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“Dan Heng,” Caelus says. “We need your help.”
He’s clearly not alone; behind him, Dan Heng can see three curious heads trying to peek past where Caelus stands, leaning in the doorway of the data archives. March had sat him down through a few minutes of a video from Caelus’s red-haired streamer friend—Guinaifen, was it?—of the four of them shrieking as they ran from some mysterious, shadowy figure. But there had been a judge with them, so at least Caelus was staying out of trouble. Hopefully.
“Of course.” Dan Heng shuts the book in his hands. “What is it? If it’s about the heliobi, I’m afraid I probably know about as much as you do—only from the history books. It was before my time. But I can check the archives, if you want.”
“Well, it is about that. Sort of.” The serious expression on Caelus’s face, so unlike him, is what sends unease thrumming through Dan Heng more than anything else. “It’s about the general.”
“The general?” Dan Heng asks, surprised. “What about him?”
Caelus exchanges silent looks with his companions. “Well, he’s… not well.”
Dan Heng feels his grip tighten around the spine of the book he still holds. The edges dig into his skin, a warning. “What’s wrong with him?”
Jing Yuan had looked fine, if a bit pale still, the last Dan Heng had seen him. He had only laughed when Dan Heng asked after his health. Only overwork, that’s all. And then, at Dan Heng’s skeptical look, I haven’t been getting into any more battles as of late, I promise.
Not for the first time, Dan Heng wonders why the fake exuviation ritual had left him with all the power of destruction in his hands, and none of the healing; as if whenever had done it had been trying to write his fate for him, engraved immutably in stone from the start.
“He’s been possessed by a heliobus,” Caelus says. “And we can’t get it out of him. That’s why I’m here.”
“You haven’t seemed to struggle with any of the other heliobi so far.” Dan Heng frowns. He forces himself to swallow down the wave of anxiety and concern that washes over him. The days where the Xianzhou’s people couldn’t control the heliobi were long gone, he tells himself. Such a thing was easily fixable, as evidenced by Caelus’s own recent adventures. “Why do you need my help for this one?”
“The heliobi trap their hosts within their own mind. In a maze of their own making.” Caelus sighs. “And the general’s is far more complicated than any of the ones we’ve been in before. Usually all we have to do is solve some riddles or puzzles relating to their past, but with Jing Yuan—we can’t figure it out. We tried asking Yanqing, and Fu Xuan, but even they couldn’t do it. Other than them, the only person who might know…”
He looks pointedly at Dan Heng.
“I don’t think… I don’t know the general like that, Caelus,” Dan Heng says. He thinks of Jing Yuan’s eyes, the warmth of it on his back as he stepped out of the Shackling Prison for the first time. And, more recently: Jing Yuan’s gentle gaze on him on the beach of the Scalegorge Waterscape. His response to Dan Heng, ever patient. Who you are is a question that only you can find the answer to. How Dan Heng knew, as instinctively as breathing, that it would be what Jing Yuan would say. The way Dan Heng had wanted to hear it from him anyway. The words feel untenable in his mouth. “I don’t have those memories. I can’t help him. Not in the way you’re thinking.”
What did Dan Heng really know of Jing Yuan? How much of it belonged to Dan Feng, and how much of it belonged to him?
I am not him, Dan Heng had said. The distance between the two of them, in his memories, stretched in an impassable gulf, devastatingly vast.
Caelus only looks back at him, pitying, as if he knows. “If not you, then who else?”
—
They find Jing Yuan resting in the shade of the only tree in the garden of his home.
Jing Yuan’s epithets have always puzzled Dan Heng. For all that Jing Yuan tries to disguise it with his purposefully cultivated demeanor, Dan Heng has always thought the unyielding steel of Jing Yuan’s dedication to be painfully obvious. It is as Jing Yuan had said: you cannot hide fire with paper. A blade cannot be hidden by silk. How could anyone ever look at Jing Yuan and think that he did not care?
Now, though, it is a different story entirely. With his eyes closed, his head tilted away from the light of the afternoon sun and a half-empty jar of wine in his hand, he is the exact embodiment of his unofficial title. The Dozing General. It is as if he is where he belongs—a purely ornamental flower, nestled amongst the spring orchids and fallen gingko leaves.
Dan Heng turns to their companions. The expressions on Huohuo, Sushang, and Guinaifen’s faces reflect the unease that he feels. Even Guinaifen has lowered her phone, turning off her stream. “Could you leave us?”
Huohuo fidgets with the talisman hanging from her hip. “Will you need our help?”
Caelus scans Dan Heng’s face. Whatever he sees there causes his brows to furrow. “I think we’ll be fine. I’ll yell for you if we do.”
Jing Yuan sits up as the two of them approach, his gaze half-lidded as he watches them draw closer to him. He does not smile. Clad in all white, the fall of his ribbon against his hair is like a splash of blood, vivid against his pale lips and cold eyes. It looks wrong. It feels wrong.
“Caelus. You’ve brought Dan Heng with you, this time,” Jing Yuan says. “Here to try again?”
“General. Can’t you feel that there’s something wrong?” Caelus straightens. “Why are you here? Everyone is waiting for you, back at the Seat of the Divine Foresight.”
“There is nothing wrong.” Jing Yuan tilts his head. “I simply wish to rest. That is all. For so long, I have borne all of these responsibilities alone. Do I not deserve this?”
“Is that what you really want? To retire?” Dan Heng asks. “You haven’t chosen your successor. You were the one who said the Master Diviner wasn’t ready yet. Are you willing to place the fate of the Luofu in her hands like this?”
“Ha!” Jing Yuan barks out a laugh. “The fate of the Luofu. Why do you think that matters to me? Why should I care about the petty struggles of an ungrateful people? What have they given me in exchange for all my years of hard work? Only an endless stream of criticism, and nothing more.”
“You aren’t alone,” Dan Heng says. “And the Jing Yuan I know would never say this.”
Jing Yuan laughs once more, bitter. “If you truly think that, then let me ask you: who is the general that you really think you know?”
The look on Jing Yuan’s face, just a half-step away from cruel, makes a strange dread creep into Dan Heng’s veins. Never before has the general looked at him like this, so devoid of care. He hadn’t even noticed its excess until it was so wholly absent.
Beside him, Caelus clutches the Harmonic Chime in his hand, his grip white knuckled around the metal of it. “Dan Heng.”
Dan Heng forces himself to turn away from Jing Yuan’s accusing stare. “Ring it.”
—
When he blinks open his eyes, Dan Heng finds himself in the courtyard of a grand residence—or to be more accurate, one that had been once been grand.
It’s Jing Yuan’s, he realizes. A recreation of where he had just been, down to the placements of the cobblestones, only with the patina of thousands of years of neglect and loss over it.
The beds of the artificial rivers that run through it are long dried, the graveyard of hundreds of lotus flowers. A thin layer of ivy covers the walls enclosing him, stretching up towards the twilight sky. The stone lions guarding the doors still remain, cobwebs stretching between their open jaws, lonely without the rosebushes that had once accompanied them.
“Caelus?” Dan Heng calls. “Huohuo? Guinaifen? Sushang? Anyone there?”
As he expects, there is no answer. The only thing that meets him is the stillness of the night. The stagnancy of it feels more peaceful than eerie. Dan Heng can’t help but think of the slow waters of the ancient sea where he was reborn, the flashes of quiet that he remembers from his time in his shell. Curled up, waiting for a new life. What does it mean that this landscape of Jing Yuan’s memories reminds him of his first home?
The setting is a far cry from the claustrophobic maze that Dan Heng had been expecting. Which begged the question: did Jing Yuan’s mind… recognize him?
He didn’t want to examine the reasons why that thought made his chest ache.
In the center of the courtyard stands that solitary gingko tree, the branches long withered and empty. A lone finch perched on it watches Dan Heng as he makes his way along the faded pathway. In the dim light of the full moon, he catches a glimpse of the feathers at the corners of its eyes: red, like the crimson of Jing Yuan’s ribbon.
When he steps through the archway at the other end of the courtyard, it is as if he has entered a different place entirely, straight into the bustling streets of a festival. He is joined by the indistinct shadows of dozens of people, weaving their way around Dan Heng as if he is not there. They cluster around food-laden stalls, hawking shopkeepers, and clamoring performers, setting off fireworks and sparklers.
“Do you think he would like it?” An all too familiar voice comes from beside him, and Dan Heng whirls around, only to see—
The man himself. But not as Dan Heng knows him now. No, this is a younger version of Jing Yuan, still soft around the edges; his white-silver hair still as messy as ever, pulled back in a careless braid over his shoulder, his eyes bright in a way that belies his youth. Here, he is wearing not the ornamental trappings of armor that the station of the Arbiter-General requires, but plain cotton robes, the only thing betraying his distinguished status the exquisitely carved jade pendant hanging from his hip.
The pendant of a dragon, Dan Heng realizes. And, when he spies the thing attached to it, the knowledge of what he is seeing sears through him like a bolt of lighting: a red tassel, one that Dan Heng has seen many times before.
“I think he would,” the man beside Jing Yuan says, amused. “It kind of looks like you, after all.”
At first, all Dan Heng can see of the Jing Yuan’s companion is his back and his white hair, drawn up in a bronze hairpin. It is strangely familiar—and then, when the man turns to look at Jing Yuan, it reveals the side profile of none other than Blade. Dan Heng’s fingers twitch as he reaches for a spear that he doesn’t have. But this, too, could not be him, not with his violet eyes and the wrinkles that line the corners of his brows. From his left ear hangs that same, damning red tassel; a perfect match to the one in Dan Feng’s right and now dangling from Jing Yuan’s belt.
“Yingxing’ge,” Jing Yuan huffs. The name, again, jolts through him. But what makes that lump in his throat stick is the softness with which Jing Yuan says it, the worn, exasperated fondness—and the way that Yingxing only laughs in response, reaching up to tuck a unruly strand of Jing Yuan’s hair behind his ear.
“Am I wrong, little bunny?” Yingxing says. “I remember when you were this tall,” he continues, his hand hovering somewhere along his hip. Jing Yuan smacks at it playfully. “Your hair was bigger than your head was, back then, and you were always hopping about everywhere with so much energy…”
“I’m going to tell Feng’ge that you’re bullying me.”
“I quite think he would agree with me.” Yingxing teases, before his expression turns into something more serious. The fondness in his eyes still lingers, turned towards the object of his affections. “But you should go see him now. The night isn’t getting any younger, after all.”
Jing Yuan tucks whatever he’s just purchased into a small cloth bag, out of Dan Heng’s sight. “I wish you could join us. If only you didn’t have that commission to finish.”
“Well, you’d have to blame that stingy bastard of a Chief Artisan who thought it was a good idea to give us all a deadline the day after the Mid-Autumn Festival,” Yingxing sighs. “But I got the chance to see him earlier today, and you haven’t yet, so it’s only fair, hmm? Go on.” He shakes his head, a smile creeping back onto his face again. “And give him this from me.”
As Dan Heng watches, his pulse pounding rapid-fire, Yingxing closes the distance to brush a kiss against the corner of Jing Yuan’s mouth, delicate. And Jing Yuan—Jing Yuan tilts his head up to receive it, as if it was a normal, expected thing. The blood roars in Dan Heng’s ears.
At the moment the two of them meet, skin against skin, the illusion of the crowd fades almost as quickly as it came, leaving behind nothing but an empty hall. The last thing to disappear is Jing Yuan’s smile, the tenderness at its corners so soft it hurts to look at. Not for the first time since entering Jing Yuan’s mind, Dan Heng feels his heart throb, his throat clenching. In the absence of that warmth, he feels cold.
And so, when he sees the flash of a crimson ribbon out of the corner of his eye, disappearing past another mysterious archway, what else can he do but follow?
—
He never gets any closer to that elusive shadow of Jing Yuan, even as he makes his way through the winding maze. Never more than a flash of that ribbon, the trailing corner of a white robe.
All the while, his thoughts whirl around in an endless loop inside his mind: at the forefront of it the sight of Yingxing’s hand on Jing Yuan’s. The way Jing Yuan had looked at him. The red tassel on his belt. The kiss. “Give him this from me,” Yingxing had said.
Were all three of them…?
When Dan Heng rounds the next corner, his own question is answered for him, because—there, finally, is that phantasm of Jing Yuan, with his face pressed into the elegant slope of Dan Feng’s shoulder. The edges of his mouth are tipped into a peaceful smile. They sit together in the candlelight of a lover’s pavilion, a rosewood-carved guqin splayed out before Dan Feng.
As Dan Feng’s fingers dance over the strings, the mirages of the two of them vanish mid-song, gone between one note and the next.
Jing Yuan’s voice still sounds in his ears, barely a whisper. “Feng’ge, will you finish the song for me?”
Whether that request comes from the illusion of the heliobus or the parts of Dan Feng that linger still in Dan Heng’s veins, Dan Heng can’t be sure. But in the face of it, he is helpless.
So he settles himself down in the grass, in front of the guqin. When his hands touch the strings, the rest of the music springs as easily to his fingertips as the cloudhymn magic does. But with it, as he plays, comes an indescribable longing that threatens to spill from his throat. His chest hurts, like a tender bruise, from the force of holding it back.
If he closes his eyes, he can feel the warmth of an exhaled breath on his shoulder.
How closely had Dan Feng held Jing Yuan to his heart to engrave his song into his bones, everlasting enough to carry it through the cleansing waves of the ancient sea?
The door creaks open as the strains of the last verse melt away into the darkness. The sound of retreating footsteps begins once more. When Dan Heng stands up, his knees feel weak, unsteady.
These memories that Dan Heng is seeing, that Jing Yuan’s mind is showing him… these are the only shrines that Jing Yuan would ever be allowed to have for Yingxing and Dan Feng. With their statuses, their relationship would’ve been taboo even at the peak of the High Cloud Quintet’s glory. Now, considering the enormity of Yingxing and Dan Feng’s sins, Jing Yuan would be better off if the knowledge of its existence was lost to time.
And by all appearances, that had been the case. Before this, Dan Heng would’ve never suspected a thing. But now…
Why was this how the heliobus chose to weave its prison around Jing Yuan? Did that mean that Jing Yuan was still unable to let go of this part of his past?
When he looks into Dan Heng’s eyes, is Jing Yuan imagining another’s in their place?
The idea of it burns. He turns away from the truth of the fire in his heart, the thing that had been kindled by the sight of their hands on Jing Yuan. The light reveals far too much. But Dan Heng can still feel the heat, licking at his heels as he chases, chases after that red ribbon, once more.
—
As if Jing Yuan’s mindscape knows of the identity of its intruder, the final intersection that he comes across… doesn’t quite contain a riddle. Not in the way that Caelus had described.
Instead, there are three locked doors. The trunks of three trees guard their fronts, their branches interlocking over him in a canopy so thick he can barely see the sky. The glimmer of the stars peek between them, just barely, just enough for him to see a little.
But unlike their lone sibling in the courtyard, their branches are not empty. Instead, they are clustered with blooming flowers, jasmines and camellias and chrysanthemums, all of them a pure, gleaming white. As if sensing his entrance, the petals twirl down from above to rest in his waiting hands. They feel like silk against his skin, like snow.
Dan Heng is no fool. He knows what they mean.
When he looks up, Dan Feng is watching him from the shadow of one of those trees, sitting gracefully by its roots. This memory of him, just like Yingxing, is perfectly rendered, down to the singular strand of hair curling around his temple in the humid dampness of the air. In his hand he holds a bouquet of white chrysanthemums. He tilts his head at Dan Heng, as if asking:
Which path will you take?
Not yours, Dan Heng thinks. Innocence, devotion, love; what are they all, against the unyielding passage of time? He wants to ask Dan Feng, in return: what do you bring him now but grief?
He crushes the petals between his fingers. When he unfolds his grip, instead of their remains, the flawless blossom of a lotus flower rests in his palms. The fragrance of it swirls through the air. No longer will I live in your shadow.
And especially not in his heart.
Dan Heng sucks in a breath, letting the scent of it fill his mouth, his lungs. He thinks of the snow-white strands of Jing Yuan’s hair, the pale pink curve of his lips, the slant of his cheekbones.
And with a flick of his hands, he sends out a blast of spiritual energy, opening all three doors at the same time. The trees vanish, white mist dissipating into the wind. Dan Feng is the last to go, his eyes bright in the darkness. In it, Dan Heng almost thinks he sees a flicker of approval.
There are no more doors now, only one final, singular archway. Beyond it, Dan Heng hears the rhythmic waves of the ocean and the rushing sound of seafoam. The sound of Jing Yuan’s voice.
He steps through it.
—
The beach of the Scalegorge Waterscape opens up before him, unraveling like a tapestry. But where the sight of it in the real, waking world had filled him with an interminable sense of regret and the remembrance of the feeling of shackles around his wrists, the rendition of it now only draws up a nostalgic ache, even though he has never seen it like this.
Here is where Dan Feng ends, and where Dan Heng begins.
The blackness of the ocean, reflecting the Luofu’s artificial night, looks so much like the view of the starry seas from the windows of the Express.
In front of him, Dan Heng can see the start of Jing Yuan’s hurried footprints in the sand. His eyes follow it to where the shore meets the sea, where he finally spots who he has been chasing all this while.
“Feng’ge!” Jing Yuan calls. A near-childish elation rings through his voice, pure and uncomplicated, the brightness of a lover finally having had the chance to meet the subject of his adoration. Uncaring of where it soaks the haphazardly rolled-up hems of his pants, he wades into the water, all in pursuit of the figure that waits for him at the end of it all, in the sea, under the light of the full moon. Hou Yi, chasing after his Chang’e.
Dan Feng turns to meet him. The light of Jing Yuan’s joy reflects off Dan Feng’s eyes and his slow, dawning smile, transforming the cold, sharp lines of his face into something softer.
“Jing Yuan,” Dan Feng says, and draws Jing Yuan into his arms, like he is cradling something precious. The brightness of the sun, between his cupped palms. Dan Heng can’t look away from the way Dan Feng’s hands meet around Jing Yuan’s waist. The way his fingers curl into the fabric of his robes.
“Feng’ge,” Jing Yuan repeats, laughing. Dan Heng has never seen him smile like this. His cheeks are flushed, his lips red, slightly wet—Dan Heng imagines them biting into the sticky coating of a tanghulu, sweet. They disappear from sight as Jing Yuan leans down to tuck his face into the curve of Dan Feng’s neck. “I missed you. Thank you for waiting.”
“Of course,” Dan Feng replies, easy. He strokes a hand along the line of Jing Yuan’s jaw. “I’m sorry if you had to leave the festivities early. If only I could’ve joined you…”
“Don’t be sorry. It’s not your fault that the Preceptors are so restrictive. Yingxing had to leave early to perform his duties at the Artisanship Commission, anyway.” Jing Yuan pulls back just enough so he can reach between their bodies and into the folds of his robe, drawing out that cloth bag from earlier and unwrapping it. “Besides, I brought you something. We can have our own celebration right here.”
Dan Heng is expecting something like a token. A hairpin, perhaps, or a bracelet. But instead, Jing Yuan places a folded paper lantern into Dan Feng’s hands. Painted across it is a charming sketch of a rabbit, curled around the outline of the moon.
“Oh? You shouldn’t have.” For all the extravagant, luxurious detailing of his robes and the clarity and fineness of the jade he wears, Dan Feng looks inordinately pleased at such a small thing. He trails his fingers along the strokes that make up the rabbit’s ears.“Is this…” Dan Feng sounds like he’s holding back a laugh. “Is this supposed to be you, Yuan’er?”
Jing Yuan sighs. “Tell me why Yingxing said the same thing.”
“The resemblance is striking.” Dan Feng’s smile turns from amusement to a quieter, gentler thing. “If the rabbit is you, then… This is your wish? Truly?”
“Yes.” Jing Yuan returns the smile, but the twist of his lips is uncertain. “Do you think it’s… foolish?”
“No,” Dan Feng says. He unfolds the paper lantern, sending a flicker of his spiritual energy into it. It springs to life in his hands, billowing like the feathers of a bird about to take flight. “But even if it is, then let us be fools together.”
Jing Yuan looks like Dan Feng has just handed him the world. “Okay.” He brushes a kiss to the corner of Dan Feng’s mouth, a perfect mirror to the one that Yingxing had granted him. “Yingxing and I can be your little jade rabbits, keeping you company for all your nights.”
Dan Feng laughs. “I could only be so lucky.”
The two figures linger in the sea, their hands intertwined. They watch as the lantern sails up into the sky, fading amongst the glow of the moon, until it is nothing more than a now-distant star.
But even stars die. And Dan Heng knows how this story ends. The moon waxes and wanes. Hou Yi waits on in the mortal world, alone.
Dan Heng traces Jing Yuan’s footsteps to where the waves meet the sand. His own leave behind no mark; his clothes are dry where they touch the water. The answer to the final puzzle is this: Dan Heng walks until he reaches Jing Yuan and Dan Feng. And then he goes even further, till it is up to his chest, his neck. The icy chill of the ocean against his skin feels like freedom, like the petals of the lotus flower tucked in his pocket. Like rebirth.
The illusion of Jing Yuan turns away from Dan Feng to meet Dan Heng’s eyes. Even like this, even though he is not real, it still feels warm as ever.
Above, the moon remains, and Dan Heng sinks beneath the waves.
—
When Dan Heng opens his eyes, this time, he is back in that same courtyard again. But now, instead of the songbird, it is Jing Yuan who awaits him under the twisting branches of the tree. This time, it is not the youthful apparition that Dan Heng has been chasing for so many midnight hours. He can tell, just by looking at the tilt of his head and the curl of his spine, facing away from Dan Heng; this is his Jing Yuan.
The shape of his back, silhouetted in the moonlight, looks impossibly lonely.
The man before him feels nearly unreachable, if not for the singular thread that binds them still. The one that Jing Yuan had created the moment he cast away Dan Heng’s shackles and set him free. In the darkness, hidden away in the confines of Jing Yuan’s mind, it was a little easier to admit the existence of it to himself. Dan Heng reaches out a hand and follows its winding path to where it ends in his heart, where that unfamiliar, quiet ache lingers.
Look at me, he thinks, honest with himself, for once. Me, not him.
“Jing Yuan,” Dan Heng says. Jing Yuan turns to face him.
“Dan Heng,” he says, his voice quiet. Dan Heng’s pulse skitters at the sound of his name and the sight of that familiar gaze, the gentleness of it scorching over his skin. “You’re here.”
“Were…” Dan Heng furrows his brows at Jing Yuan’s knowing tone. “Were you expecting me?”
“Ah, well. I suppose I was.”
“Why?”
“I’m afraid I’ve gotten a little lost, you see. And if there was anyone who would be able to find me in this place…” Jing Yuan smiles, a little sad. “It could only be you. I’m sorry.”
If not you, then who else?
Dan Heng lowers his eyes. “Why are you apologizing?”
“I promised you, didn’t I?” Jing Yuan murmurs. “That you would be freed from all the ties that bound you to this place. And yet, it is my own weakness that leads you back here again.”
“So, what?” Dan Heng asks, stung. “I should’ve just left you here?”
“Ah.” Jing Yuan inclines his head. “I am grateful to you for your help, of course. I’m afraid the heliobus possessing my body could do far too much to the Xianzhou if left unchecked for too long. My duty has yet to end, after all. But… it is peaceful here. Tempting.”
An ugly, bitter sensation rises in his throat. “You would rather stay here living out a lie?”
“Is that how you see it? A lie? Perhaps you’re right. Sometimes, I wonder if I ever knew them at all.” Jing Yuan exhales. “No, I have left the remnants of those bygone dreams behind me long ago.”
“Then what are you waiting for? Let’s leave.”
“I can’t.”
“What?”
“I’ve tried to leave. I can’t. The heliobus promised me everything I would ever want,” Jing Yuan says. He smiles again, his eyes unreadable. “And when I refused, it chose to trap me here, to show me the memories of what I had already lost. To show me what I could have if I agreed to its whims. What do you think that means, Dan Heng?”
Dan Heng steps closer, his lips curling into something that feels almost like a snarl. Jing Yuan doesn’t back away, though Dan Heng can see his eyes widen just a fraction; for all his foresight, it seems that Jing Yuan hadn’t been expecting him to do that.
“Did you lie to me, then?”
Jing Yuan’s lips part in surprise. “What?”
“What you said to me, on the beach. Tell me. When you look at me, who do you see?” Dan Heng narrows his eyes. “Do you see me as Dan Heng? Or the illusion of Dan Feng?”
Jing Yuan closes his eyes. “You, Dan Heng. Only you.”
Dan Heng draws out the lotus flower from his pocket. Instead of its unblemished petals, a folded paper lantern lies in his hands. On it, a rabbit leaps across the stars, its limbs outstretched.
The voice of the heliobus echoes around them. I could give you everything you had. Everything you want back. Why choose the uncertainty of a future, when I could guarantee you the past?
Jing Yuan’s hands tremble as he traces the rabbit’s path through the galaxies, free and unfettered.
“This is my wish,” Dan Heng says. “Do you think it foolish?”
“No,” Jing Yuan whispers. His eyes are bright. “But even if it is, let us be fools together.”
Dan Heng breathes a wisp of his qi into the lantern, now clasped between their meeting hands. The now-lit wick flickers, wavers, and then turns into a gentle blaze, like the one in his chest, filling up his lungs.
“Then come with me,” Dan Heng murmurs. Jing Yuan leans in, and Dan Heng tilts his head up to receive it, expectant.
Behind him, he feels a ripple of spiritual energy as the heliobus is sucked into the Lunaumbra Gourd. The earth rumbles beneath their feet, the world around them shuddering as the illusion destabilizes—but Jing Yuan’s hands on him are steady, unwavering. When he curls his fingers into Dan Heng’s hair, it feels like a promise.
In the now overfull rivers bloom hundreds of lotus flowers, their petals swirling in in an exultant dance as the wind carries them away. The lantern soars into the sky. The rays of the rising sun are warm upon Dan Heng’s face.
Above them, the light chases away the shadows of the past, and Jing Yuan kisses him.