Work Text:
"Doctor."
"Hm?"
Jiaoqiu hums and turns slightly to face you. His hands continue to fold the bandages. You eye the stain that's rusting on the off white shade.
"Another one."
"As usual."
A few men carry a stretcher into the tent soon after; dirtied from the filth of war. The stretcher has a man writhing and groaning in pain, but presumably passed out. His leg is injured.
Well, rather, his leg is torn.
A long tear – 3rd degree. From the bottom of his knee, just shy of the curve, to the top of his foot. The flesh is almost cartoonishly pink, decorated with blood leaks and torn veins.
Jiaoqiu doesn't flinch, immediately getting to work, registering the anesthesia while guiding you to fetch alcohol and other surgical equipment. You silently oblige, as the other men leave, dredging on with their heavy boots riddled with mud.
A few moments later, as the last stitch tugs at the skin, Jiaoqiu sputters. You look up at him, concerned. A scruched, disgruntled look on his face, eyes still closed. You look down to see the slightest bit of mara leaking from the body.
"Even if I shall put him back together, what are the chances he may survive?"
He whispers, more to himself than asking you. You stay silent. You stare at his mouth, slightly covered in saliva, most likely from his sputtering.
He continues coughing a few moments more, handing the needle over to you as you hurriedly finish up a knot, then immediately leave to stand by him, shadowing him in worry as he continues coughing for a moment.
"Sorry. I choked on my spit."
You nod, before leaving and proceeding to finish up the work, leaving Jiaoqiu to catch his bearings.
You feel almost traitorous when you have such thoughts, however,
You've noticed an awful lot of things about your senior as of late.
His fur that's seeming to fray, split and gather on almost every surface, making it hard to disinfect and keep things sterilized for the most part. The stressful, or rather constrained look on his face when another soldier is sent his way – soldiers with flesh bursting at the seams of tight skin, blood flowering around the scene. The constant choking he feels from the heavy, thick scent of iron, and more spit dribbling down his chin.
Although, you feel it may be something else.
Granted, you don't ask. You hand him your handkerchief, and continue normally. You don't, however, miss the dilation of his usually thin pupils whenever he stares down at the man on the table. Like a starved predator upon a feast.
His eyes catch yours, too. Both of you stay silent.
–
"Hm, how.. disappointing."
You hum, Jing Yuan reverting to his pondering state, as you beat him at another round of the board game he'd invited you to.
"Battle strategies are your thing, General. I'm almost surprised. Are you letting me win, by any chance?"
Jing yuan laughs, a deep, curt sound that bubbles from his chest.
"Nurse, I would know how much fairness and certainty means to you."
"Hmm.. really,now?"
Your hand grabs his wrist, gripping onto the small guards of his arm, as you catch him trying to steal one of your pieces,
"Touchè".
You huff, letting go of his wrist, his hand languidly placing back the piece, before he repositions to lean the side of his head on it,
"Perhaps your instincts from then still remain."
"Mara struck are awfully dangerous."
"I've heard plenty. And seen, too."
"One tried to stab me with an empty syringe when I turned my back for a second."
Jing yuan hums, his hand hovering over the board decisively,
"Quite peculiar, such a trait."
"Strange indeed."
Jing yuan makes his move. It's time for you to think, now.
You lean slightly over the table, observing and calculating your moves. He continues to speak,
"Were you not infected as was the Chef?"
"Not sure why.."
You mumble out, fingers gently perched on a piece as you contemplate the move.
"You must have. That fever struck you for a month."
Your thoughts stop for a moment. Jing yuan almost smiles, watching the tension of your fingers over the piece,
"It's.. hard to remember what happened."
Your other hand creeps up to wrap around your waist, under the table. Something still faintly aches, but you aren't sure if you can fix it now.
"Chef cared for you quite arduously. That was the last time I'd seen a fox like him so ruffled."
You look up and click your tongue, as Jing yuan's fingers teeter around the pieces. He stays still and smiles, playing it off.
"I was the only one who could assist him. It's.. a given."
"Hm.. I've been driven to a corner."
You chuckle softly, jing yuan's eyes turning contemplative as you move your piece into position.
"Ah-ah, not so fast."
You blink, looking up at the General as he tuts, your hand hovering over your piece. Did you make a mistake?
He leans over, his hand reaching over to pick a stray hair off of your shoulder. It was short, and pink. Fur.
His hand retracts and languidly dusts it off his finger to the side. Ah, you realise,
"Must be Jiaoqiu's."
"I'd be surprised if it wasn't."
"I have been watching over that pink-haired girl.."
Jing yuan chuckles softly, shaking his head,
"He seems quite irritable since then."
"He's.. clingy. Ever since I.."
He hums, his golden eyes calculative as he decides his next move.
"What a shame."
You yawn, the settling winter thawing under the new sun making the atmosphere more comfortable than chilling, leaning back on your arms.
"I can never understand that man.."
Jing yuan makes his move, and waits for you, as he takes a sip of his tea.
"Foxians are quite interesting."
"Hm?"
Jing yuan's words pique your interest, as you slightly perk up,
"Really? What of it?"
"They react differently to mara."
The board is abandoned by now, as you listen intently, leaning forward,
"Do you know how mara works?"
He sets the ceramic cup down, the liquid in it ebbing gently from the motion.
"Foxians of his lineage have tendencies to act far too soon on their desires, from even a smidge of exposure."
..is he lying?
"It was a strange event he decided to treat such wounds in his past. With you on the line beside him."
"But, I was already working there before him."
"Indeed. That is why I.."
He stays silent for a moment. A small chuckle leaves him, as he shakes his head,
"You should be more cautious."
You blink for a moment, simply looking at him. Under the golden sunlight, it's hard to look away.
Wait.
You look down at the board, as he steadily gets up,
"Wait, you- stole the pieces-?!"
----
You sneeze, and cringe immediately.
Jiaoqiu's unreadable expression is pointed at you, as you look to gauge his reaction. You've always hated the taste of his medicine.
It was more peaceful than anything, other than the looming threat of catching the attention of your "mentor" (or as he insisted). The occasional thick scent of chili and sizzling meats settled into the air, along with the gentle draft of early spring, hints of the winter's cold lingering in the crisp air in the atmosphere. You sniffle and shift in your seat, as Jiaoqiu approaches you.
"Try."
He places a bowl of noodles in front of you. You eye it suspiciously.
"It took me a while to prepare. So don't waste it, disciple."
You look up at him,warily. His closed eyes and sly grin greet you back.
You eye the dark, rich broth that would have had your mouth watering just a few decades ago. The perfectly cut noodles paired with an assortment of seasonings of all kinds – cut meat, hints of vegetables, boiled eggs. It was perfect.
But you couldn't taste it.
Truthfully, after you became sick, nothing tasted the same as it used to.
Your palette must have dulled. You could barely taste anything. It was as though you ate the same food, everyday, every month, every year, with no change in sight. Jiaoqiu's made a bit of a personal mission to try and challenge your dull palette.
"Jiaoqiu.."
You start, softly trying to protest,
"[Name]."
He sits down across you,
"Do you remember when I first served this?"
He leans forward, his chin cradled on his interlocked fingers, knees pressing onto the table. There's a faint smile on his face.
You sigh,
"Yes, back when.. I had a terrible fever, which just wouldn't leave."
"Mhm. It was the only reason you had the energy to walk around."
You continue staring at the dish. A hint of sentimentality at least seems to spark *some* appetite in you.
"Hm, too soupy isn't it?"
You comment, looking back up at him
"We aren't scarce on resources anymore, are we?"
"You could learn to not alter a few recipes for sentimental value."
"And what? Feed you that ashen bowl of noodles with barely a scrap of meat or any spice?"
You sigh,
"..alright."
You pick up the stationed chopsticks from the side, and stir the noodles slightly. Jiaoqiu's smile widens, as he watches you.
"The broth looks.."
"Remember when your fever wouldn't go down at all? The high temperature was so stubborn."
You shudder at the reminder. You still remember it – the searing burn of the medicine you hastily applied, the following high temperatures and sweat, the constant discomfort of being so unutterably weak you couldn't even sit upright.
You suppose he doesn't like when you nitpick. You resign yourself to eating it quietly.
–––
The sheets are soft, and cold as your bare back settles against them, your head gently hitting the soft pillow behind you. Your fingers absentmindedly trail down to the bandages on your abdomen, tracing the tight-binded edges of it.
Jiaoqiu's back is turned to you as he readies a concoction. One of many he's tried to use to "fix" you.
You sigh, staring up at the ceiling. You would have felt more awkward, more embarassed about having to lay almost half naked in your 'mentor's bed, but considering the recent flare up a few days ago, you couldn't care less.
Jiaoqiu walks around the expanse of the bedframe, and gently settles down on the other, empty side. He placed the paste on the nightstand, as his fingers reach down to undo your bandages.
There is something tender, you think, about having to lay bare under someone who has seen something so ugly, yet persist regardless. Under his fingers, where your flesh seems to either rot, or bloom. Something beautiful, if it weren't for the past pains of war still haunting you two. Something tender, if it weren't for your own flesh rotting into you.
His nose scrunches up a bit as your is exposed at the removal of the wraps. Foxians, especially of his kind, tend to have sensitive noses. Specifically for blood, if it makes sense.
Your age-old wound has shriveled and ached for so long, you almost wonder if it's alive on it's own. How have you been? You almost ask, every time you see it for yourself. The tainted flesh almost searing every time another paste, another cure, is desperately smeared on it. Almost as though it is offended.
Jiaoqiu stays silent, for a moment, his eyes slightly opened as he stares down. His hands have moved to your sides, as though framing your outline.
They move up, slowly, as though encasing your ribs. They expand with each breath, skin stretching and moving with the flesh alive underneath. His face slowly dips down, as if in prayer. His lips ghost the dip between your lower ribs, in ancient reverence. You wonder if he might break you open and eat your heart from the cages of your bones.
His lips trace down ghosting over the edge of your skin, where the previously infected part begins. He inhales, slowly, before speaking.
"I don't know how to fix this."
You stay silent. Your hand comes up to the side of his face, his hair tickling the back of it,
"Jiaoqiu. It's alright."
"It isn't."
You watch his face retract, his troubled gaze on your wound. The flesh has been marred and sunken.
"This isn't something you can fix."
He moves, the bed dipping as his weight shifts, the side of his face resting on your chest, one of his hands moving to your stomach, the back of his fingers grazing your skin as it moves up to the centre of your ribs.
"Bitter, sour.. distasteful.."
He murmurs, his fingers absentmindedly tracing your skin,
His face shifts, his lips resting just above your heart,
"Your blood smells like poison."
You still for a moment. His teeth graze your skin. The hot, damp breath wets your skin.
Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.
Your heart beats in his ears. He longs to feel it in his mouth. His other hand, still on your side, shifts, the fingers digging into your skin.
For a moment, you wonder what the scene will reel out as ‐ your limp body, a feast under his hungry mouth. Your arteries stringing from the cave of your flesh to his mouth like a bridge, thin veins scattering and puzzling themselves in the crevices of his teeth. You hope he doesn't devour you.
For now, he resigns himself to your skin. His teeth bite. They do not draw blood yet.
---
Jiaoqiu has had more peace.
Here he sits, behind you, entangling the thin stems of flowers within themselves, braiding a flower crown. His nose scrunches, and his ears flit slightly whenever you hand him a fragrant one. You chuckle whenever he comments on it. His head leans forward and rests on your shoulder, as you continue to page through recipes in his book. Medicinal ones.
"Ah, look. It's stained here."
"Hm, gunpowder?"
Jiaoqiu asks, his tail swiping your back, the curled end of it tickling the side of your face,
"I think so."
You continue paging through the recipes, before stopping on a page.
Ah. There's blood.
"Dear, how did that happen?"
Jiaoqiu muses, his fingers paused as he looks at the blood stained page.
"I wouldn't remember."
"Hm.."
The blood smells sweet, despite having sunken into the page almost decades ago. It carries a hint of vitality, still. At least, in his foxian sense.
You turn the page.
---
"Jiaoqiu!"
"Not now—"
"The nurse..!"
Jiaoqiu stops in his tracks, taking his eyes off of his station with slightly furrowed brows, towards the person who's abruptly entered,
"What is it?"
"They're ill! They've fallen to the‐"
Jiaoqiu rushes with those few meager words, swiftly walking past as he asks where you are.
Unfortunately for you, you were trying to gain your bearings on the wooden floor.
This entire month of war specifically, had torn you both down to shreds. Your inventories were looted, leaving you with scarce medicine and many maimed to look after. The enemies were bolstering their presence harshly, and closing in furiously.
Upon stumbling on a rare sight of a wounded enemy soldier, you leaned down to check if they carried anything useful – medicine, maps, anything, when you realised in your haste you should have checked for their pulse first.
And it was in that moment of realisation did you feel a sharp plunge and sting, as the soldier's arm swiftly swung and stabbed you with a small knife.
You wanted to scream, but the overwhelming pain of the intrusion, the visceral splitting of your flesh far outweighed the need to scream. You jerked away, weakly, but hastily, retreating, leaving the enemy with their last bout of energy to laugh bitterly at you.
–––
Jiaoqiu still smells poison on you.
With war came many things. A lost locket on the vast field. A lonely sword in the quiet of the night. A child asleep in front of the door, forever waiting their parent.
And with war, came your eventual poisoning.
Perhaps it was the weapon. Knives edged with venom. It could have made for a lethal weapon.
But something felt odd.
Jiaoqiu's face presses into the warmth of your stomach.
Bitter. Sour. Distasteful. Rancid. Rotting. And Defiled.
Jiaoqiu's mind often wanders to wine reds. The pulling of sinew arteries, the sharp cut of a blade through flesh. The slow leaking of myoglobin or blood through the cutting board.
Sometimes, it had wandered while he tended to patients.
Blooming flesh, at incineration of skin due to sharpnel, or burnings. The vigorous pumping of the heart at the sight of blood draining down slowly, outside it's confinement, ever so oblivious to the lethality.
Jiaoqiu had craved flesh. Flesh beyond the slaughter of a Lamb, of a Cow, of any animal.
Flesh, right under the safe confines of human ribs.
Sweet, sweet viscera of the Liver. The expanse of Lungs. The tightly wound cartilage right above and below the muscles. Bones that leaked marrow.
The heart.
But he hadn't dare consume.
With war, came hunger.
Hunger he had not experienced like any other. Hunger that devoured him whole. Hunger so vast he could feel his insides churning and dissolving for the capacity of the appetite he would need to fulfill.
A hunger for you.
Poisoned, and permanently so. It's safe to say his attempts to 'fix' you, weren't necessarily innocent.
He shifts, his face moving to your neck, nose tickling the edge of it as his lips linger on your nape. Unprotected spinal cord. His canines expose and gently press on the tender skin, the pressure increasing, waiting for the breach of the skin.
You laugh, airy and sweet.
"What are you doing?"
Jiaoqiu retracts, slightly. Staggered, shallow breathing as he struggles to restrain himself.
He stays quiet. You grow nervous at the strange silence.
"Jiaoqiu?"
"[Name]."
His head turns slightly, eyeing the open recipe book on your nightstand. The night's gentle breeze wafting through the open window agitated the pages, slightly uncovering the blood-stained page for a second.
"What is it?"
You quietly ask, sensing the slight tightness in his voice,
"You poisoned yourself."
Your breath hitches, a shock rendering your body paralyzed for a second.
What?
You shift and turn to face him. His eyes are open, staring endlessly into yours. You break into a cold sweat, his slitted eyes almost cutting through you. Your heart beats harshly in your chest, as your breathing staggers slightly.
"Jiaoqiu?"
"While concocting that medicine for yourself.."
He whispers, his hand pushing down on the pliant bed as he leans forward, making you lean back in turn,
"What are you–"
"In your haste, did you ever think to use the right ingredients?"
He's towering over you, as you look at him, eyes almost blown wide, pupils dilated, breathing heavily. You don't notice it until you realise how out of breath you feel, despite the chill of the night air causing chills on your skin.
"The.. ingredients.."
You stumbled into your tent, almost meeting the ground, your arm on reflex grabbinf onto something sturdy, as you gasped and panted. Your other hand presses onto the wound on your abdomen, as you cry out, abruptly interrupted by a sharp inhale at the pain. Tears singe your eyes, but your heart is beating too loud, and you're too pained to cry yet. You grunt as you pull yourself up, your bloodied hands sifting through the cacophany of items on your own desk, shuffling in haste for something,
Eventually, you hurriedly concocted a simple but powerful herbal paste, smothering it onto the blaring and irritated, bloody wound, seeping and crying incessantly of blood into your hands as you lathered it onto the wound in great pain. You ignored the uncharacteristic burning of the paste, hurriedly trying to wrap the bandage onto yourself, before too much blood was lost.
"Do you realise? That paste.. if you messed up a single point in the recipe, you'd poison yourself. Each ingredient was selected to neutralize the other."
Erratic, shallow breaths leave you as he looks down at you. What have you done?
This is poison. This is the curse. The curse you carried after the war. It was never mara that could affect you.
And it was the poison Jiaoqiu had longed to taste.
His face dives down into your neck again, his fangs ghosting your jugular vein,
"Do you realise what truly courses in your blood?"
A cold bead of sweat drips down from the side of your forehead. Death could possibly taste sweeter, you imagine.
"I can't wait to taste it."
And his teeth sink.