Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

It was during Cloud Recess lectures that Lan Wangji first noticed how infuriated and disappointed his uncle could be over someone. And the person that showed it to him was no other than Wei Wuxian.

The same omega who were turning his life upside down for some months by now.

The omega who had made a name for himself within days of arriving at Cloud Recesses. Loud, irreverent, endlessly curious and eager to find problems wherever he was at. He ignored all the rules, those that seemed to follow him only so they could be broken. Every lecture became an argument when he was the one asked something. Every discussion became a challenge because he didn't know when to stop talking. And… He was indeed quite smart, he had something in him that made it so… He was never wrong when bringing something up.

Most people found him exhausting. Others found him amusing. Lan Wangji… Before forming any opinion himself, found himself watching his uncle.

The disapproval was impossible to miss.

Every interruption deepened the lines around the elder’s mouth. Every grin from Wei Wuxian seemed capable of provoking an entirely new lecture on discipline and propriety. By the end of the lectures, Lan Wangji had begun anticipating the reactions before they occurred.

Wei Wuxian would say something that he found strange and his uncle’s expression would darken and he would be kicking the omega away from his classes. The cycle would repeat, again, and again, and again.

It should not have interested him. But, heavens, it did.

Because Lan Wangji had spent most of his life watching that same expression, even though it wasn't directed toward an unruly omega, it was directed towards a locked residence hidden deep within Cloud Recesses, towards a woman nobody spoke about.

Directed towards his mother.

The realization arrived slowly. Not all at once. He felt himself looking a little too much to Wei Wuxian, a little too much to how his uncle treated him. And then, a thought began forming inside his mind. At first, it was harmless, just a… What if. Just a thought that he revisited sometimes, until it became a thought that he often visited… And it eas enough that it eventually ceased feeling like a thought and became something else.

It became an opportunity.

The idea should have disturbed him, but it didn’t. It never did. For as long as he could remember, Lan Wangji had wanted his uncle disappointed, he always wanted to repay him for what he had done to his and his brother's life. He didn't want a public humiliation, not even something dramatic.

His uncle was too respected by everyone inside the jianghu to fall by something like that. He held a great position. So… Lan Wangji wanted something simpler. Something that would cling to him forever. He wanted to see him unhappy. He wanted to see him becoming frustrated. He wanted him forced to swallow the same helplessness he had fed him and his brother for decades.

The desire had lived quietly inside him since childhood. A small, ugly thing. And he had always been patient. He had always waited for the opportunity to come because he understood his position within the sect, he understood what was expected of him. Any direct challenge would ultimately hurt no one except himself.

Fortunately, there were other methods.

Far more effective methods than challenging his entire sect. The realization settled into place with surprising ease. A way much easier way to get away with what he had always wanted… Wei Wuxian merely handed it to him. He made it easy for Lan Wangji to get what he always wanted. But Lan Wangji was not reckless enough to damage his own reputation. He would use what the omega had already built.

He would use that infuriating reckless boy that came inside Cloud Recess with a shiny and irritating personality. 

His uncle despised Wei Wuxian.

Therefore, Wei Wuxian became useful.

The conclusion was embarrassingly simple to him. Lan Wangji spent several days examining it from every angle, searching for any flaws, and he found none.

A marriage proposal would solve everything, would give him what he had always dreamed of. Would ease the burn inside his chest whenever he readied himself to start his day. His uncle would never approve a marriage with the boy.

That alone made it appealing.

Yet the more Lan Wangji considered it, the more perfect the idea became. Not a marriage into Cloud Recesses, no, he needed to get out. He needed a marriage out of it. His uncle had spent decades cultivating the image of the Lan Sect into his two precious jades. Always tending to their discipline, tradition and bathing them with a pristine reputation.

What would happen when the Second Jade willingly abandoned all of it? When he married into Yunmeng Jiang? When he chose a sect known for freedom and noise and chaos over the one that raised him? The thought was almost satisfying.

No.

It was satisfying.

For the first time in years, Lan Wangji found himself smiling inside the jingshi, his late mother's prison. He was really smiling. His uncle would hate it, he knew that he would despise the marriage, would despise all the plans and would go against it.

The realization warmed something dark inside his chest. Wei Wuxian would likely accept.

There was no reason not to. Their paths had crossed often enough. They had spoken. They had touched. The omega was way too touchy with him whenever they met, whenever LanWangji found him fussing with his own things or when he's actively trying to break the rules inside Cloud Recess. He could say that they had imprinted on each other… Which was true once Lan Wangji could always smell the omega's scent lingering through his clothes whenever they parted ways.

People would believe it. More importantly, they would understand it, he already had a story that could easily be built around the arrangement. A young alpha falling in love. An impulsive courtship and a shotgun wedding.

A beautiful bond that formed during shared studies… The details hardly mattered. People always believed what they wanted to believe. And Lan Wangji could provide enough evidence for them to do so.

The plan was elegant. Efficient. And surprisingly harmless.

Or so he thought. Because nowhere within those calculations did he stop to consider the variating that would be Wei Wuxian himself. Not his feelings. Not his hopes and not even the future waiting beyond the wedding. He flourished himself only with the satisfaction of imagining his uncle’s expression when the announcement finally arrived. Years later, Lan Wangji would look back upon that moment and understand it for what it truly was.

Selfishness. A young man so consumed by his own pain and loathing that he failed to notice he was placing another person directly in its path. At the time, however, he felt only triumph. And that, perhaps, was the cruelest part of all of it. Because he didn't mean for it to be the way things turned out.

Some months later after Lan Wangji’s request, Wei Wuxian found himself thinking that marriage would feel different, that he would be prepared for when it comes.

Everyone always told him that he would be married out of the Jiang sect, to someone out there, so he would stop being a mouth to feed. He is only seventeen now, but he's been listening to it since he had his first heat. As an omega, the only omega in their family, he was treated like a trading card… But now… Oh now he was finally free of those threatening words because he was about to get married to someone he didn't fear.

To someone that he already felt something blooming for.

So, he didn't think that he could say exactly how he had expected it to feel. He had imagined it often enough throughout the years, certainly more times than he would ever admit aloud. He would avoid saying it, especially not to Jiang Cheng. And, heavens, none of those imaginings had ever truly prepared him for the reality of it. 

For how nervous he would be. For how excited he would be. For how his hands would refuse to remain still for longer than a few moments before finding something else to fuss over. Every time he smoothed one sleeve down, another suddenly seemed crooked. Every time he adjusted one ornament up on his guan, he became convinced the next one had shifted as well. 

It was ridiculous. Completely ridiculous. Yet no matter how many times he told himself to calm down, the excitement continued bubbling inside his chest.

He was getting married.

The thought alone was enough to make him smile.

To Lan Wangji.

He was getting married to the alpha who had made his heart skip beats for years now. To the alpha he had spent entirely too much time thinking about whenever he should have been paying attention to something else. To the alpha whose scent had once lingered through his clothes after the lectures and left Wei Wuxian smiling like an idiot for the rest of the day.

He was getting married to the alpha who had haunted his dreams for longer than he cared to admit. Some of those dreams are considerably more embarrassing than others.

Even now, standing inside the Lan Sect and surrounded by wedding preparations, the realization still felt strangely unreal. Lan Wangji had chosen him. Him. Out of everyone in the cultivation world, out of every omega his family could have arranged for him, out of every respectable and accomplished person that would undoubtedly make a more sensible choice, Lan Wangji had chosen him.

Wei Wuxian smiled so suddenly at the thought that Jiang Cheng immediately looked annoyed at him while tying his ribbons over his red robes. Unfortunately for his brother, there was very little capable of ruining Wei Wuxian’s mood today.

The ancestral hall looked beautiful when he finally stepped inside it. Lanterns illuminated polished wood and white walls while incense drifted softly through the air, mingling with the soured scent of dozens of gathered guests. Ancestor tablets stood silently above them, observing the ceremony just as generations before them had observed countless others. Perhaps he should have felt intimidated by it all. Perhaps he should have felt out of place standing there amongst so much history and tradition. 

Instead, Wei Wuxian found himself searching through the crowd until his eyes landed upon Jiang Yanli. The smile that spread across his face appeared immediately when he finally spotted her. His shijie smiled back at him. She had helped him through everything, since choosing the robes to making his reddened make up.

The sight settled something warm inside his chest.

For a brief moment he found himself wishing his parents could have been there. Wishing they could have seen him standing in wedding robes. Wishing they could have seen Shijie smiling and Jiang Cheng looking increasingly irritated, yet found, every time Wei Wuxian glanced in Lan Wangji’s direction. The thought hurt him, but only briefly. Today felt too bright for grief to linger long. Not when his future stood only a few steps away.

The ceremonies began shortly afterward, one ritual following another as elders guided them through traditions that stretched back generations. Wei Wuxian truly tried to pay attention. He followed every instruction correctly. Every bow. Every offering. Every prayer. For perhaps the first time in his life, nobody could accuse him of causing trouble during an important event.

The issue was that every time he raised his head, his eyes inevitably found Lan Wangji, admiring his husband. The alpha looked unfair in red. There was simply no better way to describe it.

The color suited him entirely too well, and Wei Wuxian found himself staring more often than he should have. Still, he could hardly help himself. This was Lan Wangji. His Lan Zhan. His husband. 

His alpha.

And he looked so painfully beautiful that Wri Wuxian could barely think about anything else besides the warmth rushing through his chest every single time he looked at him.

When instructed to kneel, Wei Wuxian did so immediately. When instructed to bow, he bowed. When instructed to lower himself before his future alpha, he lowered his head until his forehead touched the cool wooden floor beneath him, exposing his own neck to his alpha. And suddenly, for the first time that entire day, the reality of what was happening struck him with enough force to still every other thought.

This was real.

Not one of the countless fantasies he had entertained over the years. Not a dream. Not even a wishful thinking… It was real and happening.

Lan Wangji had chosen him.

The realization settled somewhere deep inside his chest and remained there, warm and steady and impossibly precious. By the time Wei Wuxian raised his head again, he was smiling. A small and sincere smile. One meant only for the alpha standing across from him.

He never noticed that while he spent the entire ceremony looking at Lan Wangji, Lan Wangji’s attention often drifted elsewhere. He never noticed the elder seated nearby, and he never paid enough attention to the tightening jaw or the growing disappointment hidden behind years of discipline and propriety on Lan Qiren’s face.

Because Wei Wuxian wasn’t looking there. He was looking at his future. And he didn't notice that Lan Wangji, unfortunately, was looking at his revenge being fulfilled.

Then… It was done.

The ceremony had ended and the guests had departed. The congratulations had finally stopped and now they had time to breathe. For the first time since arriving at Lotus Pier, Lan Wangji found himself alone with his own thoughts. Unfortunately, the moment he did, he discovered that he had spent remarkably little time considering what came after the wedding itself. The marriage had never truly been the objective. All he wanted with this was to achieve his uncle’s disappointment. Even now, hours later, Lan Wangji could still remember the expression on the elder’s face during the ceremony. 

He had spent years imagining it, wondering whether such dissatisfaction could ever truly appear there. Now he knew how it was, how devastatingly beautiful it was. The memory settled pleasantly inside his chest, bringing with it an ugly sense of satisfaction that he would never willingly admit aloud. 

The plan had worked exactly as intended. His uncle hated the marriage he chose to have. He hated the implications behind it and everything Lan Wangji had carefully arranged over the past months.

The problem was that the success of the plan had left him with an omega. A husband and a marriage. And tomorrow morning, the elders who helped with planning, Lans and Jiang elders, who had attended the ceremony, would expect proof that the union had been completed.

Lan Wangji closed the door behind himself and finally looked around the room. Lotus Pier had clearly spared no effort when preparing it, they were quite flattered to receive him into their family's name. The room had some red lantern lights illuminating the polished wood while red decorations hung from the beams overhead. Flowers had been arranged near the opened windows and ceremonial gifts occupied several tables inside the room. It was a big and warm place… It was welcoming. Like it was meant to be the beginning of something.

Lan Wangji's eyes crossed with Wei Wuxian's body. The omega sat upon the edge of the bed with his back turned toward the door. The sight felt strangely unfamiliar, perhaps because the omega was very quiet.

Throughout the Cloud Recesses lectures, Wei Wuxian had always been in motion, always talking his ear off. Smiling and laughing with his friends, and he was often interrupting and challenging everyone around him. He seemed physically incapable of remaining still for long. Yet, now, he sat silently beneath the wedding veil, hands resting atop red robes embroidered with gold threads, waiting patiently for Lan Wangji to approach him.

For several seconds, neither of them spoke. The silence lingered awkwardly between them and eventually, Lan Wangji crossed the room.

The movement drew an immediate reaction from his omega. Wei Wuxian straightened ever so slightly upon the bed, his shoulders growing tense beneath the heavy fabric as he moved slightly under Lan Wangji's eyes. It was such a small thing that most people would have missed it entirely. Lan Wangji, though, noticed it. He simply failed to think much of it.

His hands settled upon the omega’s shoulders before moving toward the ornaments securing the wedding veil and all of his hair. The process required more care than he gave it, but he was in no place of mind to care enough for the omega's hair now. Several strands of dark hair caught amongst the decorations as he removed them, slipping free only after a brief tug. Wei Wuxian shifted beneath his touch, but no complaint followed. The omega remained quiet throughout the entire process and Lan Wangji found himself grateful for that.

As the final pieces disappeared, dark hair spilled freely down Wei Wuxian’s back. The warm brown strands caught the lantern light beautifully as they cascaded over the crimson silk draped onto his skin. For a brief moment, Lan Wangji simply looked at them before gathering all the hair into one hand and moving it over the omega’s shoulder.

The exposed nape looked so smooth under his eyes. He swallowed around the familiar scent he had spent months encountering throughout the Cloud Recesses. That sweet spiced honey that clung to his throat and made his mouth chew on the most sweet saliva he has ever had inside his mouth when they first met.

That heavy scent had followed Wei Wuxian everywhere. Lan Wangji had become so accustomed to finding it lingering wherever the omega happened to be that he scarcely paid conscious attention to it anymore when they met before. It was simply Wei Wuxian.

Now, though, that scent carried something so pure inside it, it was almost like he was licking it from a lilly. Like the honey had been dripped over its petals.

The pure sweetness filled the space between them as instinct stirred quietly beneath his skin. Not because of affection and certainly not because of love. It was just because this was what came next, the final step in a process they had already begun… The completion of a bond everyone expected them to complete.

His hand settled against Wei Wuxian’s shoulder as he approached his neck. The pure scent made his head spin as it clung to his nose, as it sweetened between his teeth, as he felt something in him urging him to claim. Even though he never truly trusted that he would give his inner alpha what it was asking for. 

His nose pressed to the smooth and milky skin, his mouth hovering over the mating gland in there. He licked over it once, as a warning while his hands hovered down on the omega's body, guiding him to the side, until they were laid on the bed, with LanWangji over him..

The omega followed what he wanted him to do, he laid on the bed and he didn't question what was happening. Why wasn't his alpha unwrapping him, why wasn't his alpha kissing him? 

Lan Wangji felt no slightest trace of resistance. The omega had truly trusted him completely, to the point where he was willingly letting Lan Wangji hover over him, even when they hadn't even talked about it.

But, at the time, Lan Wangji barely thought about it at all. He simply watched the omega follow every touch and every silent instruction without complaint, placing complete faith in the hands of a man who had never once stopped to consider what such trust might cost him. And perhaps that was the first true mistake Lan Wangji had committed in their marriage. 

Lan Wangji opened his mouth over Wri Wuxian's skin and when he felt it placed under his teeth, he closed it. The omega thrashed beneath him the moment the skin finally gave way. When his blood spilled inside his mouth.

It was so sweet that Lan Wangji couldn't hold back from deepening it, from biting harder onto the omega's flesh just to feel his tongue getting coated with his oh so sweet blood.

A cry escaped Wei Wuxian before he could stop it, his entire body jerking instinctively against the hold keeping him in place as panic rushed through him so suddenly that it left him unable to think, his mind filled with pain and he couldn't focus on anything else. His hands reached blindly for something, anything he could grab onto, while the sharp sting against his neck only seemed to deepen, the sharp ache blooming beneath the alpha’s teeth and spreading through his entire body.

It hurt. Heavens, it hurt so much. Wei Wuxian could feel his entire body trembling over the bed. Nobody had ever told him it would hurt like that… If he had been taught he could've prepared himself for that.

Throughout the years, he had heard older omegas speak about mating bonds with embarrassed smiles hidden behind sleeves and knowing looks exchanged across dinner tables. They had spoken of instinct and affection. They always said they just trusted their partner completely. 

Had Wei Wuxian not been trusting his alpha enough? 

His mind jumped to the way the elders said that an omega would supposedly become so overwhelmed by everything surrounding the moment that they would barely notice when the bite happened. But nobody had spoken about pain. Nobody had spoken about the feeling of teeth sinking into his flesh.

Nobody had spoken about the warmth of blood slowly beginning to slide beneath the collar of his robes, and not the way he would feel so terribly sad about it staining his wedding robes. Wei Wuxian could feel his own blood dripping through his skin now, and… He couldn't understand why.

Whatever arousal that had been fluttering inside his lower belly and the heavy anticipating daze over his head moments earlier disappeared beneath the shock. 

The nervous excitement. The butterflies. The embarrassing thoughts he had carried with him throughout the entire ceremony. All of it vanished so quickly it almost felt unreal.

Another broken sound escaped him when Lan Wangji finally pulled away, when his sharp teeth left his throbbing neck. For several moments, Wei Wuxian simply remained where he was, breathing unevenly and trying to understand what had happened. The pain lingered stubbornly beneath his skin, throbbing alongside the confusion steadily growing inside his chest. This wasn’t what he had imagined. It wasn’t what anyone had described to him.

Why had everyone made it sound so beautiful? Why did they lie to him like that?

When Lan Wangji finally looked towards the freshly opened wound, his gaze lingered there only briefly. The bite already looked angry. Blood continued gathering around the broken skin before slipping downward in thin crimson trails that disappeared beneath layers of the expensive red silk. There seemed to be so much of it. Far more than Wei Wuxian had ever imagined there would be.

The alpha said nothing to him. No reassurance words, no apologies for hurting him. He didn’t reach him to cradle him between his arms like Wri Wuxian foolishly waited for… He didn’t wipe the blood away and he didn’t ask whether he was alright.

For a moment, Wei Wuxian waited, moving slowly on the bed. Then a little longer. Surely Lan Wangji was going to do something with him now… Surely there was a reason for the silence. 

His thoughts got interrupted when the mattress shifted beneath their weight. Wei Wuxian lifted his head just in time to watch Lan Wangji rise from the bed and go towards the door. Just like that.

The movement felt so unexpected that his mind struggled to follow it at first. He watched the alpha straighten his robes, watched him take a step away from the bed, and still found himself unable to understand what was happening.

Perhaps he was retrieving something.

Medicine, maybe. A cloth or some water. The healers had left oils and medicines for them inside some of the drawers… But the alpha was really heading to the door and, suddenly, the room felt far too large.

“Where…” The word caught somewhere in his throat. Wei Wuxian swallowed against the tightness there before trying again, his voice sounding smaller than he intended. “Where are you going?”

If Lan Wangji had paid a little more attention, he would have noticed the fear beginning to settle inside the omega’s eyes. Wei Wuxian felt frightened by the idea of being left alone there. He was feeling hurt and… He didn't want to feel alone.

“The wound must be treated.” The explanation came easily enough to the omega's ears and to ease his heartbeat. It was a simple, yet reasonable reason.

He watched as Lan Wangji departed without waiting for an answer, and Wei Wuxian found himself unable to give one anyway. The stinging pain in his neck seemed to spread through his entire body, leaving his thoughts sluggish and strangely difficult to grasp.

So he waited, because… What else could he do? And… At first, he wasn’t worried. Why would he be? Lan Wangji had gone to find a healer for him, he was worrying over him. That was all. The wound must have looked far worse than both of them had expected, and there had been a surprising amount of blood between them. 

Perhaps his husband had simply wanted to make sure it would heal properly. That was the thought that comforted him for a while.

Wei Wuxian remained seated upon the bed, occasionally glancing toward the door whenever footsteps echoed somewhere beyond it. Every sound made him straighten up to see if it was his alpha, slightly before sinking back into place once it became obvious the visitor was headed elsewhere. Lan Wangji would return soon. He knew it… He knew he would come back at some point… He just had to wait, right?

The room gradually grew quieter around him. The celebrations outside faded as everyone settled down for the night. All the voices disappeared one by one around the place, leaving him with only the breeze murmuring through the building and the wet splashes of the wide lake surrounding Yunmeng. The warm lantern lights flickered softly against the walls while the pain in his neck continued throbbing beneath his skin. 

Still, he waited.

He was beginning to feel restless and distressed for some time after. His hands eventually found his hair and he gathered the long strands that were still over one of his shoulders and began braiding them simply to have something to do. When the braid was finished, he unraveled it and started again. Then again. Then once more after that. Anything to occupy himself. Anything to make the waiting feel shorter and to fill his head up so he wouldn't just focus on it.

At some point… Much further into the night, he noticed that the blood had stained part of his collar. The sight made him frown, despite the tears already swimming through his cheeks. Carefully, he shifted the heavy wedding robes aside, folding them like his Shijie had taught him, trying to keep the stain from spreading further. They were beautiful robes. Expensive one. Yu Furen got furious when they appeared with those, she said something about him not being worthy of wearing such expensive clothing. Shijie was the one who said that it was a special day and to ease the Yu Furen anger. They had spent weeks preparing everything for the ceremony… She truly made it as if it was her own wedding.

He didn’t want to ruin them.

The thought felt strangely important. Easier to focus on than the empty doorway. When even more time passed without anyone arriving, Wei Wuxian eventually gathered enough courage to inspect the wound himself. His hand moved slowly over it, he felt his skin, the way it was warm on the edges, the way he had to lightly touch it because it hurt if there was too much force on his fingertips. When he brought his hand down to look at it, his fingers came wetly red. The sight unsettled him more than he wanted to admit.

He got up on his own, swaying to the sides lightly as he walked to the drawers the healers had left for them. He found all the oils and some of the pleasuring toys that some older omegas had gifted him to use with his husband. On the bottom of it, he found the medicines and carefully placed bandages. His fingers moved through the herbs and he made a little pot of a healing mix he always used to put over the wounds that Zidian left on his flesh.

He gathered a bit of it with a cloth he had damped over a bucket of water that they left in there for them too. First, he cleaned the blood that spilled through all of his neck and dripped down to his back. The movements were painful to make, but he managed. Used to the pain. Used to… Being hurt. After cleaning his skin from the blood, he had to be fast at dressing the wound because it hadn't stopped bleeding. Once his neck was neatly wrapped with the white bandage, he came back to the bed.

Still… Waiting. The only thing that could reassure him by now, was the thought that Lan Wangji would return soon. There had to be a reason for the delay… Perhaps the healer was busy or maybe something had happened and they needed him for something. Wei Wuxian pulled a light blanket over himself and curled further onto the bed.

The room felt colder than it had before as he laid down curled on himself while watching the door. Or maybe he was simply noticing now that it had always felt this cold. His eyes drifted towards the door again, and again, and again. Just in case. Just in case Lan Wangji appeared. Just in case the door begins to open. Just in case the footsteps finally stopped outside.

The waiting became harder after that. Not because he stopped believing Lan Wangji would return… But because he would keep believing it. Every passing minute convinced him that surely the next one would be the last he would need to wait. 

Eventually, the exhaustion began winning the battle he fought to keep awake. His eyelids grew heavy and the pain in his neck dulled into a distant ache as the medicine worked its way inside his body. The lanterns burned lower, making the room dim and cooler. Wei Wuxian shifted beneath the blanket and glanced one final time towards the door before sleep could fully claim him.

Then his gaze drifted to the empty space beside him. Towards the untouched side of the bed, the place where his husband should have been. For a brief moment, he simply looked at it and then he closed his eyes, thinking that maybe the alpha would come back to sleep with him.

Unfortunately, Lan Wangji never came back and Wei Wuxian woke up to a cold and empty bed.

That should have been enough to tell him that something was wrong. Perhaps another person would have understood immediately what it meant to wake up alone in the morning after their wedding, only to find that their husband had not returned at any point during the night. 

Yet the thought never truly crossed Wei Wuxian’s mind. Not even once because… He was married to the alpha of his dreams. The alpha who actively chose him. So, maybe Lan Wangji was busy with being welcomed into the Jiang sect, or maybe he got caught up into something and that was all. Something must have happened after he had fallen asleep. 

Perhaps an elder had needed him for something or perhaps there had been some unexpected issue requiring his attention, maybe he had returned during the night and left again before dawn. There were countless explanations available to him, and Wei Wuxian accepted every single one of them without much difficulty because… the alternative simply made no sense.

Days passed after that and then more. And somehow, despite the fact that they now lived beneath the same roof and shared the same marriage, Wei Wuxian found himself barely seeing his husband at all. Whenever their paths crossed, the meetings never lasted very long. Lan Wangji was always on his way somewhere. Always occupied with something… Always… Busy.

At first, Wei Wuxian tried following him for a few moments after their conversations ended, simply to continue talking a little longer, only to discover that the distance between them never seemed to shrink and that the alpha barely looked at him for longer than some seconds. The alpha never told him to leave and never physically pushed him away. He was never cruel to him. Yet somehow, every interaction left Wei Wuxian standing alone once it was over and… The feeling of being abandoned began to linger over him for longer than he wanted it to.

Sometimes, when he caught sight of Lan Wangji disappearing around a corner or leaving a room moments after he entered it, an uncomfortable thought would briefly surface inside his mind. It felt almost as though the alpha did not particularly want him nearby. Almost as if Wei Wuxian’s presence was something to be tolerated rather than desired. 

He never let it remain inside his mind for long though, always finding something else to mess with, while he tried desperately to find a way to explain it before it could settle inside him. Lan Wangji had always been quiet and reserved. Perhaps this was simply how marriage looked for him and Wei Wuxian was expecting too much too quickly.

The wound occupying the back of his neck gave him something far more immediate to focus on anyway.

Every morning, he woke to the same stinging ache beneath the bandages wrapped around his throat. Sometimes the skin felt hot. Sometimes it throbbed so persistently that he found himself touching the area throughout the day without even realizing it. The pain should have worried him. Instead, he treated it the same way he treated every other injury he had ever collected throughout his life… Like an inconvenience.

Nothing more than that.

Lan Wangji had fulfilled what needed to be fulfilled. The bond already existed now and the difficult part was over. Whatever was happening with the wound would eventually resolve for itself. Wei Wuxian had never been particularly frightened of injuries. His body carried enough scars already to make one more seem insignificant in comparison. He had bled before. He had healed before. There was no reason to believe this would be any different.

So he cleaned it, day after day. He presses the ointment he had made and dresses it… Ignoring and waiting until it finally heals.

Because everyone said mating bites healed quickly. Because the healers said to him before his marriage that his body would recognize its alpha, that it would accept the bond and that the wound would close naturally once everything settled. That was how it worked. Every omega was taught that. It was such common knowledge that Wei Wuxian felt almost embarrassed every time he caught himself worrying about it.

The problem was that his mating bite wasn’t healing.

At first, he convinced himself it simply needed another day. Then another day. Then, he thought that it would need one more week. But… Every morning, he carefully unwrapped the bandages only to discover fresh blood staining the cloth beneath. Sometimes it was little enough to dismiss. Sometimes there was so much of it that he had to change his inner robes before anyone would notice. 

The sight unsettled him every single time. Yet even then, Wei Wuxian found excuses to why his body was acting like that. Maybe Lan Wangji had bitten deeper than most alphas, maybe his own body healed slower or he had moved too much while sleeping.

It was always a maybe and never a certainty, but it was already something.

The explanations inside his head became increasingly difficult to believe as the days stretched onward, yet he continued collecting them anyways. The alternative required admitting that something was wrong, and Wei Wuxian had spent most of his life learning how to endure things that hurt. Ignoring pain has always been easier than looking directly at it.

So he continued changing the bandages every morning, he continued pretending the blood did not bother him and telling himself that tomorrow would be the day it finally stopped, but with more months added into his… Marriage, with every morning that he unwraps the cloth from around his neck and finds the fresh crimson staining white fabric once again, he simply wraps the wound anew and sighs to himself, his mind already accepting that he has to wait one more day.

As the months added up to their relationship, Wei Wuxian kept waiting for his husband to come to him.

At first, he thought it would happen naturally. They are married now. Surely they only needed time to settle into the new reality of sharing a life together and the distance between them would gradually disappear on its own once they both grew accustomed to the marriage.

So he waited.

He smiled whenever they happened to find themselves in the same room. During meals, his eyes always sought Lan Wangji first, whenever they crossed paths throughout Lotus Pier, Wei Wuxian found himself brightening immediately, his heart reacting and leaping inside his throat before his own mind could stop it. Sometimes he thought that perhaps this would be the moment where their conversation would finally last longer than a few polite exchanges, that this would be the day Lan Wangji chose to remain beside him instead of continuing on his way.

But… It never happened.

The alpha remained courteous. Respectful. Everything a husband was supposed to be on paper when meeting a wife. Yet the longer Wei Wuxian spent observing him, the more he began noticing something that left an unpleasant weight inside his chest. He noticed that Lan Wangji was kind. He was kind to everyone around him.

Just not to him.

Wei Wuxian watched him thank servants for their work, he watched him patiently answer questions to some of the disciples, he watched him praise the juniors when they performed well and offer quiet encouragement whenever they struggled… He watched Lan Wangji speak to his Shijie with genuine respect and exchange quiet words with Jiang Cheng that, while brief, still felt more natural than anything he ever received himself.

Sometimes Wei Wuxian found himself staring from across a room while Lan Wangji spoke to someone else, wondering what they possessed that he did not.

The thought always felt ugly afterwards, it was like he was being petty and… childish. Yet, it continued returning to his head. He would always ask himself while looking at the lake moving in front of his saddened eyes: Why did everyone else seem capable of receiving that softness? Why couldn’t he receive it too?

The mark upon his neck certainly offered no answers besides hurting him further. If anything, it only made everything worse. The wound continued aching whenever Lan Wangji was nearby, the skin burning beneath the bandages as though his own body was desperately trying to draw attention to something Wei Wuxian would rather ignore. Every time it happened, he found himself touching the spot absentmindedly and wondering whether all bonded omegas experienced the same thing, but there was nobody he felt comfortable with to ask.

Eventually, Wei Wuxian reached a conclusion that seemed perfectly reasonable to his hurt and tired mind: He simply wasn’t trying hard enough.

The realization settled inside his mind with surprising ease. After all, Lan Wangji had chosen him. He had agreed to the marriage. If something wasn’t working between them, then surely Wei Wuxian could put in a little more effort, because the problem surely was him. Relationships required work, that's what his Shijie had always said, because people didn’t simply wake up one day understanding each other completely.

So he tried harder. He asked the cooks for help first, and then he asked Shijie.

After overhearing Lan Wangji politely compliment one of her meals, Wei Wuxian spent the next several days learning recipes he had never paid attention to before. He burned some of them and oversalted others. He   endured endless teasing from Jiang Cheng whenever he appeared carrying ingredients somewhere he clearly did not belong and felt guilty for making his Shijie taste his poisonous food before he gave it to his husband. Still, he persisted… Because maybe Lan Wangji would like it. Maybe he would smile at him.

Maybe he would look at Wei Wuxian the same way he had looked at the food his Shijie had made and he would compliment Wei Wuxian the same way he complimented her. The possibility alone made the effort worthwhile.

It didn't though. His husband gave him a polite thanks and left after eating the food. He felt lost, as if the ground underneath him had just opened and he was falling inside it with nothing to hold onto.

But… He would not give himself up. That may have failed to change anything, but Wei Wuxian had something else to try.

He began caring for Lan Wangji’s robes himself. At first, there were only one or two pieces left amongst the laundry. Then it became a habit, the servants left his alpha's clothes for him to care for. He carefully sniffed them before cleaning them. He couldn't help himself from burying his face inside the white robes and inhaling all of that worn scent. It always made his mind dizzy and it was like he could feel the rainy scent his alpha always carries around pouring over his body and slipping into his lips. It's like being with his mouth open to drink from the rain. 

It never failed to ease his aching away.

He carefully folded them after washing and drying, before storing them away exactly as he imagined Lan Wangji preferred. He liked how the scent lingered on his hands afterwards, how the worn sandalwood would make itself present over his own robes. It always made the big room feel a little less empty. It made the distance between them feel a little smaller.

And perhaps, some foolish part of him hoped that if his own scent lingered on the fabric in return, Lan Wangji might think of him when he wore them. Perhaps he would come looking for him and would stay the night so they could scent themselves.

And… Sadly when that didn’t work either, Wei Wuxian simply found more excuses to be nearby him.

He accompanied Lan Wangji through Lotus Pier whenever he could, he would sit through lessons he had absolutely no reason to attend, he would help organize documents he knew that had nothing to do with him. He usually found himself following conversations about matters that bored him senseless, simply because Lan Wangji happened to be involved in them.

But… None of it worked. No matter how much effort he invested, the result remained painfully unchanged, it was always a polite thank you or a nod, or even the better ones, a brief acknowledgment. And then… Then… It would be distance.

Again. And again. And again.

The worst part was that Lan Wangji never seemed annoyed by him and Wei Wuxian almost wished he was, because anger would have been easier to understand, he even wished to catch some change into his alpha's scent that would hint something, but Lan Wangji remained endlessly polite, respectful and unreachable, his scent never showed anything aside from the normal.

And slowly, without even realizing it, Wei Wuxian began learning just how lonely a marriage could be. As the time continued moving forward, he accepted being alone, whether Wei Wuxian wanted it to or not.

And, as if he wasn't already going through enough, his body began to act against him. Little by little he felt more fatigue than usual, there were a few mornings where getting out of bed felt strangely difficult. Days when his body seemed heavier than it should have, as though someone had quietly draped weights over his limbs while he slept. 

And even if it were happening, none of it felt serious enough for him to share with others. None of it felt worth mentioning to a healer, because everyone became tired sometimes and everyone had difficult days.

So he ignored it. Then… the difficult days became more frequent.

Some mornings, Wei Wuxian found himself staring at the ceiling for long moments before gathering the energy necessary to sit up because his body felt way too heavy for him to even move. Other days, the room tilted unpleasantly whenever he stood up, forcing him to remain still until the dizziness passed. There were afternoons where his joints ached for reasons he couldn’t understand and evenings where simply walking around the Lotus Pier left him exhausted enough to seek out a place to sit.

The changes arrived so gradually that he barely noticed them. Until one day he did. Until one day he realized he was tired all the time. That day was when he was trying to teach a junior how to use his sword the right way and he noticed that his mouth wasn't accompanying his thoughts. And by then, it had already become something normal to him. The kid had to ask if he was alright for him to understand that his breathing felt heavier and that he could barely move.

He did nothing about that besides going to his room to get some sleep. And the strangest part was that the worse he felt, the harder he seemed to try to get his alpha's eyes over him. Perhaps because some stubborn part of him had become convinced that if he simply put in enough effort, everything else would eventually fall into place.

If he could make Lan Wangji smile, if he could make him stay hell if he could become someone worth seeking out instead of someone merely tolerated, then perhaps all the other problems would solve themselves as well.

So whenever his body demanded rest, Wei Wuxian found another reason to keep moving. Whenever exhaustion urged him back toward bed, he sought Lan Wangji out instead.

He forced himself to join the lessons when he barely had the strength to remain standing through them, he kept washing, folding and storing his alpha's clothes as a foolish try, he kept scenting his robes day by day hoping that it would make Lan Wangji come to him. He followed his husband through Lotus Pier despite the ache steadily building inside his bones. He kept trying, even if everyday he returned to the room that should be theirs feeling so drained that he could scarcely remove his own outer robes before collapsing onto the bed.

It never changed anything. Lan Wangji remained polite. Always making Wei Wuxian's heart ache with his politeness and respectfulness.

Always, so… So distant.

Wei Wuxian didn't notice that there were years passing with how hard he had forced himself to try, years passed beneath that same pattern because Wei Wuxian stopped counting them eventually.

He never had a heat after his marriage. At first, he assumed they had simply become irregular. Stress could do that, couldn’t it? He remembered hearing older omegas mention it before, and he had always been a disfuncionalômega whenIt comes to his cycles. Yet months continued passing without any sign of them. Then longer still.

The realization should have frightened him.

Instead, it merely joined the growing list of things he quietly chose not to think about. There were already too many questions occupying his mind, too many things that refused to make sense inside his hurting head.

Every morning, he stood before the mirror and unwound the bandages from around his neck. Every morning, he found the same thing waiting for him beneath them. Angry skin and fresh blood. A wound that had never healed despite the years that had passed since his wedding.

The sight had long since lost its ability to shock him. Now it simply felt exhausting, having to do it everyday on his own because he didn't want his alpha to lose face going over to the healers to say that his mating bite was still bleeding and hurting and that it had never healed. The routine had become as familiar as breathing to him anyways.

Yet sometimes, when he caught sight of his own reflection while replacing the bandages, he found himself staring a little longer than usual at his own eyes. The person looking back at him seemed so strange. Thinner, tired and… Lonelier.

The realization always lingered inside him. And lately, so had the questions.

Why did his husband never come to him? The thought followed him everywhere now… Through meals, through his many sleepless nights, through long afternoons spent pretending not to notice the distance between them. Lan Wangji was an alpha and alphas had needs, instincts… Ruts. The simple reality of being who they were.

Yet in all these years, Wei Wuxian had never once been sought out. Never once had he been wanted during the night. Never once had he seen his alpha coming feverish to him so he could offer his body to ease his pain away. The thought hurt more than he cared to admit because… Why would it never come?

Sometimes, alone in his room, he found himself staring at the empty side of the bed and wondering whether the fault belonged to him, if he had done something wrong, if he was lacking something everyone else seemed to possess naturally.

If he simply wasn’t enough.

The questions never received answers from his exhausted mind. They just remained there, growing heavier with every passing day. Just like the wound that refused to heal. Just like the marriage he continued trying to save alone.

Wei Wuxian woke up one day, after a dream. A dream where his alpha was between another omega's embrace. He felt the urge to throw up, because… It wasn't something so far from what he was thinking, right? Someone had to be doing it.

That afternoon, he found himself sitting beside Lan Wangji, and… His mouth opened alone as his voice came out without his consent.

“What’s wrong with me?”

Wei Wuxian kept his eyes lowered toward the lotus seeds in his hands as he spoke, carefully peeling away the green skin before dropping the pale fruit into the bowl resting between them. He had always found excuses to do little things for Lan Wangji. At first it had been because he wanted to, and then, because he hoped it would make the alpha look at him as something more than a nuisance. Somewhere along the years it had simply become a habit. 

“There is nothing wrong with you.” The answer came immediately, so immediately that Wei Wuxian almost wished the alpha had paused to think first.

Lan Wangji didn’t even look at him when he said it. Instead, he reached for one of the seeds Wei Wuxian had prepared and placed it into his mouth, his gaze drifting elsewhere while he chewed. The sight made something twist painfully inside Wei Wuxian’s chest because that was exactly the problem. There had to be something wrong with him. There had to be. He had spent years trying to understand what was wrong in their relationship and every answer he found eventually led him back to himself.

“Then why don’t you come to me?” he asked, watching his own fingers pause around the half-peeled seed resting in his hands. “Did I do something wrong? Did I fail you somehow? Is there something I’m supposed to be doing that nobody told me about?” The questions felt strangely natural once they were finally spoken aloud, those words had lived inside him for so many years that he sometimes forgot other people didn’t hear them too. His own voice, the one that remained trapped for so long inside him had finally come out and he could notice that it was angry. 

He could remember every lonely night. Every empty morning. Every meal shared with someone who felt impossibly distant despite sitting only a few steps away. And he suddenly felt so angry.

Lan Wangji remained silent and it just added to the boiling feeling inside his chest.

Wei Wuxian found himself staring at the bowl between them because the silence hurt more than any answer probably would have. At least an answer could be understood. Silence could become anything, it could become every horrible possibility a person spent years trying not to think about.

“Why don’t you spend the nights with me?” The question came out with his anger tainting it more than the others, and he hated that, he hated how sharp his voice sounded. Hated how desperate he must look. Most of all, he hated that he still wanted an answer anyway.

But then, the alpha moved to stand on his feet and make his way out of the room, something inside Wei Wuxian immediately tightened and then, it shattered. For years he had watched conversations end this way. For years he had watched the alpha leave while questions remained unanswered behind him. Usually he let it happen. Usually he swallowed the disappointment and convinced himself there would be another opportunity tomorrow, but now, tomorrow had already stretched itself across years and he found, suddenly, that he needed an answer now.

“Lan Zhan...” No response to his sharpened tone.

The alpha continued toward the doorway and Wei Wuxian found himself standing almost immediately, following after him before he had consciously decided to do so. The questions came easier now that they had begun. They spilled from him as though they had spent years waiting for permission to even exist.

“Lan Wangji!” That seemed to get his attention as the alpha stopped walking to look at him. “Why don’t you sleep beside me? Why don’t you touch me? Why don’t you talk to me?” The words followed them into the corridor and he could feel them pouring off his heart. He couldn't take it anymore. There was just so much rejection one could take. “It’s been years! Do you know that? Years, Lan Wangji!I keep waiting for you to come to me and you never do. I keep thinking that one day it will be different and it never is. You talk more to the disciples than you do to me. Hell, Lan Wangji, I'm your wife!” His throat felt tight and his eyes burned as his tone kept increasing until he reached the breaking point where the question that pushed him over the edge came through his lips. “Who’s been pleasing you when you need it? Because I know it's not me!”

Who are you betraying me with?

The question sounded awful the moment it left his mouth. Desperate and deeply humiliating, yet the humiliation barely had time to settle before the sound echoed through the corridor.

For one impossible moment Wei Wuxian didn’t understand what had happened. He only knew that his head had turned sharply to one side and that heat was suddenly spreading across his cheek. The sting arrived a heartbeat later, followed immediately by silence so complete it seemed to swallow the entire building. Even the lake outside sounded distant.

Neither of them moved. 

Wei Wuxian slowly lifted his gaze as he heard his ears ringing and the souring sandalwood scent filling his lungs. Not the one that he loved, the one that made him worried. He could detect the instant and deep regret the alpha's scent shared with him, but… He needed some seconds to understand why.

Across from him, Lan Wangji looked just as shocked.

His hand remained suspended for only a moment before lowering again, the fingers curling into a fist as though he no longer knew what to do with them. Wei Wuxian stared at him and, for the first time in years, something inside him finally stopped making excuses. Because people didn’t avoid things they loved… They didn’t spend years running from them, they didn’t leave them alone night after night, they didn’t look relieved every time a conversation ended.

The realization hurt far more than the slap ever could.

His eyes filled before he could stop them. Not because his cheek burned. Not because the mark on his neck had deepened its stinging feeling. But because the truth had been standing right in front of him all this time and he had spent years refusing to look directly at it.

“I didn’t know you hated me that much.” His voice shook when he spoke, all the anger had left his body. The words came out wet and small and broken somewhere around the edges, yet they seemed to hit harder than every question that had come before them. Lan Wangji opened his mouth immediately afterwards, perhaps to explain, perhaps to apologize, perhaps to deny it entirely, but Wei Wuxian found that he no longer cared enough to hear whatever answer might come next.

Lan Wangji stood frozen where he was after hearing this. The words refused to leave his mind, they had settled heavily inside his chest and seemed to repeat themselves over and over again until he could scarcely hear anything else around him.

I didn’t know you hated me that much.

Hatred. 

Wei Wuxian thought he hated him. Not disliked. Not even resented. Hated. The realization struck harder than any blow ever could as he felt his chest tightening painfully and, for the first time in years, Lan Wangji became aware of the way his own heart was beating and the way he could feel it inside histhroat. The rhythm felt wrong inside his body, too fast and too heavy, as though something was desperately trying to claw its way out from behind his ribs.

He didn't know what to do now because for years, he had avoided conversations like this, he had avoided questions and confessions, he avoided everything that required him to look directly at the consequences of his own choices. And it had always been easier that way, easier to leave and remain silent. 

It proved easier to convince himself that distance was somehow kinder than being honest with his omega. And now, after spending years carefully avoiding the problem, it stood directly in front of him regardless, and to his surprise, he had created a much bigger problem to deal with now.

His omega’s eyes were red and the skin of his cheek was already beginning to darken where Lan Wangji had struck him. His tears continued slipping down his face despite the obvious effort he was making to wipe them away before they could fall any further. 

The sight should have been familiar because Wei Wuxian had cried before, Lan Wangji had seen him laugh and smile before. Yet Lan Wangji found himself staring because he suddenly realized he could not remember the last time he had truly looked at him. Not just a glance in his direction, not just a simple acknowledgement of his presence. The realization settled somewhere ugly inside his chest.

When did the reckless omega become this?

The thought arrived unexpectedly when Wei Wuxian let out a small laugh and lowered his gaze toward his own hands. The sound felt so wrong to Lan Wangji’s ears. He knew Wei Wuxian’s laughter, or at least he thought he did. He remembered loud laughter echoing through Cloud Recesses despite every rule against loud noises, and he remembers his laughter used to be carried across Lotus Pier by summer winds some time ago when they were courting before marriage… And this wasn’t that laughter. This sounded thin, fragile and so worn down. As though something had slowly scraped away pieces of it over the years until only this remained. 

And somehow, Lan Wangji had never noticed it, because he simply didn't care enough..

“I suppose that answers it.” The words were quiet.

Wei Wuxian didn’t look at him when he spoke. Instead, he continued staring at his own feet as though the conversation had already ended, as though there was nothing left worth hearing. Lan Wangji opened his mouth immediately afterwards, but nothing came out. For perhaps the first time in his life, words had completely abandoned him. 

Because where was he supposed to begin? With their marriage? With the lie? With the years of neglect? With the realization that Wei Wuxian had spent all this time believing himself fundamentally unworthy of affection because of choices Lan Wangji himself had made? Every possible explanation felt too small. Too late. 

He remained standing there while Wei Wuxian finally turned away from him. The movement felt strangely final. Not dramatic and not angry as he was before. He was simply leaving. 

“I will bother you no more.”

The words landed softly between them.

Wei Wuxian didn’t raise his voice, didn’t accuse him of anything anymore, he didn't demand anything either. If anything, he sounded relieved, as though some terrible question that had haunted him for years had finally received its answer. Lan Wangji watched him walk away and found himself unable to move. One step became two. Then three as the omega left behind.

The distance between them steadily grew larger and, for the first time since the beginning of their marriage, Lan Wangji truly understood what that distance looked like.

For years, he had convinced himself that this was what he wanted. Distance had been the easier route, the safer and simpler one. Distance had allowed him to avoid difficult truths and uncomfortable questions. Yet as he stood alone in the corridor and watched as Wei Wuxian disappeared from his sight, he felt something inside him finally understand the cost of that choice. Unfortunately, time had a painful way of teaching people when to stop waiting for something and Wei Wuxian has had plenty of it.

The next morning, Lan Wangji found himself searching for Wei Wuxian without meaning to. He wanted to apologize, to maybe talk to him, to try and fix things up.

The realization arrived gradually enough that he almost missed it. His eyes kept drifting toward doorways and courtyards whenever he crossed Lotus Pier while dealing with the endless duties occupying his days. Every distant laugh made him glance up from whatever document rested in his hands, the same happened with all the flashes of dark robes somewhere in the distance that caught his attention before he could stop himself. 

It felt weird for him when he looked around and didn't find the omega waiting for him to give him some of his attention. For years, he had never needed to search for Wei Wuxian since the omega had always found him first. He appeared at meals, at his lessons, outside his study and along the paths connecting one building to another. Sometimes Lan Wangji would look up from his work only to discover Wei Wuxian already sitting nearby, talking about something entirely unrelated to whatever task had occupied the alpha moments before.

Wei Wuxian had always been there… The realization settled heavily inside his chest. Because now, he wasn’t… Because it’s so easy to notice that something is missing when it's already unreachable.

The first impact that Lan Wangji truly noticed was the absence that followed him throughout the entire morning as a ghost slumped over his shoulders. It wasn't obvious enough to immediately identify, yet he knew it was there all the same. He caught himself missing the moments with Wri Wuxian by his side. Missing when the omega started talking about his own lessons, when he brought up something he had bought for Lan Wangji… He caught himself missing the moments where the omega would interrupt his thoughts with that sweet voice of his. Now though, he had no moments where a familiar voice suddenly appeared behind him and demanded his attention. 

For years, those things had been so constant that Lan Wangji had stopped noticing them entirely. Now he found himself noticing their absence instead.

When they finally crossed paths later that day, the encounter lasted less than a minute, Wei Wuxian lowered his gaze before Lan Wangji could properly look at him. The alpha felt his own hand heavy, the same hand he had wronged his omega with. He felt the need to chop it off as the omega offered a polite bow and stepped aside to allow him passage before continuing on his way without a single word. 

Not a single smile followed. Not the slight attempt at conversation, there was no excuse to remain nearby a little longer… Nothing. The entire exchange happened so quickly that Wei Wuxian was already halfway down the corridor before Lan Wangji fully processed what had happened.

He should have felt relieved.

For years, this was exactly what he had wanted. Distance, peace and silence.

He had spent years cultivating that distance between them, avoiding the conversations before they could begin, leaving the rooms first and convincing himself that maintaining boundaries was the kindest thing he could do. Wei Wuxian had been young when they married. Emotional and so, so affectionate. Entirely too willing to attach himself to someone who had never deserved that devotion in the first place. Lan Wangji had told himself that distance would prevent deeper wounds later. That keeping the omega at arm’s length would somehow make everything easier.

Now he finally had what he wanted. Wei Wuxian no longer followed him through Lotus Pier. No longer waited for him at meals or sought him out at the end of the day. He no longer had that look that Wri Wuxian had as if he were the most important person out there. The distance Lan Wangji had spent years building finally existed between them.

And somehow, standing alone in the corridor while watching Wei Wuxian disappear around a corner without looking back even once, the victory felt remarkably similar to loss, enough that it left a bitter taste inside his mouth that the sweet fading spiced honey scent couldn't conceal.

After that days became weeks and weeks turned into months.

He noticed with that bitter taste inside his mouth that the tea he liked stopped appearing on his desk, and the nuts and snacks that used to accompany his paperwork vanished without him ever noticing exactly when. There was no longer any trace of Wei Wuxian’s scent clinging to his robes after they returned from the laundry and he could no longer find it lingering throughout Lotus Pier either. Not in the corridors. Not in the rooms they shared. 

Once, he caught himself entering Wei Wuxian's room just to take a look at his nest, just to try and find any trace of that scent that he was always looking out for. He didn't find it. Not even inside Wei Wuxian’s nest.

That realization unsettled him more than it should have.

For years, the scent had simply existed, it was constant enough that Lan Wangji had stopped paying conscious attention to it. He had found it lingering on furniture, woven into blankets, trapped inside clothing and hidden amongst the objects Wei Wuxian touched throughout the day. It had always been there, like sunlight spilling through the windows, like the sound of water surrounding Lotus Pier. A familiar and completely mundane presence that required no effort to notice because it had become part of the world itself.

Now it was gone.

Even the small things disappeared alongside it. Wei Wuxian no longer appeared during lessons beneath increasingly unconvincing excuses. He no longer followed Lan Wangji through Lotus Pier while talking about whatever thought happened to cross his mind. He no longer interrupted his work to bring him food and sit beside him during meals. He no longer waited for him outside meetings. Lan Wangji was no longer sought out at the end of the day simply because his omega wanted to spend time with him.

The seat beside him remained empty now.

And somehow Lan Wangji’s eyes continued drifting toward it despite already knowing that nobody would be there. That the omega meant what he had said.

The silence grew louder with every passing day and… At first, he appreciated it. Or at least that's what he thought that he did.

There were fewer interruptions, fewer distractions. It meant more time to dedicate toward work. The distance Lan Wangji had spent years creating finally existed between them. The problem was that he had never imagined what it would actually feel like.

One afternoon, while reviewing reports inside his study, Lan Wangji found himself pausing in the middle of a sentence. His brush hovered above the paper while his attention shifted toward the doorway. He remained like that for several moments, staring at nothing in particular, before the realization slowly settled over him.

He was waiting.

The thought felt strange enough that he almost dismissed it immediately, yet his gaze lingered on the doorway. His brush remained suspended in his hand, dripping with ink as he couldn't move while his mind worked that feeling out. And gradually, unwillingly, Lan Wangji was forced to acknowledge exactly what he had been doing.

He had been waiting for Wei Wuxian to walk through the door, he was waiting for the interruption. Waiting for the voice that used to fill the room before he had even looked up from his work, he was waiting for his omega to come to him and give him his dose of company.

Waiting…

He didn't notice at first, but he was waiting just like Wei Wuxian had once waited for him. Now that he finally had the distance that he so desperately built between them, he found himself unable to endure it, and as the weeks stretched themselves into months, Lan Wangji found himself standing outside Wei Wuxian's rooms before he consciously decided to go there.

It was so quiet when he entered. Not the comfortable sort of quiet he was accustomed to within Cloud Recesses. Not the peaceful silence of libraries and empty pavilions where stillness felt normal. This silence felt different, unsettling. It felt like it belonged to an abandoned place. As though life had gradually withdrawn from the room and left only its outline behind.

There was a cup of tea sitting forgotten over the nearby bedside table, the ceramic had long since cooled, accompanying it, he found a tray of food that too remained untouched. One of the dishes disturbed only enough to suggest that someone had attempted a few bites before giving up. 

The sight immediately drew Lan Wangji's attention because Wei Wuxian had always eaten his food… Or that's what he grew used to thinking. Because even during the worst days, while injured or even sick, eating his food had always been something he approached.

Now the meal sat untouched.

The nest occupying the corner of the room looked no better. Blankets seemed to remain exactly where they had been left, lacking the familiar signs of use that Lan Wangji saw that they once carried. There were no impressions left behind by the restless sleep everyone said the omega had, there was no evidence of someone spending hours hidden amongst the layers. 

But, to him, the most unsettling of all was the absence of the scent, because the room no longer smelled like Wei Wuxian.

Lan Wangji stood still for a moment, that realization felt wrong as it sank inside his brain, and for one brief moment, he genuinely thought Wei Wuxian wasn't there until noticing him beside the window.

The large windows overlooking Lotus Pier stood open, allowing the warm and fresh afternoon breeze to drift freely through the room. Sunlight spilled across the wooden floorboards and painted everything in shades of gold. Dust floated lazily through the light while the distant sounds of the compound drifted inside alongside the wind.

Wei Wuxian sat near the frame with his back partially turned toward the door.

From where Lan Wangji stood, he could see the view stretching beyond him. Lotus ponds spread throughout the compound, their waters reflecting the afternoon sunlight and shining it back to the sky. Disciples moved between buildings carrying books and training equipment, as they carried weights under severe commands from their elders, he too could see the servants crossing courtyards with baskets balanced carefully in their hands and, somewhere in the distance, laughter echoed through the air before disappearing again.

It was an ordinary day inside Lotus Pier.

The sort of day that would have inevitably ended with Wei Wuxian chasing someone through the courtyards, arguing over something insignificant or dragging unwilling disciples into whatever idea had captured his attention that morning.

Yet now he simply sat there.

Watching it pass.

Just… watching.

The sight unsettled Lan Wangji far more than the empty room ever had. Because for the first time since entering, he realized that Wei Wuxian wasn't looking out at Lotus Pier the way someone admired a beautiful view. He looked like a man observing a world that continued moving without him.

Lan Wangji remained where he was for several moments, waiting for the omega to notice his presence. In the past, Wei Wuxian would have noticed immediately, he would have turned around with that infuriatingly bright smile before Lan Wangji had even crossed the room, he would have been all over him, talking before he had the opportunity to sit down, filling the room with his voice and his scent until Lan Wangji found himself silently enduring both of them.

Nothing happened.

Wei Wuxian didn't move.

A strange unease settled beneath Lan Wangji's ribs as the silence continued stretching around them. At first, he ignored it, assuming the omega was simply distracted by whatever was happening outside the window, but as the seconds passed and Wei Wuxian remained completely still, he found himself slowly stepping closer, his gaze never leaving the figure seated beside the frame.

Only then did he realize that Wei Wuxian was asleep.

His head rested against the wooden frame at an angle that could not possibly be comfortable, one arm folded loosely across his stomach while the other lay forgotten at his side. His eyes were closed, his breathing slow and shallow, and the afternoon sunlight spilling through the open windows illuminated every detail of his face. For the first time in a very long time, Lan Wangji truly looked at him.

The sight struck him harder than he expected because Wei Wuxian looked tired, not in the way someone looked after a difficult night or an exhausting training session, not the sort of fatigue that disappeared after proper rest and a few days of recovery, but something deeper than that, something that seemed to have been quietly settling into him for a very long time while nobody was paying attention. The shadows beneath his eyes had become impossible to ignore now that Lan Wangji was actually looking for them and his face appeared thinner than he remembered, the familiar softness slowly disappearing beneath sharpness he could not remember noticing before. Even his robes seemed to hang differently upon his frame, the fabric no longer resting where it once had.

There was something fragile about him now that had never existed before, or perhaps it had. Perhaps the fragility had always been there and Lan Wangji had simply spent years refusing to see it because seeing it would have required him to pay closer attention than he ever allowed himself to. The thought lingered unpleasantly in his chest while he continued standing there, watching the afternoon light settle across Wei Wuxian's sleeping figure.

Inside the room, time seemed strangely slower than it did outside. His omega sat alone beside an open window, asleep in the middle of the day while life continued moving beyond the walls of Lotus Pier. Disciples crossed courtyards carrying books and training equipment, servants moved between buildings with baskets balanced carefully in their hands, distant laughter occasionally drifted in with the breeze before disappearing again, and yet Wei Wuxian remained here, sleeping through all of it, as though he no longer had the strength or desire to participate in the world unfolding beyond the glass.

Lan Wangji's gaze eventually drifted lower towards the collar of Wei Wuxian's robes that had shifted slightly during his sleep and, beneath the fabric, just visible above the edge of the cloth, was the familiar white bandage wrapped around his neck.

For a moment, he just stared at it like it was something new.

The thing is, the sight should not have surprised him. Wei Wuxian had worn bandages for years, after all. He had seen them countless times, so many times that they had stopped appearing unusual and had instead become another detail his eyes passed over without thought, another part of Wei Wuxian's appearance that simply existed. Yet now, standing in the quiet room while watching him sleep beneath the afternoon sunlight, Lan Wangji found himself unable to look away from them, because for the first time in years a question finally occurred to him.

Why was he still wearing them?

Standing there, watching the omega sleep beneath the afternoon sun, he found himself unable to remember why he had ever accepted that as normal, and the realization left a bitter taste in his mouth... Because the answer was just as simple as breathing.

He had never asked.

He gathered the omega from the window and carried him to the bed.

The realization struck him immediately because Wei Wuxian felt far too light in his arms, the difference subtle enough that he might not have noticed it years ago, back when he rarely paid attention to such things, yet impossible to ignore now. After settling him carefully beneath the blankets, Lan Wangji remained there for a moment longer than necessary, looking down at the sleeping figure and finding himself strangely reluctant to leave. 

A deep, awakening, part of him wanted to stay until Wei Wuxian woke up. Another part reminded him that his presence had rarely brought the omega comfort the past days, especially after what he had done to him. After everything that had happened between them, after years spent creating distance and the conversation that had finally shattered whatever remained of it, Lan Wangji found himself uncertain whether Wei Wuxian would want to open his eyes and find him waiting nearby. 

In the end the uncertainty won the war. He pulled the blanket a little higher over the omega's shoulders and quietly left the room.

Days passed, then more, and Lan Wangji continued convincing himself that staying away was the correct decision. Wei Wuxian deserved peace and, increasingly, he found himself believing that his own presence brought very little of it. Every attempt to approach him seemed to end poorly. Every conversation carried the weight of years that neither of them knew how to navigate. So he stayed away, telling himself it was for Wei Wuxian's sake, that he would just hurt the omega more if he got closer to him, even as something inside him remained deeply unsatisfied by the explanation.

He did not see him again until several weeks later, during one of the larger gatherings held within Lotus Pier. Attendance was expected and Wei Wuxian's absence would have been noticed immediately, questioned by elders and other sect leaders, so Lan Wangji had not been surprised to find him there. What surprised him was the feeling that something was wrong the moment he saw him. 

At first he could not identify it. He simply found himself looking twice, then a third time, then a fourth, until he eventually realized that his attention kept returning to the omega no matter how many times he forced it elsewhere. Wei Wuxian appeared ill, and once the thought occurred to him, Lan Wangji found himself unable to dismiss it. Discussions unfolded around them, voices rising and falling as matters concerning Lotus Pier and other alliances that Lan Wangji had already been inserted to were debated, yet remarkably little of it managed to hold his attention. His gaze kept drifting back toward Wei Wuxian, and every time it did he noticed something else. 

Every little detail, how he didn't touch his papers, how he didn't move much under everyone's eyes. More than once, when someone addressed him directly and a noticeable delay passed before he responded, as though the words required extra time to reach him. At first, Lan Wangji assumed he was distracted, yet the longer he watched, the less convinced he became. Distraction implied attention had wandered elsewhere. Wei Wuxian simply seemed absent, as though part of him was no longer entirely present in the room.

The conference continued and Lan Wangji continued watching, noticing details that should have been obvious long ago. The way Wei Wuxian occasionally swayed where he sat, the way his fingers tightened around the edge of the table whenever the dizziness seemed to come over him, the faint tremor running through his hands whenever he lifted his teacup. None of it was dramatic enough to immediately attract attention and yet once he noticed, it became impossible to ignore, each detail quietly building upon the last until the image before him no longer resembled the man he remembered.

Then, somewhere in the middle of a discussion he could no longer recall, Wei Wuxian suddenly frowned, his hand rising toward his face while confusion briefly crossed his expression. The movement was small enough that most people would have missed it entirely, yet Lan Wangji had already been watching. 

For a moment, Wei Wuxian simply stared at his own fingers, as though trying to understand something, and then a bright red drop slipped from his nose, tracing a slow path over his plump lips before continuing toward his chin. Another followed, then another, until a thin crimson stream was steadily making its way down his face.

For a moment, Wei Wuxian simply stared at the blood staining his fingertips, looking at it with a confusion that settled somewhere deep inside Lan Wangji's chest and refused to leave. 

Years later, when he thought back to that day, it would not be the blood itself that haunted him, it would be that expression, that brief and terrible moment where Wei Wuxian looked at the evidence of his own body failing him and seemed almost unsurprised by it, as though suffering had become such a constant companion that he no longer recognized when something was wrong.

His chair scraped violently against the floor.

Several people spoke at once while Wei Wuxian attempted to stand, perhaps out of habit, perhaps because he didn't want to cause a scene in front of so many people. Even now, even while blood continued trailing from his nose, his first instinct seemed to be making himself smaller. His hand reached for the edge of the table as though it could steady him, his fingers tightening around the wood with visible effort, but it wasn't enough. Wei Wuxian's knees gave out almost immediately and for one brief moment, he remained suspended between standing and falling, his body swaying forward while confusion still lingered across his features, as though he had not yet realized what was happening. Then gravity claimed him.

Lan Wangji was already moving by then.

The room seemed to dissolve around him as voices rose from every direction at once. Someone called for a healer. Someone else pushed back their chair. Questions began spreading through the gathering before Wei Wuxian had even reached the floor. Lan Wangji barely heard any of it. The distance separating them vanished beneath hurried steps and he reached the omega just as his body pitched forward, catching him before his head could strike the ground.

The impact jolted through his arms.

Not because of the weight.

But because of the lack of it.

The realization struck him with a force that left something cold settling inside his chest. Wei Wuxian had always been small compared to him, yet this felt different. Wrong. The body resting against his arms felt alarmingly light, as though entire pieces of him had quietly disappeared while nobody was paying attention. The sensation immediately brought him back to the afternoon beside the window, to the moment he had lifted the sleeping omega from the floor and noticed the same thing. At the time, he had managed to push the thought aside.

Wei Wuxian stirred weakly against him, his brows pulling together as though even remaining conscious required effort. More blood stained the front of his robes as his unconscious body convulsed, as his omega choked on his own blood flowing over his lips. The sight immediately drew Lan Wangji's attention toward his face and, for a far too long moment, something dangerously close to panic tightened around his ribs because his omega looked worse up close.

Much worse.