Chapter Text
Zhuo Yichen makes his fateful decision in a way that is out of his usual character. For once, as he so rarely does, he acts entirely on impulse. He leaves Ao Yin scrambling in the dirt for an antidote that he now knows never existed and he runs. He runs like his own life depends on it, runs like the world itself depends on it, abandons the charcoal dust that remains of Wen Zongyu, leaves a stricken Zhen Mei behind staring at the pile that once was his master, disregards Ao Yin's frantic search behind him. He knows what to do, he can save Wen Xiao's life, though she'll never forgive him for this.
The world can survive without a Zhuo Yichen, he reasons, blood pounding in his ears. But the Wilderness, which he's now sworn to protect, cannot survive without a Baize Goddess. Zhao Yuanzhou, he's sure, cannot survive without her either.
Zhuo Yichen runs. He runs, and runs, and runs, until his legs are numb and his breathe rattles in his lungs. His feet carry him to the Kunlun gate where he finally stops and staggers in place, allowing himself the necessary precious moments to catch his breath.
After taking the time to calm himself and straighten his clothes, he straightens, walks through the gate and straight to Wen Xiao's side.
Pei Sijing sits at her side, holding her hand when he arrives. She looks up with naked hope on her face. "The antidote?"
"A fake." It hurts saying it, even though he knows there's an alternate solution.
Pei Sijing's face twists, caught between grief and anger. He understands and steps closer. "Let me sit with her a while?"
"Just don't wake her," she says as she stands and lets him settle in. "She spent so long with Zhao Yuanzhou that she's barely gotten any rest."
Zhuo Yichen gently folds Wen Xiao's warm hand into both of his own, grateful to feel her fingers twitch against his palm. "What about him? Is he awake?"
"He was, but he's resting again. I told himself if he bothers her in the next hour, I'll kill him myself." Pei Sijing busies herself with Wen Xiao's blankets before she heads to the door. "I'll…tell the others. We'll find a way."
He wants to say she doesn't need to, but if she knows—if any of them knows—she'll surely stop him, so instead he makes a soft noise that doesn't mean anything at all, and tries not to weep at the little crease of pain painted between Wen Xiao's brows.
Having yao qi is still such a new thing. It circulates through Zhuo Yichen in strange ways he doesn't fully understand despite Zhao Yuanzhou's patient explanations. But for this he doesn't think he needs finesse so much as brute force, and brute force he can certainly manage. It takes a moment to work up the courage to place his palm over Wen Xiao's heart meridian, struggling against the urge to flinch from the intimacy of the contact. It takes far less time to find the poison twisting its way through her body, a ravenous sort of bile that jumps for him like something alive when he touches its edges with his qi. He grabs for it, spooling as much of it into his own body as he can, and then more of it still, so much he's afraid this won't work and Wen Xiao will still die and this will have all been for nothing.
Wen Xiao stirs and turns her head with a sigh. Zhuo Yichen coughs wetly and tastes blood. Maybe he can't do this after all, he thinks, and just as he's about to give up, the last of the poison twitches free of her meridians and sinks into him like fetid water.
He yanks his hand away from her, breathing hard.
It's…done. He's done it.
He checks her again, just in case, but she's alright. The poison is gone. There's nothing left of it in her.
Her color looks better already, her pale cheeks warming to a healthy pink. Her breathing is easier too. She looks peaceful and truly at rest for the first time in a very, very long time. A relief so profound he could cry washes over Zhuo Yichen.
"Wen Xiao," he whispers. She stirs a little, then settles back against the pillow, the fingers of one hand plucking at the blanket in her sleep. He pulls it up and tucks it carefully around her. "I have to go, but you'll be okay now. You're safe. And I'm sorry."
He flees the sleeping niche, passes quietly through the labyrinthine caves, using the sound of conversations around him to guide his path away from his companions. He pulls up short outside Li Lun's one-time cavern, not sure what he'll do if Zhao Yuanzhou is there. A pair of voices float lazily through the cave system, Zhao Yuanzhou's dry rumble a counterpoint to Ying Lei's frenetic cheer, and Zhuo Yichen relaxes—or relaxes as much as the filth now running through not only his meridians, but his veins, will allow him to.
The voices move and he freezes, caught guiltily in place before he realizes they're moving away. He catches the sound of Ying Lei saying Wen Xiao's name and knows he needs to move now, before the truth inevitably comes out. He ducks into the grotto and back out again, making his way back to the Kunlun gate as fast as he dares.
Nobody sees him. Nobody is there to stop him. It's better this way.
Zhuo Yichen bursts through the Kunlun gate and back into the mortal realm to the brilliant glare of sunshine on snow. Enough has fallen in a short time that the ground is blanketed with it, the edges of stone and tiles softened by it. He blinks against the light until his eyes adjust, dimly aware that if he were still mortal he'd be too lightly dressed for the freezing temperatures.
"You," says a disgusted voice that sounds young and old at once.
He turns, heart sinking, and there sits Bai Jiu— no, there sits Li Lun, in Bai Jiu's too small body, untouched by the snow save for a few flakes caught in his hair and lashes. Zhuo Yichen swallows hard and curls the fingers of his left hand around the hilt of his sword. He doesn't intend to use it, but he feels steadier knowing its there.
Bai Jiu wavers before his eyes and resolves in his vision into Li Lun, imposing despite the hunch of his shoulders. The flecks of blood on the corners of his mouth.
There's no time to waste for either of them.
Zhuo Yichen shows Li Lun the box he carries in his right hand. He opens it and sees Li Lun's eyes widen a fraction before they narrow again, his face bitter and suspicious.
"Is this meant to be a joke?"
"He wants you to live," he says in response.
Li Lun laughs derisively until it turns into ragged coughing that makes Zhuo Yichen flinch. "Live? Return to my primordial root, cultivate a new body, and emerge just in time for this poison you mortals concocted to kill me? He wants me to live?"
"I can fix it." Zhuo Yichen takes a step closer, cautious even though he knows Li Lun isn't a threat. Not like this. Not right now. One step, then another, and cycles his qi as best he can so Li Lun can see what floats sickly through his meridians, a poison they both know very well wasn't there just a day ago. "I know how. I already took it from Wen Xiao."
Something in Li Lun's face changes from disgust to calculation. "You. Pretty young yao that you are, have thrown your life away for the goddess."
Zhuo Yichen can feel heat on the back of his neck. The beginning of a fever. He's running out of time.
He holds the box as steadily as he can and takes the root from it with his left hand, holding the scrap of ancient wood like it's something precious. Which, of course, it is. "Li Lun. Please. We don't have time. He wants you to live. And I…don't want Bai Jiu to die."
On the steps, Li Lun moves as though he wants to stand, but his legs give out beneath him. He sits down heavily on the icy stone, head down and shoulders heaving. There's so little left of him. So little left of Bai Jiu.
"Please," Zhuo Yichen says again. He comes as close as he dares and drops to one knee; the effort of it exhausts him so completely he isn't sure he'll be able to stand again. The poison coursing through him calls to the poison coursing through Li Lun, and Zhuo Yichen reaches for it, a hand catching Li Lun by the ankle, his qi grabbing hold of the pollution killing them both. He pulls and pulls and pulls and watches Li Lun's expression slowly transform from calculation to shock and finally, he thinks, to something like horror.
Snow muffles all the sound around them, the silence loud in its own way. Li Lun's voice breaks through the quiet with a low, angry "you fool."
Zhuo Yichen lifts his head. Li Lun stares at him unblinking, and he finds himself transfixed by the intensity of his gaze. He wants to say something, plead Bai Jiu's case again, but though his mouth opens, he can't seem to form words.
Li Lun sits up, straight and proud, and says nothing. A cloud of smoke rises from the ends of his hair and fingertips; it's dark like the night sky on a moonless night. Zhuo Yichen watches it curl higher, flecked with gold as it coalesces into something almost tangible. He realizes in the same moment that it's Li Lun's primordial spirit and also the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. If this is the last thing he ever sees, maybe that's alright.
Li Lun's primordial spirit pours itself into the small root in Zhuo Yichen's left hand and on impulse, he cards his fingers through the smoke as it passes. It feels like nothing and everything all at once, an autumn breeze, a cool stream, the last chill of winter before spring blooms anew. There's a lingering, unpleasant tar that sticks invisibly as the last of the spirit vanishes into the wood. The feeling sinks into Zhuo Yichen's hand and he feels his stomach roil with it, the final touches of poison rotting him from the inside out.
He coughs and blood stains the snow at his feet. Bai Jiu stirs on the steps and Zhuo Yichen feels his heart soar despite the poison clotted in his lungs.
He's safe, he thinks. Wen Xiao is safe. Li Lun is safe. Zhao Yuanzhou, I saved them.
And then he thinks nothing at all.