Lan Zhan is, implacable after his present preoccupation. A small smile, a steady, silk-covered steel reply. )
You don't have my permission to die. So it stands to reason, Lan Zhan, that we both must live.
( In another mindset or time, this might seem more a threat to harken back to bitter words and dripped venom in another forest, run darker; another forest, filled with owls and decay slowed down to delicacy. They are not in that forest now, but death stalks here too, and he knows its taste, can feel its weight on the back of his tongue, coating his bruised throat with a cloying rot.
Another shift, fast and fleeting, to slide atop his husband, slam both hands down, holding wrists overhead. )
Find another wish. This is no rooftop, this is no trial by injustice. I won't ask you to be my death again.
( To have been glad it would be Lan Zhan, that not some squirming, putrid mass of self-satisfied hedonism would be his end, but instead a man he respected, had seen and understood and yet not fully understood at all, just as he had not been, just as their ways to reach out were blocked by their own choices, their own plodding steps down different paths.
Wells and rivers failing to mix, both quenching the thirsts of different lands. He'd lap him up, if it were a way through to a better understanding. Maybe it's what he's been doing, the last year, as they've nipped and torn at each other, as they've learned and unlearned, as they've fought and not forgiven, or forgiven and not forgot, or forgot, because it was easier than the fight.
Caring, whatever the form, is the hardest damn thing in the worlds. )
Play nice, Lan Zhan. Leave the staining to me.
( A second, a breath, and that talisman will be on him, with the drop of Wei Wuxian down that fractional distance, to press chest to chest. Body Stilling, Frozen, Stopped. A moment is all he needs to plant a suggest, and leave, swallowed by the shadows.
no subject
A tweak of reproach, in what used to be a very painful twisting. Here, only a mockery, because if it moves more, he needs to be ready to fend off his insatiable husband's dalliance with death, both of theirs, in a twisted double murder-suicide, at speed. So reasonable, Lan Zhan is, implacable after his present preoccupation. A small smile, a steady, silk-covered steel reply. )
You don't have my permission to die. So it stands to reason, Lan Zhan, that we both must live.
( In another mindset or time, this might seem more a threat to harken back to bitter words and dripped venom in another forest, run darker; another forest, filled with owls and decay slowed down to delicacy. They are not in that forest now, but death stalks here too, and he knows its taste, can feel its weight on the back of his tongue, coating his bruised throat with a cloying rot.
Another shift, fast and fleeting, to slide atop his husband, slam both hands down, holding wrists overhead. )
Find another wish. This is no rooftop, this is no trial by injustice. I won't ask you to be my death again.
( To have been glad it would be Lan Zhan, that not some squirming, putrid mass of self-satisfied hedonism would be his end, but instead a man he respected, had seen and understood and yet not fully understood at all, just as he had not been, just as their ways to reach out were blocked by their own choices, their own plodding steps down different paths.
Wells and rivers failing to mix, both quenching the thirsts of different lands. He'd lap him up, if it were a way through to a better understanding. Maybe it's what he's been doing, the last year, as they've nipped and torn at each other, as they've learned and unlearned, as they've fought and not forgiven, or forgiven and not forgot, or forgot, because it was easier than the fight.
Caring, whatever the form, is the hardest damn thing in the worlds. )
Play nice, Lan Zhan. Leave the staining to me.
( A second, a breath, and that talisman will be on him, with the drop of Wei Wuxian down that fractional distance, to press chest to chest. Body Stilling, Frozen, Stopped. A moment is all he needs to plant a suggest, and leave, swallowed by the shadows.
A moment, if it's his. )