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I.
Loss is a feeling He Xuan is as familiar with as he is with breathing. Maybe more than that, even. He hasn't needed to take a breath in centuries, though he is accustomed to doing so anyway for the sake of making others think he is something he's not, but loss-
Loss has followed him wherever he went for so long. It permeates his existence, every step he takes, every word that leaves his bloodless lips. The four urns he keeps beneath the Nether Water Manor are like an ever-present throb in the back of his mind, a knife digging over and over into a wound that was first inflicted hundreds of years ago, a wound that He Xuan now knows will never heal.
He thought-
All this time, he thought - expected something to change the instant he wrenched Shi Wudu's head off his shoulders. Believed his blood soaking through He Xuan's robes would wash him clean of the grief, the anger. That he would break through the icy waters he's been drowning in for longer than he can remember, even as he made them his home. Something. Anything. He dreamed about it, fantasized about it. He pictured it so many times, the things he would do once he finally got his hands on Shi Wudu and his little brother, his-
Faint smudges of Shi Qingxuan's blood stain the wall at the far end of the room, the barest hints of red dulling the gleam of the iron shackles that hang down.
The wave of sickness is so sudden and so overwhelming that it forces He Xuan to his knees, brackish black water mixed with blood drenching his robes. He shouldn't be able to feel nauseous at all. He has no living body, no warm blood being pumped through his veins by a beating heart. Even when he eats, when he can't stop eating, there's nothing there to digest any of it- he's hungry, he's always so hungry, but it's pointless.
He's so hungry.
The air smells like iron and rot. He Xuan's nails dig into the rocky, uneven ground, submerged in water. He feels his skin tearing, knows the flesh beneath is gray and bloodless.
Loss cuts through him like the blade of the sharpest sword. He can't tear his eyes away from the red smudges on the wall. His ears are ringing.
"I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I'M SORRY I'M SORRY! WE'RE THE ONES WHO SINNED! WE'RE THE ONES WHO WRONGED YOU! IT'S ALL MY FAULT! MY BROTHER'S GONE MAD, CAN'T YOU SEE?"
Shi Qingxuan's face, contorted beyond recognition with unbridled terror, is burned into his mind, the image bleeding into the memory of him laughing, high-pitched and crystal clear like a bell.
Him grabbing onto He Xuan's arm, giggling, wine drunk.
Him dancing in the middle of a field, wind in his hair, reaching a hand out and asking He Xuan to join him.
Him sitting next to He Xuan in front of a fire, pressed tightly against his side, resting his head on his shoulder, dark lashes fluttering against his cheeks as he struggled to stay awake.
Him unguarded and open, without his elaborate robes and hair ornaments, placing unconditional trust in He Xuan, asleep next to him without the faintest inkling that He Xuan would spend all night with his eyes locked onto his throat, picturing his hands around it.
All of it, drenched in blood, dissolving in the water that laps at He Xuan's knees.
What has he done?
*
Time is a relative concept when you're a ghost. Most lose count of the years they've seen after a couple of decades.
He Xuan was two hundred and seventy-four years old on the day that he killed Shi Wudu. He had been dead for two hundred and fifty-one of those years.
By the time he drags himself out of the Nether Water Manor and into Hua Cheng's Gambling Den in the Ghost City, he has lost track of how old he is.
He's in his true form, an occurrence so rare it takes most of the low level ghosts in the room several long moments to figure out who he is, although the aura of power a devastation class ghost radiates is one that should be familiar and unmistakeable to all of them. When the realization comes to them, they scurry out of his way, giving him a wide berth as he stumbles more than walks over to the gambling table in the center of the room.
He can tell that the other ghosts are scared of him. That suits him just fine, as long as they're not so terrified that there'll be no one left to bet against. He doesn't care whether he wins or loses, whether his debt to Hua Cheng shrinks or grows - the number is insurmountable, it barely makes a difference. But he hasn't left the Nether Water Manor in so long, he-
He-
He Xuan's ashes are fashioned into a precious stone, as most powerful ghosts tend to have it done. The stone, black as ink, is inside an iron case buried deep in the ocean floor, warded with so many spells and arrays it would take even a god too long to break through to get to the case before He Xuan would notice.
Two days ago, He Xuan dug the case out of the ground. Opened it. Closed his fist around the stone.
He doesn't know what prevented him from crushing it into dust in the end. Maybe some remnant of the animal instincts he thought he'd left behind in the Kiln along with everything else that made him human.
He does know that if he can't force himself to focus on something, anything else right now, the instinct won't save him a second time.
The ghosts are terrified, but they stay and gamble with him, their hands or claws quivering as they shake the dice. At some point, several plates of food are placed in front of him, along with some kind of alcohol He Xuan is fairly sure would send a mortal straight to Ghost City to join the ranks of Hua Cheng's underlings.
He turns his head minutely to stare at the red curtain at the other side of the room. The vague shape of the man behind it is unmoving.
The food turns to ash in his mouth.
He Xuan doesn't know how much time he spends in the Gambling Den, how much money he loses, how much he eats, how much he drinks. The hordes of weak ghosts start to lose focus after a while, colors all bleeding into each other. He can tell that people are talking, but the sounds lose their shape, merging into an indistinct roar that makes He Xuan's ears ache. The metallic stench of blood and guts is sharp in his nose. Where is it coming from? He isn't sure. He doesn't care.
Even in his haze he notices the way the sudden rustling of the red curtain cuts through the room like a knife. The ghost opposite He Xuan freezes. Half his face is melting off, or maybe that's the wine distorting He Xuan's vision.
There's a sharp clap. "Alright, that's enough. All of you, get out. Not you, Hei Shui."
I wasn't going to, He Xuan wants to say. His tongue feels like lead in his mouth.
The ghosts obey their lord's command with frightened haste. He Xuan blinks and the next moment, the room is empty, no trace of the hordes of undead that filled it to the brim until a heartbeat ago. The ghost with the melting face pushed his cup over in his hurry. Wine is spilling onto the table and dripping onto the floor.
Hua Cheng steps out from behind his curtain, pulls up a chair and sits down next to He Xuan. It's frustrating how elegant he looks even as he slouches in his chair like a teenager, looking at He Xuan with an eyebrow raised like he's eyeing a peculiar insect.
"What in the goddamn hell do you think you're doing, Hei Shui?"
His voice pierces through the - not pleasant, but numbing fog the alcohol has left over He Xuan's mind. It's aggravating his headache, but even in his drunken stupor He Xuan has too much sense to tell Hua Cheng to fuck off right in the heart of his own territory. He doesn't think he can bring himself to say anything else, though, so he stays silent.
Hua Cheng doesn't seem offended. "You know, this is a new low for you, and I was there to see you crawling out of Mount Tong'lu on your hands and knees, covered in blood, guts and grime from head to toe," he says conversationally. It's infuriating.
He Xuan somehow finds the strength to turn his head and stare at Hua Cheng. He, too, is in his true form, from what He Xuan can tell. Painted in crimson, dripping silver. It somehow makes him more despicable.
"Anything else?" He can hear the slur in his own speech.
Hua Cheng grins. "I'm concerned for your wellbeing, Hei Shui. First you disappear off the face of earth for years, then you suddenly barge into my home, drip salt water all over my floor and scare my subjects shitless while decimating my wine supply."
"Bullshit. As if you've ever been concerned about anything except your taizi dianxia."
Hua Cheng's grin softens for an instant. Disgusting. "You got me there."
He Xuan drops his head forward onto the table. "What do you want," he mumbles.
Hua Cheng lets out a deep, overdramatic sigh, then, to He Xuan's shock, reaches out and pats He Xuan's back. "This is about the Lord Wind Master, isn't it."
The title alone feels like a slap in the face. He Xuan grits his teeth. "You don't know shit about me."
"That's a lie and you know it."
He does, a fact that he despises.
"You know," Hua Cheng continues, "I have to say, I was surprised when you actually went through with your little vengeance plot. I know you were obsessed with tearing the Shi brothers limb from limb ever since you died, but..." He shrugs. "You seemed kind of attached to the Wind Master."
"Shut up."
"No, I don't think I will. You came here for something, Hei Shui, and it wasn't the wine. You can drink wine in the Nether Water Manor." Hua Cheng cocks his head in a way that makes He Xuan want to rip it off like he did with Shi Wudu. Not that it would last. "I think you wanted my advice - which, by the way, I'm going to hold over your head for the next eight hundred years."
I didn't, He Xuan wants to say, but to his immense horror, he realizes he isn't sure if it's true.
"Normally I wouldn't bother, but I've been in a good mood lately."
He Xuan's eyes can't help but fall on the thin red string knotted around Hua Cheng's finger. He recalls the moment of softness on his face. It makes him nauseous, annoyance brewing with something sickeningly like envy in the pit of his stomach.
"Go on, then," he bites out. "Bestow upon me your generosity, oh Crimson Rain Sought Flower."
Hua Cheng cackles and leans a bit closer. "I think that your plan backfired. You thought you were just going to infiltrate Heaven, spy on the gods a little and make the Shi brothers trust you just enough for you to get them alone so you could skewer them in peace, didn't you? But Shi Qingxuan decided, for some reason I frankly can't comprehend, to befriend you. And instead of taking the first opportunity you got to rip his throat out, you let the little nuisance. For nearly a hundred years."
Hua Cheng spreads his arms. "And then, when you got your chance at revenge, you were so caught up in the euphoria of finally getting to stain your hands with Shi Wudu's blood that you didn't realize you actually cared about his darling little brother it was too late and you'd traumatized him and made him hate you forever." A dramatic pause. "Am I correct in my assessment?"
Would it be possible to make himself black out if he slammed his head into this table hard enough, He Xuan wonders. He remains silent.
"Of course I am," Hua Cheng answers his own question. "I am over five hundred years older than you, after all. Life experience is something you just can't compensate for."
"Xue Yu..." He Xuan sounds agonized even to his own ears. There's only so much of Hua Cheng's taunting he can put up with, even on a good day, and he's rapidly approaching that limit.
"Oh, are you going to beg me to shut up? That could be fun." The smirk is obvious in his voice.
"No, but I am going to punch your teeth in if you don't get to the fucking point."
To his surprise, Hua Cheng does sober up at that. "As you wish."
Something blazes in his single dark eye as he leans in closer. "You, Hei Shui, got attached to someone you hated, ruined his life, and now you've realized that it's the worst mistake you've ever made."
The silence in the Gambling Den is suddenly deafening. The only noise that permeates it is the soft drip, drop, drip, drop, of the spilled wine onto the wooden floor.
He Xuan closes his eyes. All the anger has been sapped out of him in the blink of an eye. He doesn't even feel like punching Hua Cheng anymore.
What for, he's just telling you what you don't want to hear.
He's so tired.
The ghost of Shi Qingxuan's laughter won't leave his ears. And in this instant, with his forehead resting on his arms on top of Hua Cheng's gambling table, the drip-drop of the wine in the background, his head spinning and an ache in his chest that's familiar and entirely new at the same time-
He realizes that there's nothing, not a single thing in the world that he wants more than to hear it again.
II.
After he falls, Shi Qingxuan stays in the Royal Capital for nearly a decade. His wounds take that long to heal, although neither his arm nor his leg ever return to to how they were before. He finds himself missing it less than he thought. After a few tries, he manages to fashion himself a cane out of a tree branch, and equipped with it, he can walk, though slowly. Faced with necessity, he builds muscle, more than he ever had in his first life as a mortal or his time as a pampered elemental god who barely ever saw a day of hardship.
At first, he misses the luxury he used to take for granted, beautiful robes in white and blue and green, made of the finest flowing silks, precious jewelry, music, food and wine of the highest quality. Things he hasn't had to live without since his brother ascended to the heavens when Shi Qingxuan was sixteen.
But Shi Qingxuan learns something about himself. He's adaptive.
True, he isn't used to going hungry, sleeping on the hard ground and suffering the effects of the heat and the cold. But he doesn't cry anymore past the first week. He makes friends with the other beggars, convinces them to teach him how to talk the wealthy into tossing him a few coins or a steamed bun. They call him Lao Feng, show him the safest, driest spots to spend the night, which households have soft-hearted kitchen hands that will smuggle them leftovers sometimes. Shi Qingxuan listens and learns. He adjusts.
He's well liked here as he's been everywhere his whole life. It stings knowing that that, too, might not be rightfully his, but that feeling is one he grows used to like he grows used to everything about what he's accepted as his new life.
That there are things in the world that he simply cannot change no matter how much he wishes he could was a lesson he learned the hard way. His brother never did, and his refusal to accept fate earned him an ugly, painful death.
Shi Qingxuan thinks of his brother every day. He can't deny that he misses him, and he doesn't know if the truth that he did what he did makes that easier or harder to bear.
He tries not to think of the sight of his head torn from his body on the ground too often, but it visits him in his dreams nearly every night for the first few years. The others get used to Lao Feng waking up in the middle of the night shivering and not going back to sleep until the sun is already on the verge of rising. He'll sit and stare up at the starry sky and feel pitch black waves crashing against the edges of his mind.
But the waves recede. Time passes, and the dreams become a rarity. There comes a day when he stops avoiding canals and wells for fear of what might await beneath the surface. And Shi Qingxuan finds himself drawn away from the city, and towards the coast.
It's both easy and difficult to say goodbye to the friends he's made here. They ask him to stay, he declines. They ask him why, and all he can do is smile at them and tell them he can't.
The city took him in, taught him first to crawl and then to walk again, saved his life in more ways than one, but he can't stay. With every passing day he feels more like something inside him is drawing taut, and it will snap if he doesn't go.
Xie Lian has been visiting him regularly, often offering his help, which Shi Qingxuan has always refused. This time, he tries to persuade Shi Qingxuan to let him take him to the coast with a Distance-Shortening Array and spare him the long journey on foot, but Shi Qingxuan just smiles and shakes his head.
"Thank you, Your Highness, but I'd rather walk."
Xie Lian eyes his bad leg and the cane he leans on. "Are you sure? Your injuries..."
"Are long healed," Shi Qingxuan reminds him gently. "I'll be fine, I promise."
Xie Lian sighs, but doesn't argue further. "Be safe, my friend. I'll be keeping an eye on you in case you ever do need my help."
And with that Shi Qingxuan is on his way.
He's slow, and it takes him months to reach his destination, but he doesn't mind the journey; cherishes it, in fact. He stops in smaller and larger towns frequently along the way and charms the people everywhere; he rarely has to go hungry, although he has no money. This, too, is a privilege, one of many along with his pretty face, young age and the education he received that most in his position are not granted. He shares what little he has with less fortunate souls he encounters everywhere he goes. Just how much poverty and misery there is in the world is something else that he'd never been conscious of before he himself came face to face with it. It makes him wish he'd done more to combat it when he still had the means to. But those are things Shi Qingxuan avoids dwelling on these days. What's in the past is in the past.
He finally reaches the coast in late summer, when the trees are just beginning to change colors and the air is still pleasantly warm. The salty smell of the sea reaches Shi Qingxuan's nose long before he sees it, and he finds himself smiling. It's been so long. He's missed this.
The dirt road beneath his feet becomes sandy, and the cries of seagulls fill the air. Shi Qingxuan slowly climbs a hill covered with tall, pale green grass, and there it is: the ocean, stretching further than the eye can see, calm at this time of the year, gentle dark waves crowned in white rolling onto the sand. Shi Qingxuan feels his smile widening. He feels lighter than he has in a long time.
He sits in the sand for hours, until the sun is setting and painting the water in vibrant shades of orange and violet, thinking about everything and nothing at all. A small part of him still recoils at the sight of the sea, but it's a part that's been shrinking further with every passing year. These aren't the vicious, inky depths that drew him in and took everything from him. He's safe here.
Then again, he muses as he gets up, pats the sand off his clothes and starts slowly making his way towards the town he can see in the distance, maybe it isn't fair to blame those waters for what he lost. It was never rightfully his in the first place, after all. Everything that was was taken away by his own brother hundreds of years ago, when Shi Wudu thought himself above fate. He never asked Shi Qingxuan what he wanted, simply decided for him, as he did all his life.
And look where it got us.
Shi Qingxuan sighs. His life now isn't so bad. He barely misses the Heavenly Capital anymore, and the one he knew is long gone anyway. If he asked, Xie Lian would help him, he knows; would let him live in Puqi Shrine or somewhere in Ghost City under his husband's protection. But he doesn't want to be dependent, not again. For so long he's lived a good life off the accomplishments of others, and he's had enough of it. If the price for his freedom is the ground under his bare feet, the growl of his stomach and the twinge of his bad leg as he walks, so be it.
The town is small and charming, mostly made up of fishers and boatbuilders, buildings of white stone with dark roofs. Shi Qingxuan doesn't see a lot of other beggars at first glance, although he's sure they're here - there's beggars everywhere - but apart from a few strange looks at his somewhat disheveled appearance, he's met with no hostility.
The sun has almost set by now, and he finds a nice, dry spot at the corner of two houses where he sets his meager belongings down and settles in for the night. He pulls his last steamed bun out of his bundle and eats it slowly. It's a bit stale, but nothing too bad. He's eaten much, much worse in the time since he was banished.
The stars above him are starting to blink into existence when he finishes. A beautiful sight that puts a smile on his lips as he closes his eyes and soon falls asleep.
Come the next morning, Shi Qingxuan notices that the taut feeling in his chest has vanished. Something tells him that he's exactly where he's meant to be.
So he stays.
The fishing town is kind to him. He finds work here, unlike in the royal capital: on the days that his bad arm and leg allow it, he helps out on the fishing boats, on the other days he works in the kitchen of the town's only inn. He isn't used to cooking, has to be taught how to clean and gut fish, but the people are patient with him, more patient than he would expect.
The money he makes isn't enough to afford a house, but the keeper of one of the handful of temples allows him to sleep there in exchange for some help keeping it tidy. The temple, Shi Qingxuan notes, is of the Water Master, but not Shi Wudu - a female deity, a new one, as he's told. They call her Shui Shi Yanli. The statue in the temple depicts a pretty young woman in simple lavender robes with a kind smile and kinder eyes. Shi Qingxuan makes a mental note to ask Xie Lian about her the next time he visits.
Time passes. Weeks turn into months and months turn into years. Seasons come and go, but the town and its people stay the same, and so does Shi Qingxuan. He doesn't feel the urge to leave. He never goes further than the beach where he sat for hours when he first came here. Why would he? This is a good place. He has everything he needs to live: he barely ever goes hungry, he has a place to sleep, clothes on his back, people who have accepted him as one of their own.
He doesn't age, thanks to his cursed shackle. At first, that troubled him, the knowledge that he'd be damned to this existence forever, but it doesn't anymore. It feels like he's waiting for something. He doesn't know what it is, but he knows it's there, and it will find its way to him one day. Being patient is something he's gotten a lot of practice in. Xie Lian remarks on it during one of his visits in Shi Qingxuan's eleventh year in the town by the sea. Shi Qingxuan laughs.
"There's not much for me to do other than waiting these days. I'm sure you'd understand, Your Highness."
"I would," Xie Lian concedes. "I'm just surprised, I suppose. You've changed, Qingxuan."
Shi Qingxuan inclines his head. "I was always going to, one day."
Xie Lian looks at him, something unreadable in his gentle dark eyes. "Tell me something. Do you know why San Lang never accompanies me on these visits?"
"I just assumed he didn't care for my company all that much." Shi Qingxuan raises an eyebrow. "He never seemed to care much for anyone's company except for yours."
Xie Lian shakes his head, an unbearably fond look on his face. "You're not wrong, but that's not what I meant."
Shi Qingxuan gives him a gentle smile. "I know, Your Highness. I'm aware where I've decided to settle."
"And you're sure..." Xie Lian's sentence trails off.
"If I wasn't, don't you think I would have left by now?"
Water Master Yanli's name isn't the only one Shi Qingxuan has heard the fishermen whisper before setting out on days when the waves are high and the sea unruly. The water here is darker than elsewhere, and storms are often seen brewing on the horizon. It didn't take Shi Qingxuan long to figure out just whose domain this town borders on. In retrospect, he thinks he knew all along. He's only slightly surprised that it doesn't scare him.
Shi Qingxuan waits.
In the ninety-seventh year after Shi Wudu's death, something changes.
Shi Qingxuan is sitting on the steps to the Water Master temple, watching the sun paint the sky orange as it sinks lower on the horizon, when he sees him.
The man approaches the temple with slow, almost somehow unsteady steps, like he's stiff and weak from a prolonged illness. He's tall and thin and clad from head to toe in black, with not a single touch of color. His pale face is unfamiliar, his eyes as inky as his long hair, tied back in a ponytail. When he reaches the temple, he only walks up the first three steps before he stops, turns and sits down next to Shi Qingxuan, far enough away that if Shi Qingxuan reached out, he wouldn't be able to touch him.
The man doesn't say a word, and he doesn't look at Shi Qingxuan. He just sits, eyes on the sun as it dips lower and lower, falling into the dark sea's waiting embrace. The faint salty breeze plays with the end of his ponytail. There's an ever so slight crease speaking of weariness between his slim brows, a note of sorrow in the faintly downturned corners of his mouth.
When the sun has disappeared and the stars are starting to blink into existence in its stead, the man gets up, dusts his robes off and walks away, as silently as he came. Shi Qingxuan watches him go, and for the first time since he came to this town, the taut feeling in his chest is back. He's forgotten what it felt like, to ache like this.
The next evening, the man comes back. He looks almost exactly like he did the previous day, except for the way his eyes appear to be the barest shade lighter than before. Just like yesterday, he walks up the first three steps to the temple and sits down, too far away for Shi Qingxuan to touch him. Just like yesterday, he's silent, and stays only until the sun has finished its descent into the sea, only to vanish again.
The next evening, the man comes back.
He comes back the evening after that, and the one after that, and the one after that. He never speaks a single word, never sits any closer to Shi Qingxuan, never stays a moment longer than it takes for the sun to set. Every day, he looks just slightly different. His hair is a touch longer, his robes a shade darker, his skin paler, brows deeper. The last rays of the sun, caught in the barest glimmer of gold at the hem of his sleeve.
Shi Qingxuan waits, and welcomes the storm brewing inside him with every one of those quiet sunsets.
III.
He Xuan never intended to come back to the town by the sea after his first (stupid, impulsive) visit. He's been aware of Shi Qingxuan's presence since the moment he'd first stepped foot onto the sand nearly a century ago - how could he not, when the town is so close to his domain that he can hear the cries of the seagulls, feel the lap of the waves against the shore, taste the salt in the air even from far beneath the surface?
And he's been keeping an eye on the former Lord Wind Master. At first his flimsy excuse was wanting to make sure Shi Qingxuan wasn't planning revenge. Ridiculous. He couldn't have done any lasting damage to He Xuan even at the height of his power, and he's nothing but a mortal now, a frail, limping mortal who hasn't had more than a handful of full meals in decades. And even if it was different...
He Xuan knows him too well to believe that. The thought feels like a knife digging into his belly even after all these years, tastes like betrayal in his mouth. He doesn't have the right to claim he knows Shi Qingxuan, washed it away along with his blood on the wall.
But it's true. He wore the skin of the Earth Master for so long that there was a time when he sometimes forgot it wasn't truly his own. Years spent by the Wind Master's side, following him wherever he went even as he pretended to be unwilling, watching his every move and gaining his trust until he was Shi Qingxuan's closest confidant have left him with an unshakeable knowledge of one thing:
Shi Qingxuan isn't capable of such malice. Whatever pain he could possibly inflict on He Xuan, He Xuan would deserve all of it and more, but worse than the fact that Shi Qingxuan is unable to do so is the unavoidable truth that-
He doesn't want to.
Centuries ago, He Xuan used to dream of his hands around Shi Wudu's throat.
The rare times he sleeps these days, all he sees is Shi Qingxuan's around his own. Each time he wakes, cold and alone, he finds himself sick with the absence of pain he know he should be feeling.
When he went into the town the first time, wearing a false skin like he used to, he barely dared to look at Shi Qingxuan's face. He knew that if he did, if he lost that last tiny shred of control, he wouldn't be able to stop himself from grabbing him by the collar and screaming why won't you do anything to me? Why won't you hurt me? Don't you want justice? Have you forgotten what I did to your brother? To you?
He doesn't entertain the thought that Shi Qingxuan might not have recognized him. He could see it in his eyes, and with it the nauseating complete absence of fear.
He Xuan knows it's a mistake, but he can't help himself. He goes back into town the next evening, and the one after that, and every evening after that until it becomes habit. Shi Qingxuan is always there. He always looks at him with soft hazel eyes, expression open and vulnerable in a way that reminds He Xuan too much of the time when he had Shi Qingxuan's trust. But there's something else in those eyes too, something that makes it impossible for He Xuan to hold his gaze for longer than an instant.
He looks much the same, except for his unruly hair and simple clothing, but one look is enough to tell that Shi Qingxuan is no longer the immature, wide-eyed, spoiled god He Xuan once knew. He's vulnerable, yes (so, so vulnerable, He Xuan could hurt him so easily, why isn't he scared?) but he's... calm. Steady.
He Xuan could throw him down the temple stairs without lifting more than a single finger, but somehow, sitting there on the ground, bathed in golden sunlight, he looks like nothing could shake him. Unmovable as the tallest mountain. There is a presence to him, something firmly rooted and deep, that is new.
Or perhaps it isn't, and He Xuan simply wasn't there to watch it grow.
The thought hurts too much to pursue.
It takes months until either of them speak. Shi Qingxuan is the first to break the silence, as he's always been.
"I have a question for you, Hei Shui."
He Xuan doesn't know if he flinches at the title or simply at the sound of his voice. For an instant, exhilaration and terror flood his empty veins, like the single sentence, uttered so calmly by a mouth he wrought screams from the last time they met, has broken a dam inside him, holding at bay furious waves of resentment and a wild joy clawing at his ribs he hasn't felt in too long to remember.
His breath in this form is nothing more than a facade, a prop to futilely try and lend himself more credibility, but it hitches for just a moment, like his body forgets itself in Shi Qingxuan's presence, doesn't want to remember that it's already dead.
"How did you recognize me?"
It's a pointless question and he knows it, but he wants to hear the answer.
A noncommittal hum. "You're not very subtle. This is your territory, and you look more like yourself every day. Your eyes are already almost the right color."
That isn't the whole truth, but He Xuan doesn't press the subject. It doesn't matter.
His gaze is trained on the stone steps to the temple, but he feels Shi Qingxuan's eyes on him. One of the steps is cracked down the middle. Weeds have begun to grow from it, persistent little specks of green. He Xuan forces down the urge to squash them with his boot.
"I have a question for you," Shi Qingxuan repeats, like he's waiting for permission.
"Anything," He Xuan says. He means it. If Shi Qingxuan asked him what the location of his ashes was, he would tell him without hesitating. He feels brittle, like the saltwater of the ocean has hollowed him out the way it did the submerged caves his bone dragons sleep in.
"Did you love me, back then?"
Shi Qingxuan says it softly, almost casually, as if his words aren't making He Xuan's dead lungs fill to the brim with black, brackish water, the same his life dissolved in ninety-seven years ago, so full they might burst in his chest the next moment.
"Yes." He means this too, and he's surprised when no liquid spills from his lips as he speaks.
"But it wasn't enough." It's a statement. Shi Qingxuan already knows the answer, He Xuan gives it anyway.
"No."
Another hum. Shi Qingxuan doesn't seem offended, somehow less hurt by this damning truth than He Xuan himself. He Xuan would have resented him for it, once. But that was a long time ago.
They don't speak anymore that night. He Xuan leaves with the last rays of sun, as he always does.
He comes back the next day, as he always does.
A week later, Shi Qingxuan asks him another question.
"Hei Shui, did you hate me?"
The water in his lungs tastes like copper.
Don't call me that. Just once, he wants to hear his name from Shi Qingxuan's lips.
He swallows it down.
"I did, once." Before I met you. Before I knew you.
From the corner of his eye, he sees Shi Qingxuan tilting his head, the breeze playing with his hair. It's even longer than He Xuan remembers it, soft dark curls haphazardly pulled back in a simple half bun, nothing like the elaborate styles he used to wear it in.
He Xuan digs his sharp nails into his palms to suppress the urge to reach out and run his fingers through it.
"Do you, still?"
A small, pathetic part of He Xuan wishes more than anything that Shi Qingxuan would never have to ask that question.
"No." It comes out sharper than intended. "I haven't hated you in a long time, Qingxuan." He nearly chokes on the name that doesn't belong on his lips anymore. "I..."
I still love you.
I'm sorry.
He hears the echo of his own voice.
And what good is your apology?
He can't bring himself to say any of it. He leaves the town early that night.
It takes a long time after that until they speak again, although He Xuan never stops coming to the temple. Once, it starts raining shortly after he gets there, the sky covered in clouds and only faintly orange as the sun goes down. He wouldn't mind just sitting outside in the rain - water is familiar to him, and the sensation of being drenched to the bone almost comforting. But Shi Qingxuan gets up and moves inside, sitting just by the open doors of the temple where the roof shields him from the rain. So He Xuan follows him, and tries not to look at the way Shi Qingxuan's mouth tightens in pain when he slowly walks up the stairs.
You did that.
He wants to ask, do you hate me? But he doesn't have the courage.
He wants Shi Qingxuan to hate him. He should.
"Your leg..." The words leave his mouth without him meaning them to. His voice sounds oddly hoarse. Shi Qingxuan looks down at his leg, then up at He Xuan.
"What about it?"
"Does it still hurt?"
It's a stupid question. Of course it still hurts.
"Yes," Shi Qingxuan says. "Every day."
He smiles. It's almost the same smile he used to wear so frequently, that he gave out so freely to anyone he met. Not quite as wide, slightly more tempered. But just as radiant. A ray of light in the middle of a savage tempest.
"It's not so bad," he says. "I've had lots of time to get used to it. And it makes me do things slowly. It's a good thing sometimes, being unable to rush into anything."
He Xuan's heart wants to lift at the realization that despite everything he did to him, Shi Qingxuan's optimism, his ability to make the best of anything, survived, but the guilt weighs it back down, weighs his tongue down in his mouth, too. Like lead, unable to move. He doesn't deserve to feel relief at Shi Qingxuan's words. Didn't deserve to hear them in the first place.
All he does is take, take, take. And Shi Qingxuan continues to give, even now.
"You know, Hei Shui," he says gently, "I don't hate you either."
It should make him glad to hear it. Instead, it feels like a punch to the gut.
"I tried for a while," Shi Qingxuan continues, "but I discovered there was no point to it."
"Why not?" He Xuan bites out. Something is boiling in the pit of his stomach, and he can't tell if it's fury or misery or both. He wants to break something, but he doesn't. He just sits there on the ground and watches the rain fall.
"It won't change anything. Things are the way they are, whether I scream and cry and curse your name for it or not."
It feels like an accusation. He thinks of the four urns beneath the Nether Water Manor. Mother, father, sister, fiancée.
Whether I scream and cry and curse your name for it or not.
He Xuan feels sick. The sun has nearly set. The rain is coming down harder, covering the town in a soft gray haze, drowning out even the rolling of the nearby sea.
He gets up and walks down the temple steps. It takes mere seconds for him to be soaked, but he doesn't care.
It doesn't matter.
The sky is clear when he comes back the next day, and Shi Qingxuan is sitting in the same spot where he always sits, watching him approach, not smiling, but not moving away either.
"I don't want your absolution," He Xuan says before he even sits down. His hands are curled into fists at his sides.
Shi Qingxuan raises an eyebrow. "Who said I was absolving you of anything?"
It knocks the wind straight out of him. He had more things he wanted to say, anger-fueled, bitter things. Blows to shatter Shi Qingxuan's ridiculous resolve to not be furious at him.
He can't remember any of them anymore. All he can do is stand there and stare at Shi Qingxuan. It's quite possibly the first time since he first came here that he's looking straight at him, hazel eyes meeting narrowed golden ones, their true color by now.
"I ruined your life," He Xuan says.
"Yes." Shi Qingxuan' voice is calm. "You did."
He Xuan is silent. He remains unmoving for more several more moments, gaze not breaking away from Shi Qingxuan's. Then he walks up the first three steps and sits down next to him. A seagull cries in the distance. The air is still.
The rest of the evening passes in silence.
Weeks later, Shi Qingxuan asks him how things have been in the Black Water Demon Lair. He Xuan turns his head and stares at him, incredulous. Shi Qingxuan doesn't seem to mind the reaction. "Have you gotten the chance to rebuild it?" he continues. "His Highness told me it really took a beating in the fight against Jun Wu."
It takes He Xuan a few more moments to regain his words. "Why do you want to know?"
Shi Qingxuan sighs. "Does there have to be an ulterior motive behind everything I say to you, Hei Shui?"
There's a hint of his old pouting tone, the one he always used to use on He Xuan when he wanted to convince him to do something ridiculous. He Xuan feels ridiculous now, too, making- smalltalk. With Shi Qingxuan. Like they're just a pair of old friends, catching up. Like He Xuan couldn't snap Shi Qingxuan in half without so much as blinking.
Like he didn't almost do exactly that.
Still, he forced the words across his tongue. They feel foreign in his mouth. "... no. I haven't rebuilt it much."
He could have, but not without driving himself deeper into debt with Hua Cheng, and it would have taken months and he was tired. What is the point? What is the difference whether he wastes his days away in a fortress or among ruins?
Shi Qingxuan regards him with that oddly, unfittingly gentle look again. "Maybe you should."
There's the urge to laugh for a moment, somewhere deep in his chest. It feels strange. Laughter would feel strange on his lips. "Why?"
"It's your home, isn't it?"
He Xuan minutely shakes his head and doesn't say that nothing and nowhere has felt like home since the day he tossed Shi Qingxuan into the streets of the Royal Capital, unconscious and still wearing his bloody and tattered divine robes.
They have those odd little conversations more often, after that. They still spend most evenings in silence, but sometimes Shi Qingxuan will ask him things, questions about how he's been and how he spent the last century that He Xuan avoids answering directly. More rarely, he talks about himself, the life he's built for himself in this town. He Xuan much prefers that. There's something comforting in hearing about all the ways he hasn't ruined Shi Qingxuan.
He vaguely remembers a time when the Wind Master's voice was grating on his ears and he spent their various outings imagining creative ways to shut him up. Now, he doesn't think he'd ever tire of it. He'd spend the next hundred years sitting here on the stairs to a temple of an unfamiliar god and listening to Shi Qingxuan talk.
But that, of course, is a pointless thought. A stupid thought. A dangerous thought. And so every night as soon as the sun has set, He Xuan walks back into the sea where he belongs. The cold embrace of the waves doesn't hold the comfort it once brought him anymore.
"Qingxuan."
He says it without thinking close to a year after he first came to the town. It's only the second time he's said his name.
"Hm?" Shi Qingxuan looks up from where he has his spare robe draped over his lap with a needle and thread, in the process of mending a tear in the sleeve. His motions are practiced, his uninjured hand steady. He's not doing this for the first time. There's something strange about seeing him like this, difficult to reconcile him with the god He Xuan once knew, who wasn't so much opposed to these menial tasks as simply oblivious to their necessity, but the two are bleeding into each other more and more with every minute He Xuan spends in his company.
"It didn't bring me peace."
He Xuan's voice is quiet, and he can't quite meet Shi Qingxuan's eyes. There's a burning shame in the admission, crawling across his dead skin. I hurt you so much, and for what?
Shi Qingxuan is silent for a few moments. Then he nods and resumes his needlework. "That's what I thought," he murmurs.
It's not an apology. It's barely an acknowledgement of guilt. But it's a start. It's something.
It takes him months of trying to force the words past his lips and failing until he can bring himself to say anything more. There's so much he wants to say - no, feels like he has to say or the words will eventually eat him up, corrode his insides and collapse the hollow shell he feels like most days - but honesty is something that is foreign to He Xuan. There was a time when it was different, when his very hatred of deceit brought about his downfall, but it's been so long since he was He Sheng that the memory doesn't feel like his own.
And so he has to dig his nails into his palms so hard they'd draw blood if he had any when he finally manages to open his mouth.
"I'd do it again," he bites out. Shi Qingxuan flinches ever so slightly, posture stiffening. For the first time since He Xuan came here he sees apprehension on his face, not quite fear, but close to it, too close.
Isn't this what you wanted?, He Xuan asks himself, and yes. A part of him relishes the sight, proof that Shi Qingxuan is finally seeing the truth, will soon recognize him for the monstrosity he is. But more than that, he hates it, hates that he put that look onto Shi Qingxuan's face, again, can't seem to help it, the words he once dedicated his life to betraying him.
"Your brother, I'd kill him again. He deserved it for what he did to my family."
He doesn't know what keeps him speaking. Every word feels like it's tearing at his lips as he forces it past them.
"But." He Xuan grits his teeth against the way every inch of him is recoiling at what he's about to say, a truth he's been bottling up inside for so long he's forgotten what it was like to live without it, but acknowledging it this way feels more terrifyingly vulnerable than placing Shi Qingxuan's hands around his throat would.
"Not if it meant harming you again."
It hangs in the air between, heavy, almost suffocating. He Xuan is overcome with the urge to run, but he digs his nails in harder and stays where he is, gaze trained on the ground.
Shi Qingxuan deserves more than this, but He Xuan can't give him more. Not now. Maybe not ever.
"You're right." Shi Qingxuan's voice is soft and sounds brittle somehow. "He deserved it."
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, we're the ones who sinned, we're the ones who wronged you!
He Xuan lifts his head and looks at Shi Qingxuan. There are tears on his face and the sight makes him freeze. If his heart was more than a rotten, black lump in his chest it would be brought to a stop by this.
He's seen Shi Qingxuan cry countless times over hundreds of years. He was always brought to tears so easily, by sorrow, by joy. He Xuan remembers how Shi Wudu used to chastise him for it, like he chastised him for taking his beloved female form, laughing too much, caring too much. Why are you crying, what kind of man are you? You're embarrassing me, pull yourself together.
Never before did the sight rip through He Xuan like this, make him want to reach out and wipe his tears away, make him want to fall to his knees and press his forehead to the ground and beg for Shi Qingxuan's forgiveness. Forgiveness he has done nothing to earn.
Helplessly, he sits there and doesn't say anything as Shi Qingxuan spills tears over his brother whose head He Xuan wrenched from his body with his bare hands. The sun has almost set by the time the tears stop coming, and He Xuan gets up to leave like he does every evening, but he feels like something is teetering him to his spot, and it takes him too long to tear himself away, a momentary lapse, an instant when he's so close - so close - to opening his mouth and saying the words he can't stop thinking.
He doesn't, of course.
The next several evenings are spent in utter silence, an occurrence that has become rare recently. Shi Qingxuan's expression is more closed off, stormy, than He Xuan remembers it ever being, and he begins to wonder if he should stop coming here, put an end to this farce that was never going to lead anywhere anyway. But then, a week after He Xuan made him cry, Shi Qingxuan speaks up.
"I've thought a lot about what you said." He sounds tired, but not quite as distant as He Xuan feared. "And I think I owe it to you to at least say that-"
"You don't owe me anything," He Xuan cuts in. Shi Qingxuan throws him an irritated glance.
"To say that," he continues without acknowledging He Xuan's words further, "I know what my brother did was abhorrent."
His hands are twisting in the rough fabric of his robe. "Doing that to you and your family just because you happened to be born at the same time as me... it's vile. Unforgivable. Sometimes I still can't wrap my head around it. I know he did it to save me, but there had to be other ways - and even if there weren't, who gave him the right to decide my life was worth more than yours?"
It is.
"I would never have thought him capable of something like that. I wouldn't have wanted him to do it if I had known..." He sighs and shakes his head. "But I didn't know. I lived a good life off what he stole from you for too long, and for that I'm sorry, Hei Shui. I hope you can believe me."
Copper in his mouth. He Xuan's hands are shaking in his lap. The memory of the last time Shi Qingxuan apologized to him for his brother's deeds comes up suddenly like bile. It takes several long moments until he can pull himself together enough to get any words out.
"Qingxuan. I've only ever harmed two people who didn't deserve it." He forces himself to turn his head and look into Shi Qingxuan's eyes. "One was Ming Yi. The other was you."
Something about the admission feels tremendous. He Xuan could swear he feels something shift in the air between them, Shi Qingxuan's gaze becoming sharper, searching. His next words are uttered cautiously, every syllable carefully considered. He never used to sound like that before.
"You lost everything because of me."
"You lost everything because of me too." He Xuan is surprised to hear the pained tone of his own voice. "You didn't ask your brother to switch our fates. Blaming you for it is cruel." Was cruel.
They sit there looking at each other for a very long time. Gradually, Shi Qingxuan's face softens. Gradually, the tension in He Xuan's chest begins to ease, for the first time in as long as he can remember.
"I miss my best friend." Shi Qingxuan's voice is very quiet, but it cuts through He Xuan better than the sharpest knife. Something wild is clawing at its confines in the pit of his stomach, that same savage joy and misery he felt the first time he came here.
A single nod is all he manages in response, but Shi Qingxuan smiles, and everything was worth it for this.
Everything feels easier after that. Shi Qingxuan laughs more when he tells He Xuan about his day. The colors of the sunset seem more vibrant, the sounds of the rolling waves gentler. Some days, He Xuan can almost - almost - picture that they're back to how they were, that Shi Qingxuan is the Wind Master, that He Xuan is pretending to be Ming Yi again. It's a bittersweet thought, but He Xuan can't help but think that this isn't so bad. It gets better with every passing day, just like he looks more like himself every day.
There are aspects of his true form he doesn't dare show out in the open - his pointed ears, the places where his skin splits on the sides of his neck like gills, the webbing between his fingers. But the face he shows to Shi Qingxuan every night is his own. His eyes are golden, and his skin the white of the foam that crowns the waves, and his hands are those of a scholar, slim and free of callouses the day Shi Qingxuan gets up from the stairs when the sun has set and holds a hand out for He Xuan to take.
He Xuan stares at him in disbelief. It's been over two and a half years, but touch is a line they haven't crossed, have carefully tip toed around, the both of them. There's a knot in his stomach pulling tight at the thought, and he can't tell if it's with anticipation or fear.
"What are you doing?" he asks. Shi Qingxuan smiles, his teeth showing.
"Helping you up, of course!"
"You're the one of us with the crippled leg."
The smile becomes a laugh, and an unfamiliar warmth blooms in He Xuan's chest. "Don't worry. You're so skinny, I can pull you up no problem. Maybe you should eat more, Hei Shui."
It's a bad joke, but He Xuan barely manages to swallow his chuckle down, reducing it to a soft snort. He doesn’t remember the last time he felt the urge to laugh.
He hesitates for another moment. Then he reaches out and carefully puts his hand in Shi Qingxuan's.
The earth doesn't move and the heavens don't realign themselves the moment they touch. But it feels like- something slotting into place. Something He Xuan didn't know he was missing until he had it back.
He doesn't need to breathe, but in this moment, he wants to. Wants to inhale and draw the salty air into his lungs, wants to feel its taste, wants to feel like he's still a part of this world that he's been a foreign body in for more than three hundred years.
But he doesn’t feel quite so foreign anymore when true to his word, Shi Qingxuan pulls him to his feet without much effort, and they start walking. Shi Qingxuan has made it a habit to accompany him to the shore at night, watch as he disappears back into the sea. Tonight, as they pass the last of the houses, he stops He Xuan with a hand on his arm.
"I understand your rage, you know," he says softly. "It wasn't my fault, true, but what you went through... if I had been in your place..."
"You wouldn't have done what I did."
"You don't know that. Maybe I would have."
It's not a thought He Xuan enjoys entertaining. Images flash in his mind, images of himself draped in gold, surrounded by a divine glow, of Shi Qingxuan with a bloodless ashen face, a mouth full of sharp teeth, funeral robes smeared with red.
He shakes his head and banishes the thought. There's no point to it. What's done is done, what's real is real. No matter what might have been, all they have is this. He Xuan had to learn that a long time ago.
"Until tomorrow, Hei Shui," Shi Qingxuan says, and He Xuan walks into the cold embrace of the waves, even though everything within him is pulling him back to the shore.
Months pass, and every night, Shi Qingxuan comes with him to the edge of the town. Every night, it becomes harder to let the sea take him. It's the part of him that still whispers into his ear that he's lying to Shi Qingxuan again, making him think he's not his worst nightmare anymore, that makes the decision for him over and over, and he grows sick of it.
The water in his lungs tastes less like blood every day, but there are last remnants of the metallic flavor he can't seem to shake.
Four days out from the date that marks three years of He Xuan's visits to the town by the shore, the night is warm and the sky clear, millions of stars in the dark blue left behind by the sinking sun like the delicate silver embroidery on the gowns Shi Qingxuan used to wear. But that was a lifetime ago, and tonight he's in the same set of robes He Xuan watched him mend on the temple steps over and over. His hair is tied back the same way it was when He Xuan first came here, and his eyes are impossibly brighter even in the dim light shed by those stars and the waning moon.
They reach the sand, and Shi Qingxuan stops. Smiles. "Until tomorrow, Hei Shui."
It's been three years, and a century before that, and something in He Xuan snaps.
"That's not my name." His voice is hoarse, and he can barely hold Shi Qingxuan's gaze, those hazel eyes that become searching, like they always do when He Xuan takes a step towards, takes another inch off the distance between them that doesn't feel so immeasurable anymore.
For three years and a century he's wanted to hear his name from Shi Qingxuan's lips. Just once.
The waves roll gently against the shore. More and more stars blink into existence above them. Faintly, He Xuan wonders if any of the heavenly officials up there are watching them, keeping an eye on the one who was once one of their own and the one who wronged him so. But he doubts it. They never did care too much about anything but themselves.
Shi Qingxuan reaches out and trails his fingertips over He Xuan's ice cold cheek, for just an instant.
"He Xuan."
And he breaks.
He doesn't know if he chooses to fall to his knees or if his legs give out beneath him, but it doesn't matter. He lets himself fall forward, presses his forehead into the sand, phantom tears he can't shed stinging in his closed eyes. His body shifts, changing the last missing details until he's in his true form, only the second time Shi Qingxuan has ever seen it.
"Forgive me," he pleads, a broken whisper nearly carried away by the wind. He wants to say more, wants to so desperately, but his throat is so dry, his lips won't move. The clawing thing in his belly has broken free and it's roaring through his veins where his blood should be, completing him. Consuming him.
He hears the faint rustling of cloth, and feels hands on his shoulders, drawing him up. Warm lips pressed to his forehead.
"All you had to do was ask."
The next evening, as the last rays of the sun kiss the water, Shi Qingxuan walks away from the Water Master temple, from the town that sheltered him for a century, across the sand and into the sea. The shape of a black clad man awaits him among the waves. They're gentle as they wash over Shi Qingxuan's skin, like they were waiting for him just like the embrace he finds himself in.
The water swallows them both.
IV.
Over a hundred years after the fall of the Wind Master, the grand bell in the rebuilt Heavenly Capital tolls and shakes all the gods' palaces as Shi Qingxuan ascends to Heaven for the second time. He's wearing dark robes, carries a silver cane, and the simple hairpiece atop his head holds a single circular stone, black as ink.
His Highness the Crown Prince Xie Lian welcomes him personally with a smile on his face. The other gods stand back and watch silently as Shi Qingxuan bows deeply before the Heavenly Emperor.
"Your Highness, if this ascension is not rightfully mine, I don't want it," he says, his tone unwavering, such a far cry from the ever flighty young god from all that time ago. "Pray His Highness may have the grace to cast me back down if it is not."
Xie Lian steps forward and lifts him out of his bow with gentle hands. "My old friend, this is no one's but yours."
Shi Qingxuan straightens, and divinity glows from within him so brightly the other Officials have to avert their gazes. But they hear it when their Emperor says:
"Welcome home, Lord Wind Master."