When Lan Wangji emerged from his seclusion, scars tight and still painful on his back, he felt as though he had forgotten every carefully-gathered scrap of knowledge about how to be a part of the world. He was encased in a sheet of ice, brittle with grief and too aware that his life was a gift handed to him by his uncle, who loved him too much to punish him as harshly as he deserved. It was a gift he was only barely certain he wanted. He had meditated for days on end, time enough that the yawning wound of his grief had just begun to scab over with the understanding that Wei Ying was gone. The loss was permanent, and nothing would ever again be as it was.
A-Yuan had grown in his absence, and his fever had washed away his memory of the Burial Mounds and the Wen remnants. Lan Qiren handed the child to Lan Wangji with tempered irritation, as though to say Here, you wanted him, and Lan Wangji was frozen. He was in Yiling again, A-Yuan's tears soaking through his robes and all the passersby laughing about Lan Wangji's stiffness, his unsuitability to caring for a child.
The two of them had to learn one another. By then, A-Yuan recognized Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren more readily, and would cry and ask for them. Lan Wangji, who wanted to give him everything he asked for, complied, until the first time that A-Yuan drifted to sleep in his arms instead. Lan Wangji stared down at him in shock. There was a stirring in him, new life green and tender through the coating of frost. A-Yuan was warm, heavier than Lan Wangji could have imagined for a child so small and sweet. Lan Wangji held him until he awoke, the skin and bones of his chest feeling so thin that a breeze could have carried his heart away if it so wished.
Here, now, with Magnus a steady warmth on his side, he is immensely grateful for every slow change that time has visited upon him. He knows now how to be gentle, how to watch a young person grow with pride and love, how to accept the gift of trust that comes with another person relaxing into his hold and believing without fear that Lan Wangji will allow no harm to come to them.
He smiles, quick, just a hint of it like sunlight catching on a white jade token at the perfect angle. Magnus may leave. They may be parted, and Lan Wangji may know a new kind of grief. Still: he is glad for this day, this tree, and this boy.
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A-Yuan had grown in his absence, and his fever had washed away his memory of the Burial Mounds and the Wen remnants. Lan Qiren handed the child to Lan Wangji with tempered irritation, as though to say Here, you wanted him, and Lan Wangji was frozen. He was in Yiling again, A-Yuan's tears soaking through his robes and all the passersby laughing about Lan Wangji's stiffness, his unsuitability to caring for a child.
The two of them had to learn one another. By then, A-Yuan recognized Lan Xichen and Lan Qiren more readily, and would cry and ask for them. Lan Wangji, who wanted to give him everything he asked for, complied, until the first time that A-Yuan drifted to sleep in his arms instead. Lan Wangji stared down at him in shock. There was a stirring in him, new life green and tender through the coating of frost. A-Yuan was warm, heavier than Lan Wangji could have imagined for a child so small and sweet. Lan Wangji held him until he awoke, the skin and bones of his chest feeling so thin that a breeze could have carried his heart away if it so wished.
Here, now, with Magnus a steady warmth on his side, he is immensely grateful for every slow change that time has visited upon him. He knows now how to be gentle, how to watch a young person grow with pride and love, how to accept the gift of trust that comes with another person relaxing into his hold and believing without fear that Lan Wangji will allow no harm to come to them.
He smiles, quick, just a hint of it like sunlight catching on a white jade token at the perfect angle. Magnus may leave. They may be parted, and Lan Wangji may know a new kind of grief. Still: he is glad for this day, this tree, and this boy.