Work Text:
君既至，望莫归。
Gong Jun is drifting off to sleep on the small bed he’s made on the forest ground when his ears catch on to the sound of a melody on the wind. He can’t make out the words, but the voice, clear and hauntingly familiar, makes him forget the fatigue of his muscles as it beckons him near.
He had left the last village over a week ago; if he recalls correctly, he should be nearing the next one. But the voice isn’t coming from the direction of the road—it draws him away from it, and deeper into the forest.
Distantly, Gong Jun knows he should be more careful. He’s close to the Dark Forest, now, and any manner of demon could be trying to tempt him to prey on his soul. He knows that, and yet—he also knows, deep in his heart, that this voice won’t hurt him.
He follows the voice to the edge of a deep, wide pond, illuminated by the warm lights of the manor sitting behind it. A sturdy wooden deck extends over the water, and a man sits at the edge of it, singing as his bare foot traces idle circles in the water beside a blue lotus.
“I’m still waiting for the rainfall,” he sings, “to wash away our past together. You were the air I breathed. I can’t return to the day I first met you. I can’t return to that first day…”
Gong Jun takes a step forward without thinking, his boot landing with a solid thump against the wooden deck.
The man whips his head up, silvery hair whipping over his shoulder, and he stares at Gong Jun, dark eyes wide and pink lips parted in the shape of the last word he sang.
Silence hangs between them, a vibrant, delicate thing that Gong Jun is loath to shatter, though he doesn’t completely understand why. He’s never had a first meeting like this before—never felt, before, the thing people meant when they said, it only takes one look for the heart to know.
His heart, Gong Jun is sure, knows something that his mind does not.
The man stands, red and gold pooling around him in a silken wave as he brushes his silvery hair back over his shoulder with an elegant curl of his wrist. The man’s face melts into a veneer of indifference, and Gong Jun realizes abruptly that he’s interrupted what was likely meant to be a private moment.
He takes a step back and bows deeply. “This careless one apologizes deeply for—”
“Trespassing onto my manor?” the man cuts in airily. He crosses his arms, the bangles around his wrist tinkling with the movement. It’s a soothing sound—which is not something Gong Jun should be thinking about at the moment, because he’s just been accused of—
“Trespassing,” Gong Jun repeats. “Trespassing?” He whips his head around and finds that, on the way to the pond, he had in fact made his way through the outer gates of a manor. The circular red doors sit wide open, but that still isn’t an excuse for barging in without invitation and accosting the manor lord. Gong Jun feels himself warming with shame. He deepens his bow. “Zhuangzhu, this careless commoner—”
“Enough of that.” The manor lord draws closer, the sound of bells accompanying each step. “Stand up.”
Gong Jun stands, and keeps himself still as the manor lord comes to a stop an arm’s length from him, studying Gong Jun with an inscrutable expression.
“How long have you been living in the village?” the manor lord says.
“If you mean the one nearby, this humble wanderer has yet to visit.” Gong Jun watches the manor lord’s expression carefully, but nothing about it gives away whether or not that was the answer he was looking for. “For many years now, there hasn’t been a place that this one has called home.”
The manor lord continues to look at him in silence. Then he closes his eyes, a second too long to be a blink, and when he opens them again, there’s something tired in his expression. “It’s only a shichen’s journey to the village from here,” he says, “but it’s best not to travel after nightfall this close to the Dark Forest.” He gestures with a sweep of his sleeve toward the manor. “Why don’t you come in for a rest?”
Gong Jun’s not sure how they’ve pivoted so quickly from accusations of trespassing to being invited to stay for the night, but he knows that at this point it would be rude to decline. “This humble one graciously accepts zhuangzhu’s generous invitation.”
A complicated expression—some kind of cross between annoyance and something else too fleeting to name—flits across the manor lord’s face. “On the condition that you stop talking like that.”
“Um,” Gong Jun says.
The manor lord sweeps past him. “Come.”
The manor is at once elegant and understated, covered in red and gold draperies but only sparsely decorated with wooden furniture and ceramic figurines. Gong Jun’s eyes sweep over it all, unable to recognize much beyond the fact that it feels… empty, but intentionally so. Like there has been space left deliberately for something, but no one had taken the time to go back and fill it.
“Forgive me for the lack of hospitality,” the manor lord says, glancing over his shoulder at Gong Jun, who’s following a few paces behind. “I don’t often have guests.”
“It’s no problem,” Gong Jun is quick to say. “This—that is, I’m very grateful for the place to rest, ah…”
“A-Han,” the manor lord says, answering Gong Jun’s unspoken question.
“Han-zhuangzhu,” Gong Jun says. “If there’s any way that I can repay you for this, and for the intrusion earlier, please let me know. I’ll be happy to oblige if it’s within my abilities.”
Han-zhuangzhu waves a careless hand without looking back. “You said you’ve been a wanderer all your life?”
“As much of it as I can remember,” Gong Jun says, and stops before he ends up delving into a backstory that Han-zhuangzhu probably isn’t interested in hearing.
“It sounds like a lonely way to live,” Han-zhuangzhu says, in a reflective, distant way. “Not having a place to call home.”
Is it any less lonely, Gong Jun wonders but doesn’t say aloud, to have a home with no people? The manor only feels emptier the deeper they go, past vacant seats and barren rooms and bare walls. He wouldn’t be surprised if Han-zhuangzhu had been living here by himself for years.
“I’ve met a lot of interesting people,” Gong Jun says instead. “I have no reason to complain.”
“Is that enough?” Han-zhuangzhu says. “Not having a reason to complain?”
Gong Jun hesitates, and wishes that he could see Han-zhuangzhu’s face. “I’m not sure I understand.”
“Are you happy?”
Gong Jun falls into silence, both out of surprise that Han-zhuangzhu would ask such a question in the first place and surprise that Gong Jun isn’t really sure of the most honest answer to give.
They come to a stop in front of a set of doors, and Han-zhuangzhu turns to face him. From his slightly raised brows, Gong Jun can see he’s still waiting for an answer.
“Happy enough,” Gong Jun says finally.
Han-zhuangzhu searches his face. Then he turns toward the doors, expression not giving away whether or not he’s found what he’s looking for. “Get some rest, daxia. You have a journey ahead of you in the morning.”
Gong Jun is by the pond again.
It’s dark—even darker than before, since this time the manor lights are out, and he can only see as far as the moonlight reveals. A man is kneeling on the deck, his arm reaching out over the water to touch the petals of a blue lotus flower.
It isn’t A-Han—in fact, he feels like the opposite.
The man’s robes are a dark blue-green in the pale light, and his ponytail falls thick and dark over his back. Gong Jun steps closer, feeling a sense of déjà vu in the way his boots thud against the deck.
The man turns. Over his face is a white porcelain mask.
Gong Jun feels himself drawn closer. He doesn’t pay attention to the steps he’s taking—doesn’t even notice he’s taking steps, really, until he’s right in front of the man, who had stood as Gong Jun approached.
Gong Jun can’t see his face—can’t even begin to imagine what may lie beneath the porcelain—but he’s certain, nevertheless, that he knows this man.
Gong Jun lifts his hand to touch the edge of the mask, but he doesn’t try to lift it, just lets his fingers rest along the edge. The man lets him without protest, and for a moment they stand there, staring at the other. The air between them thrums with energy.
“Who are you?” Gong Jun murmurs.
The man’s hand comes up, fingers covering Gong Jun’s. “It’s only here that I can meet you, you know.” His voice is familiar, warm and lightly teasing. “Don’t waste our time on questions you already know the answer to.”
His hand closes around Gong Jun’s fingers on the edge of his mask, and lifts up.
Gong Jun wakes.
The dream lingers on him as he changes out of the sleep robe and back into his armor, but if anything, his conscious mind is even less clear on who he had seen. The more he thinks about it, the more quickly the memory seems to slip from his mind.
He closes his eyes, holds onto the image of the masked man as best that he can, and sets it aside for now.
When he steps out of the room, the manor is quiet. He retraces the steps they had taken to the rooms from the entrance hall, not daring to explore anywhere else on his own, but he doesn’t find Han-zhuangzhu anywhere along the way. It’s only when he steps out onto the deck that he finds something—a small bag, packed with a steamed bun, nuts, a gourd of water, and first aid supplies. The note on top says safe journeys written in a steady hand.
Gong Jun quashes his disappointment at the fact that Han-zhuangzhu seems to have already left. He’s already received more than he expected from his chance encounter; he can’t ask for anything more.
He takes up the bag and exits the manor walls. The gates still sit as wide open as they did when he wandered through last night, and, after a moment of consideration, Gong Jun decides he should probably close them—but no matter how hard he pulls, they won’t budge.
Defeated, he leaves them as is, and trusts that Han-zhuangzhu has some kind of enchantment to open and close the doors as he desires.
As Han-zhuangzhu said, it takes Gong Jun about a shichen to reach the village. He makes his way into a tea shop and, after placing his order and engaging in the proper amount of pleasantries, says, “Do you know anything about the manor a shichen north from here?”
“Ah, I believe you refer to Koi Manor,” the shopkeep says. “The golden koi on the doors are quite difficult to miss.”
Gong Jun, who has not seen golden koi on the doors because he has not seen the doors closed, makes vague noises of agreement.
“The lord there used to serve the Shamaness’s temple and fulfill the wishes made in the pond,” the shopkeep says. “He still does, on occasion, though he’s long been released from service and gone on to build that manor.”
“What happened?” Gong Jun says.
The shopkeep hesitates and glances deliberately at the front counter, even though it’s an odd enough hour that there’s no one here but Gong Jun. “It’s a bit of a long tale.”
Gong Jun obligingly passes over a few more coins.
The shopkeeper pockets them and smiles. “This is all ancient history, mind, so I can only tell you what I’ve heard passed down. Aside from Han-zhuangzhu, there used to be another at the temple, Zhe-gongzi. The two of them were cultivation partners, and together they served the temple, granting wishes and protecting us against demons from the Dark Forest.
“One day, a man came claiming that the Shamaness and her servants had lost their way and fallen into the demonic path, using illnesses and misfortune that had befallen the village as proof. Suspicions grew, and one night, the villagers gathered to place talismans to force demonic energy to reveal itself. It turned out that the man was partially right, and Zhe-gongzi had fallen into the demonic way.
“When his nature was revealed, he went into a rampage and nearly killed Han-zhuangzhu, but he was stopped just in time. Still, the pain of losing his zhiji was too great, and so Han-zhuangzhu built his manor and went into seclusion. It’s been six hundred years since, and still—”
Gong Jun nearly spills tea on himself in his haste to lower the cup. “Six—six hundred years of seclusion?”
“It takes a thousand years to cultivate the fortune to meet your zhiji,” the shopkeep says mildly. “Surely it must take at least that long to grieve their loss.”
Gong Jun pictures Han-zhuangzhu sitting on that deck by the edge of the pond, singing to himself for six hundred years as he lives in his big, lonely manor—the manor that had been designed and built to welcome another who would never return.
Gong Jun pictures it, and he aches.
“Who was that man?” Gong Jun says quietly. “The one who came to warn everyone about the temple.”
“I heard that he was the follower of a different god, worshipped by the villages to the north.” The shopkeep scratches his head. “But it’s been so long, no one knows for sure.”
That would make sense, in a twisted way that Gong Jun feels sick to think about. “The Shamaness’s temple is still here?”
The shopkeep nods. “Keep walking toward the south gate, you can’t miss it. And the pond is there, if you’d like to make your wish.”
“It’s really Han-zhuangzhu who still grants the wishes?”
“Everyone seems to think so,” the shopkeep says. “Can’t be proven, though. He’s rarely been seen since he entered seclusion, maybe not even at all in the past century. In fact, I’ve heard that his beauty is literally blinding if you gaze upon him for too long.”
Gong Jun is very much still in possession of his vision, but he thinks he agrees with the statement in a metaphorical sense. But another detail catches his attention. “He hasn’t been seen at all? Not even at Koi Manor?”
“Well, now, the gates of Koi Manor have been closed for six hundred years,” the shopkeep says. “If not for his appearances outside, who would even know he was still there?” The shopkeep pauses, and Gong Jun sees a moment of clarity in his eyes before he turns to Gong Jun with suspicion and says, “Say, all these questions that you have about the manor and its lord… You don’t mean to tell me that—”
“Thank you for your time,” Gong Jun says, dropping a few more coins on the table before and nearly tripping over himself in his haste to leave the shop, ignoring the shopkeep’s calls for him to wait.
His mind races as he hurries down the street. The manor gates shouldn’t have been open to him, which explains why Han-zhuangzhu was so surprised to see him there—no one else was ever meant to be within those walls, no one else save Han-zhuangzhu and one other.
Was it an accident? Some flaw in Han-zhuangzhu’s enchantment? Or something about Gong Jun himself that’s enabled him to go where no one else can?
The question weighs on him as he makes his way over to the Shamaness’s temple and kneels beside the pond. The koi swim close as if to greet him, and he smiles at them and waves. Blue lotuses float on the water, the same kind that he saw in Koi Manor—and in his dreams. He reaches out, caressing a petal with a gloved finger, and feels more lost than he ever has before.
He stands and draws a coin from his bag, weighing it in his hand as he considers his options.
He pictures Han-zhuangzhu again, staring across the water, singing songs to be heard only by his ears. He pictures the cross of his arms, the closed-off set of his expression, the empty manor that he calls home.
He takes a deep breath, and tosses the coin into the pond, watching it sink beneath the depths.
I wish that Han-zhuangzhu won’t be alone.
Since he can remember, Gong Jun has felt himself drawn to places far away. He’s spent years wandering from village to village, in search of something he hasn’t been able to name.
All he knows is that he hasn’t found it.
He seldom spends more than a week in any given village, helping out with any errant tasks they need done in exchange for room and board, before wandering to the next one. It’s an aimless journey, and it often feels like an endless one, but still he’s drawn from place to place, searching, searching, searching without looking back.
He’s never wanted to stay anywhere. Sometimes, he wonders if he was ever meant to stay.
And yet.
The sun is beginning to sink in the sky. Gong Jun should think about finding the local inn, trading coins and labor for a bed to rest in.
Instead, his mind returns to Koi Manor.
He isn’t sure if it’s the manor or its lord that’s captured his attention—but he knows he’s never felt so drawn to a place or a person like this before.
His mind is telling him something, and Gong Jun is determined to listen.
The gates are still open when he arrives, though he doesn’t see the figure of Han-zhuangzhu by the pond. Reluctant to actually enter the manor itself, he wanders the grounds around it instead, taking in the landscape in the light of the sun. A large tree grows on the far side of the pond, and beside it is a stone lantern that catches Gong Jun’s eye. However, when he takes a closer look, he realizes it isn’t a lantern at all. Inside is a pool of water, upon which floats a single blue lotus petal that seems to pulse with a faint, warm glow. He doesn’t realize he’s reaching out until cold fingers snap closed around his wrist.
The hold is loose—as soon as Gong Jun flinches back, the hand falls away and back to Han-zhuangzhu’s side.
“If you’ve returned to make a wish,” Han-zhuangzhu says, “you’ve come to the wrong place.”
Caught, Gong Jun clasps his hands together and bows deeply. “Zhuangzhu—”
Han-zhuangzhu touches him again, catching his arm and lightly pushing him upward. “Enough already.” The tiredness in his voice pulls Gong Jun up straight. “Didn’t you find the village?”
“I did.” Gong Jun folds his hands behind his back so that he won’t fiddle with them. “I came to learn more about Koi Manor while I was there. I understand I’m fortunate to meet zhuangzhu.”
“Indeed.” Han-zhuangzhu’s gaze is still cryptic. “Came to test your fortune a second time, then?”
While Gong Jun wouldn’t have put it that way, he can’t deny that he had come with the hope of seeing Han-zhuangzhu again. He inclines his head wordlessly.
Gong Jun can’t imagine it’s enough of an answer, but Han-zhuangzhu seems to accept it as one, anyway. He turns away, walking back toward the entrance of his manor. “And what else did you learn?”
Gong Jun jogs to catch up to him. “I was told that you’ve been in seclusion here ever since the—the passing of Zhe-gongzi.”
Han-zhuangzhu’s step stutters, only noticeable because Gong Jun has fallen into his rhythm and becomes off-step. “I don’t need to hear pretty words. He was killed.”
The way he says it is cold and detached—but Gong Jun thinks it sounds more that he feels too much, rather than not feeling anything at all, even after six hundred years.
“Killed, then,” Gong Jun says softly.
Han-zhuangzhu glances over his shoulder, but turns forward again too quickly for Gong Jun to read his expression.
“They said that he hurt you, back then.”
“It wasn’t his fault,” Han-zhuangzhu lifts his chin. “A-Zhe—he would never have hurt anyone if he’d had the choice, least of all me. They wanted him to be a villain, so they made him one.”
“I’m sorry,” Gong Jun says.
Han-zhuangzhu stops in the middle of the deck and turns to face Gong Jun fully, robes swishing around his ankles. His brows are furrowed. “That’s it?”
“What?”
“That’s all it takes for you to believe me?”
“Between zhuangzhu and the village, you were the one who was there,” Gong Jun says. “You were the one who knew him, and who his betrayal would hurt most. Is there anyone else I should believe?”
Han-zhuangzhu continues to look at him with that strange expression, something both like confusion and not. “You really—” He sighs, arms relaxing by his sides. “Forget it. And stop calling me zhuangzhu.”
“Ah,” Gong Jun says, startled. “Then what—”
“A-Han,” Han-zhuangzhu says, enunciating each syllable.
It feels overly familiar for an at-least-six-hundred-year-old manor lord that Gong Jun’s only met the day prior, but he also feels the need to respect the at-least-six-hundred-year-old manor lord’s wishes, so he says, carefully, “A-Han.”
A-Han’s smile is a small, gentle thing that still somehow spreads to every part of his face. Gong Jun can’t look away.
“A-Han,” he says again, to keep that smile on his face. “Friends call me Junjun.”
“Junjun,” A-Han says, the name smooth and honeyed in his voice. “Why don’t you come in for a rest?”
It’s nighttime, and Gong Jun is sitting in front of the pond. The man in blue-green sits beside him, hand resting on top of Gong Jun’s on the deck—a warm, familiar weight on his skin. His face is still unreadable under his porcelain mask.
Gong Jun doesn’t know how long they sit there in silence, watching the koi swim around their feet.
“Close your eyes,” the man sitting next to him says, voice low and quiet.
Gong Jun obliges wordlessly, darkness sliding over his vision. The hand over his shifts, and presses down, and then the weight of the man falls over his lap. Gong Jun keeps his eyes shut, but he hears the soft clatter of the mask being placed on the deck, and feels the hot breath fanning over his lips.
A warm palm presses over his eyes, and then warm lips press against his. The kisses are unhurried, but brief—little moments of pressure, one after the other, with not enough time for Gong Jun to inhale in between. He holds on to the back of the man’s thighs and lets his breath be stolen.
After a minute or a shichen, the man draws back, Gong Jun leaning forward to chase him without thought; the man kisses him firmly once more.
“No questions tonight?” the man says.
Gong Jun licks his lips. “Zhe-gongzi,” he whispers, feeling extremely certain of the name even though he has no reason to know. “You’re Zhe-gongzi, aren’t you?”
The man kisses him again, though it’s more of a pinch than a kiss. Gong Jun gasps.
“That isn’t what you call me,” Zhe-gongzi says, and he lifts his hand from Gong Jun’s eyes.
“Can you tell me about him?” Gong Jun says as he balances himself on the branch of A-Han’s peach tree. “Zhe-gongzi, I mean.”
“What do you want to know?” A-Han says from below, where he’s ostensibly waiting to catch Gong Jun in case he falls. Gong Jun has some doubts about how that would end, so he’s simply resolved not to fall.
Gong Jun plucks a peach from the branch and deposits it into the basket strapped on his back. “What was he like?”
A-Han hums in thought. “A brat.”
Gong Jun laughs, startled. “Really.”
“Really!” A-Han says, though he doesn’t sound annoyed. “Don’t ask questions if you’re not going to accept my answers, daxia.”
“This humble one begs your forgiveness,” Gong Jun says, and tosses a peach down in apology. A-Han wipes it on his sleeve and takes a bite that leaves his lips shiny with juice. Gong Jun shivers, remembering his dream with Zhe-gongzi, and diverts his gaze to the tree before his thoughts can wander. “Why was he a brat?”
“He was clingy and stubborn,” A-Han says. “He wouldn’t have gotten into half the trouble he did if he weren’t so stubborn.”
“He wouldn’t have been himself if he weren’t,” Gong Jun says, understanding that much.
“No, he wouldn’t have,” A-Han says, quietly enough that Gong Jun would have missed it if he weren’t paying attention. Then, at his normal volume, he says, “Back then, the Shamaness was trying to contain demonic energy from the Dark Forest within the temple, but some of it was leaking out. A-Zhe was absorbing all of it. No one realized until after he was gone.”
“He didn’t tell you?”
“He didn’t want to cause trouble for anyone, I think,” A-Han says. “In the end, I think the outcome was what he would’ve wanted. No one was hurt but him.”
“That’s not true,” Gong Jun says without thinking. “You were hurt, too.”
“My injuries weren’t severe.”
“That’s not what I meant,” Gong Jun says, and waits until A-Han holds his gaze, questioning. “You’re hurt, even now. Here.” He places his fist over his own heart.
A-Han lowers his head again, and falls silent.
Gong Jun turns his gaze to the peaches again. “You said the outcome was what he would have wanted. What would you have wanted?”
“For none of it to have happened in the first place,” A-Han says wryly, and Gong Jun realizes how insensitive the question sounded. Before he can apologize, though, A-Han says, “Considering what did happen, this is the only outcome that makes sense. I’ve thought, before, that maybe it would have been better if I’d met my end with him, but he wouldn’t have wanted that. And that wouldn’t have been fair.”
“You don’t wish that the Shamaness would have stepped in to stop the villagers?” Gong Jun says. “Or that anyone else would have stood up?”
“Anyone else standing up would have just been throwing away their fate,” A-Han says. “As for the Shamaness… she had her reasons. If it had gotten out that her improper seals had led to the leak of demonic energy… even though it wasn’t intentional, it would have caused the people to lose faith in her. In the end, what she had to protect was bigger than me or A-Zhe. It isn’t the choice I would have made, but I don’t blame her for it.”
Gong Jun slowly tucks the peach he’s holding into his basket and turns to A-Han. “You’re a kind person,” he says, believing it completely. He’s met many people on his travels—the best and worst of what humanity has to offer, and everything in between. Many times he’s been disgusted by the greed he’s seen, the cruel willingness of some people to use others until there was nothing left, and even then seeing what they could scavenge from the ashes.
If he had known someone like A-Han before, would he have ended up on this lonely path?
“I think A-Zhe was kinder,” A-Han says.
Gong Jun looks at him as he slowly clambers across to the last branch, worried he’d touched upon something he shouldn’t have, but A-Han’s lowered gaze is more reflective than upset.
“What do you miss most about him?”
A-Han’s head stays lowered.
Gong Jun gives him time, filling his basket with peaches in the meantime. When Gong Jun is reaching carefully over the end of the branch, A-Han says, “I miss the way he always knew the right thing to say. Whenever I had my doubts or concerns, he knew exactly how to make them go away. He knew the questions to ask to get me thinking about things in the right way. I miss…”
Gong Jun silently edges his way back to the trunk of the tree.
“I miss having someone to talk to,” A-Han says.
Gong Jun’s known that A-Han must be lonely, but to hear it so clearly in the timbre of his voice makes his heart tremble and fall. He drops from the trunk and stops an arm’s distance away from A-Han.
“Let me stay,” Gong Jun says.
It’s a sudden proposition, but Gong Jun realizes that the moment he decided to return to Koi Manor was the moment he knew that he wanted to stay.
He doesn’t know why. He hasn’t known A-Han for very long at all, and deep inside he still feels the longing for something unknown, but the call of the vast world outside is weak, so weak compared to the call of the heart in front of him.
“If you would have me,” Gong Jun says, “then I would want to stay with you.”
A-Han stares at him for a long time, the half-eaten peach forgotten in his hand. Gong Jun doesn’t dare look away. After an eternity of silence, A-Han says quietly, “You don’t even know me.”
“I know enough,” Gong Jun says. “And I know myself. I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it.”
“You could change your mind,” A-Han says, and Gong Jun thinks it’s meant to be dismissive, but his voice edges more toward desperation.
Gong Jun takes a step closer, close enough to touch, though he doesn’t. He looks up at A-Han. “You’ve been alone for six hundred years,” he says gently. “Won’t you at least let me try? And if it’s not working, if it doesn’t feel right—whether it’s been a week or a month or a year, if you ask me to leave, I will.”
A-Han is silent again for a long time, long enough for Gong Jun to wonder if he’d made a mistake by asking and to consider what he could say to take it back.
“A-Han—”
“I won’t ask you to leave,” A-Han says. He steps into Gong Jun’s space, and closes his hand around one of the ropes attaching the basket to Gong Jun’s back. “But I could never ask you to stay, either.”
“Then it’s a good thing I’m offering,” Gong Jun says.
“You really—” A-Han cuts himself off and sighs. “Ah, Junjun. What am I going to do with you?”
Gong Jun blinks. “What do you mean?”
“Nothing,” A-Han says, letting his arm drop. “Nothing at all.”
Gong Jun doesn’t know where he is, but he knows who he’s with.
Zhe-gongzi is in his lap again, his hand fisted around Gong Jun’s bound hair and their lips sealed together. His robes are loosened, and Gong Jun’s hands are under them, fingers nearly encircling Zhe-gongzi’s slender waist.
He doesn’t know what it is about these dreams, about Zhe-gongzi, that make him feel so much, that make him yearn so much for something—something he still can’t name. An image that hovers at the edge of his vision, but when he tries to bring it into focus, it blurs away, escaping him in a single tear.
Zhe-gongzi kisses it away. “Don’t be sad, Junjun,” he murmurs. “We can’t handle it when you’re sad.”
“We?”
Zhe-gongzi hums an affirmative against his cheek, before leaving a searing trail of open-mouthed kisses down to his throat. “You should kiss A-Han,” Zhe-gongzi says, his breath warming Gong Jun’s skin. “He’s been waiting a long time, you know.”
Gong Jun swallows. His Adam’s apple brushes against Zhe-gongzi’s lips. “Waiting for someone to be with him?”
Zhe-gongzi shakes his head, and places his hand on Gong Jun’s chest. “Waiting for you.”
A-Han looks up from his qin and squints at Gong Jun.
“Sorry,” Gong Jun says weakly. “I told you I’m not any good at it.”
“You’re…” A-Han takes a moment, and Gong Jun is sure that he’s assessing the benefits of lying.
They’re out on the deck by the pond, A-Han kneeling in front of his qin. Gong Jun’s learned that A-Han enjoys playing music outdoors, and often comes to sit and listen, but this time, he was bullied into singing.
Gong Jun enjoys singing, but he’s aware that he doesn’t have the voice control to do it well. It’s just never been a skill that he’s put any real effort into working on for the simple reason that, generally, no one asks him to sing for them. He’s been focused on more practical skills like cooking, fighting, and generally being strong enough to lift heavy items and climb trees to pick fruit.
“You really don’t have to try to find a nice way to put it,” Gong Jun says as he watches A-Han struggle. “Why don’t you sing instead? I like listening to your voice.”
“Oh?” A-Han says, preening, and Gong Jun is convinced that the only reason he thinks to describe A-Han’s little smile as kissable is that Zhe-gongzi has implanted impure thoughts into his mind. “And you’ll play for me instead?”
Gong Jun looks uncertainly at the instrument, and A-Han’s elegant fingers curled over the strings.
“Or maybe dance?” A-Han suggests.
Gong Jun winces. He has heard… not particularly kind things about his dancing. But again he’ll own up to the fact that it isn’t a skill he’s ever bothered to improve—the number of requests he’s had to dance have been so few he could count them on one hand.
“You can’t just be swinging your sword around all day,” A-Han says.
“I’m obviously not,” Gong Jun says. He isn’t swinging a sword around most days; in fact, he isn’t sure he’s even used it once since coming to the manor. “I’m not often paid to be an entertainer, all right. Why don’t you show me your dancing?”
“Ah, I think you should dance first.”
Gong Jun raises an eyebrow. “Could it be that I’m not the only one who can’t dance?”
A-Han scoffs. “I can dance. Of course I can dance. You dare disrespect me in my own manor?”
“No, no, of course I wouldn’t dare,” Gong Jun says, hiding a smile.
A-Han rises to his feet and glides toward Gong Jun. “I think you are,” he says, his voice a dismal mockery of outrage. “I think that perhaps you’re getting too comfortable here.”
“Am I?” Gong Jun says, feeling the smile creeping onto his face regardless.
“You are,” A-Han says. His lips are pursed like he’s trying not to smile, too.
Gong Jun really needs to stop looking at his lips.
“I wonder what we should do about you,” A-Han says.
Gong Jun lowers his eyes, peering at A-Han from beneath his lashes. “I’ll accept whatever punishment you deem fit.”
“Hm.” A-Han’s eyes sweep up and down his body, and Gong Jun has to suppress a completely inappropriate response. A-Han snaps his fingers. “I think you should dance.”
Gong Jun starts to roll his eyes, catches himself, and bows. “I think that would be more of a punishment for zhuangzhu to have to witness.”
A-Han is silent for long enough that Gong Jun glances up at his vaguely stunned expression. A-Han seems to snap back when their eyes meet. He reaches out and pokes Gong Jun’s forehead lightly. “What happened to you? I thought you weren’t good at talking.”
“I never said that,” Gong Jun says, straightening up. He’s been wandering for so many years; how could he have survived if he wasn’t at least a little good with words? “It’s just around you that I—”
A-Han raises his eyebrows.
“Nevermind.”
“No, I want to know now.” A-Han comes in close enough that, if Gong Jun were to lean forward just a bit, they would be kissing. “What about me?”
Gong Jun has no thoughts left in his brain except, “You’re very close.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“Why,” Gong Jun says, “are you this close?”
“I was just curious,” A-Han says, without backing off. “So I see that you’re still not good at talking if I get closer, hm?”
“Zhuangzhu,” Gong Jun says a little weakly. “Please don’t tease.”
“What did I tell you about calling me zhuangzhu?” A-Han says, in what is definitely a teasing tone of voice. He leans closer. Their noses bump. “And who’s teasing?”
Gong Jun takes a step backward, and falls into the pond.
Gong Jun is on a bed.
The crisp, red sheets beneath him are both familiar and not—as are the cool lips pressed against his, the long fingers wrapped around his hips, and the warm body steadily rocking into him.
He gasps, awareness and arousal surging into him all at once, and then overwhelming him as he comes.
The hands slide up his body, skimming past his stomach and chest to clutch at his shoulders for leverage. The thrusts deepen, and Gong Jun chokes. “Xiaozhe.”
Xiaozhe makes a muffled, desperate noise, and slams into him one final time before collapsing on top of Gong Jun, heedless of the mess between their bodies. He wraps his limbs around Gong Jun and holds him tighter, presses in deeper, like they could meld into one if he tried hard enough.
Gong Jun kisses the top of Xiaozhe’s forehead, warm and damp with sweat. “Xiaozhe,” he murmurs. “You’ve been lonely, too, haven’t you?”
Xiaozhe somehow clings to him even tighter and whispers, “Not anymore.”
Gong Jun’s still only half-awake when he shoves his hand beneath his robes and works himself quickly to completion. He spends perhaps the next half shichen floating in a wrung-out daze, and then spends the next few minutes after coming back to himself scrambling to find a washcloth to wipe himself off with.
But even if he can erase that evidence, he unfortunately can’t erase A-Han’s memory of other incriminating behavior—something he really wishes he were capable of when A-Han smiles slyly at him from across the table and says, “Good dream?”
Gong Jun flushes, but he can’t deny the nature of what his dreams have been. He looks down at his bowl. “What did you hear?”
“Just this and that,” A-Han says. Gong Jun suspects he’s enjoying it. “The name you said—”
Gong Jun chokes on his rice.
“—if you said a name, I didn’t hear it,” A-Han finishes. He sways forward, propping himself on his elbow. “But you did say one, didn’t you?”
Gong Jun occupies his mouth with drinking water so he doesn’t have to talk.
“Your dreams,” A-Han says, from far too close. “Could they be about me?”
“No no no, I wouldn’t dare,” Gong Jun says quickly. He lowers his cup to the table. “It’s actually that… for a while now, I’ve been dreaming of Xiaozhe.”
A-Han’s lips part slightly. “Who?”
“Zhe-gongzi,” Gong Jun says, realizing his slip-up too late.
“But what did you call him?”
“Xiaozhe.” The more he says the name outside the dream, the more right it feels in the shape of his mouth. “I don’t know where I heard it, but it’s what I called him, last time. He didn’t like when I called him Zhe-gongzi.”
“He wouldn’t,” A-Han mutters. “How long have you been dreaming of him?”
“Ever since the first night.”
“Dreams like this?”
“No, not—this is the first time it’s been like this,” Gong Jun says, flustered. “Usually it’s just kissing?”
“Usually just kissing,” A-Han says, like he can’t believe what he’s hearing.
“Not always!” Gong Jun should have known he would have to talk about this with A-Han eventually. He should have known to prepare for this, and now he regrets not doing it sooner.
“All right.” A-Han crosses his arms. “In which dreams have you not kissed, or done… other things?”
“The… the first one.”
“And?”
“Just the first one.” Gong Jun shields his eyes with a hand. “A-Han, really, I can’t control my dreams, all right? I don’t know why they’re happening.”
“It’s happening because he wants it to,” A-Han says, sounding more exasperated than anything else. “A-Zhe still has some power here, but maybe only enough to enter your dreams. How typical. He always was the impatient one. Barely alive and has barely spent more than a moment with you, but he still can’t keep it in his robes.”
Gong Jun spends a moment trying to make sense of that sentence—any of those sentences—and doesn’t succeed. “He’s—I’m—what?”
“What?”
“How?” Gong Jun says, but also, more importantly, “Why me?”
A-Han, for once, hesitates to answer. He looks down into his lap and toys with the edge of his sleeve for the space of a few long, silent breaths.
“You asked, before,” A-Han says finally, “if I’d wished there would have been someone else to help stand up for us, back then. There was someone. A hero who had settled in the village, helping us fight against the demons of the Dark Forest.”
The words resonate in Gong Jun’s mind, and he both knows and doesn’t know where they’re going. “What happened to him?”
“He was our closest friend,” A-Han says. “He would have fought for us until his last breath.”
“You didn’t let him.”
A-Han shakes his head. “I told him to leave us.”
“Did he?”
“Would you have?”
“No.” Gong Jun doesn’t even have to stop to consider it. “You would have had to work hard to convince me.”
“That’s one option,” A-Han agrees.
“And what’s the other?” Gong Jun says, stomach sinking.
A-Han’s lips press together in a thin smile. “Take away the choice.”
Gong Jun’s breath catches. “What did you do?”
“He shouldn’t have had to make the choice in the first place,” A-Han says, as if to defend himself. “He had his whole life ahead of him, but, righteous boy that he was, he couldn’t stand to see the injustice of it. Never mind that I told him his death would mean nothing. The choice was between him and us, or just us. He wanted to believe he could make a difference.”
“You didn’t let him find out.”
“I sealed his memory.” A-Han places his palms flat on the table and looks straight at Gong Jun. “I sealed his memory and sent him away. I don’t regret it. To lose him and A-Zhe both would have been too much. At least I could know that he was still out there, somewhere, living well, even if it wasn’t with me.”
“It’s been centuries since then,” Gong Jun says. “You’ve never wanted to look for him?”
“That’s the curse I put upon myself, isn’t it?” A-Han’s smile is wry. “I didn’t think I could handle it, seeing him and knowing that he didn’t know me in return.”
“If you sealed his memories, then you could unseal them, couldn’t you?”
“I could,” A-Han says. “But to what end? He had a life before me, and I ensured he would have a life after me. I sent him off with my own hands. I never wanted him to come back.”
“That’s not true.” That, at least, Gong Jun is sure of.
A-Han looks at him, unsettled. “What?”
“The manor gates opened for me,” Gong Jun says. The gates that have never opened for anyone; the gates that have sealed off Koi Manor from the outside world for centuries. “If you didn’t know I would come—if you didn’t want me to come—why did you build the gates with the expectation that I would?”
A-Han’s expression crumples. “I…” He ducks his head lower, and he trembles.
Gong Jun crawls to his side and gently wraps his arms around him, tucking A-Han’s head under his chin. A-Han leans into him, and breathes.
“It feels worse, sometimes,” A-Han whispers eventually, “to have hope.”
“I know,” Gong Jun says, and holds him closer.
Gong Jun is sitting on the stone steps of the Shamaness’s temple, looking over the pond. A-Han’s sleeping soundly with his head laying heavy and warm on Gong Jun’s lap, his breaths coming even and slow. Gong Jun massages his scalp with gloved fingers.
There’s a quiet step and a rustle of fabric, and then Xiaozhe is settling himself on Gong Jun’s other side. Gong Jun looks at him and wonders how much is real—and how much is memory, or imagination.
“A-Han will be upset if you hurt yourself thinking too hard because of this,” Xiaozhe says.
“A-Han gave me amnesia for six hundred years,” Gong Jun says, lightly tugging at a strand of A-Han’s hair, “so I think he can find it in his heart to forgive me this time.”
Xiaozhe laughs, his smile catching the corners of his eyes. Gong Jun reaches up and touches the edge of his smile without thinking. Xiaozhe’s smile tilts, softens. He presses his face into Gong Jun’s palm.
“I still can’t remember everything,” Gong Jun says. “It’s coming in pieces.”
“It was a long time ago,” Xiaozhe says. “Even if he hadn’t sealed your memories, it would be hard to remember it all.”
“I remember some things, near the end,” Gong Jun says, letting his hand drop.
Xiaozhe raises his eyebrows, gesturing for him to go on.
“I remember we fought,” Gong Jun says, “because you wanted me to leave.”
“It wasn’t your time.”
“It wasn’t your time, either.”
Xiaozhe raises his chin and sets his mouth into a familiar, stubborn line. “None of us wanted to lose the other. You understand that.”
Gong Jun looks down at A-Han in his lap, and gently tucks a lock of hair behind his ear. “We don’t know that things would have ended poorly, if I’d stayed.”
“We don’t know that things would have ended well, either.” Xiaozhe puts his hand over Gong Jun’s. “Junjun. It doesn’t matter. What’s happened is done. There’s no use dwelling on it.”
Gong Jun falls silent. Then, “He still misses you.”
“I know.”
“I miss you, too.”
“I know.”
Gong Jun turns to him, and Xiaozhe leans in, pressing their foreheads together. He’s solid and warm against Gong Jun, memory and imagination and past and potential all in one. When Gong Jun hugs him he feels that he’s holding all that Xiaozhe was and could have been—feels the love and the joy and the frustration and the helplessness and the grief so overwhelming that, for a moment, he wonders if he will ever feel anything else.
“Xiaozhe,” Gong Jun whispers, voice thick with everything he hasn’t said, might never say aloud for fear that it will consume him. “Will you ever return?”
Xiaozhe cups Gong Jun’s face in his hand. “I don’t know,” he says, mournfully, like he wishes he had a better answer to give. “But even if I don’t, you’ll be okay. You’ll both be okay.”
“I miss you,” Gong Jun says again, desperately.
Xiaozhe leans in and kisses him sweetly. “Live well for me, Junjun.” And then, “I miss you, too.”
Gong Jun wakes, face wet with tears.
“Junjun.” A-Han hovers over him, face twisted in worry. He reaches out with a finger and catches Gong Jun’s tear. “Junjun, are you all right?”
“No,” Gong Jun says. “No, I’m not.”
And then he rolls over, buries his face into A-Han’s shoulder, and cries.
“Before he cultivated a human form,” A-Han says, placing his hand on the stone not-lantern, “A-Zhe was a lotus.”
Gong Jun looks at the blue petal, suspended inside, and remembers how familiar it had felt, the first time he’d seen it. “This is part of him?”
“A piece of his soul, when it shattered,” A-Han says. “The only piece that I was able to save. I don’t know if the rest are still out there somewhere, and I don’t know if he’ll be able to return, even if we find them, but—I have to believe that as long as some part of him is still alive, then that hope is still alive, too.”
Gong Jun links their fingers together. He doesn’t make any promises about how things will turn out; he can’t. But what he can promise is this:
“Whatever happens, we’ll face it together.”
“Together,” A-Han says, and squeezes his hand.
Gong Jun squeezes back.