silent lies

xiaoyu takes a moment while the man’s talking to let his eyes scour over him just a little. he’s handsome, and xiaoyu might even have entertained the idea of flirting with him had they not both been naked. the man’s counter-argument doesn’t really hold much merit, xiaoyu think, and he’s about to tell him so, when he introduces himself, and splashes more water at xiaoyu.

with a small gasp and a pout of displeasure, xiaoyu smacks water back as he, too, introduces himself. “i’m xiaoyu. wei xiaoyu.” he says. he wonders what clan the man belongs to, but without any robes, and no other distinguishable marks about his person, it’s impossible to tell. he’s therefore not sure how to treat this person.

he’s pretty sure he’d not a lan, as he very much doubts a lan would strip naked around anyone else, let alone start a splashing fight. the same might be said for a jin, so he’s probably not one of them either. that leaves nie, jiang, or some smaller clan. of course, if he’s from a smaller clan xiaoyu would hope it was one that didn’t have the airs and graces of a jin, without the power - he’s heard of far too many like that, thinking that if they act high and mighty someday it’ll get them up among the bigger clans.

“what’s with the splashing anyway? why splash a stranger, hmm? i could’ve been a dangerous, easily angered psychopath!” xiaoyu says, finally ceasing his splashing and simply skimming his hands over the surface of the water to create little ripples.

     in a second xuan places his arm over his face as an attempt to cover his face from the attack he sees coming. he did a few times before get compliments for his fast reflexes, maybe those compliments made sense, because xuan reacted fast enough for hardly any water to splash him in the face. For some reason, xuan didn’t exactly think of the fact that the male would splash water back at him, and even though the male had already splashed water back once he was not fully prepared for the second attack. 

     “Wei Xiaoyu!” the male replies back excitingly. “So you’re from the wei clan? I’ve never really met a lot of those” the male goes silent for a short second “I wanna see your clothes! Show me your clothes after you’ve finished showering” the male continues with a smile. Though surely, Xuan is twenty-two, it’s rather rare to see him act his age, mostly, he’s just a little child, excited and interested in most things he doesn’t know much of. 

          Lian could probably admit that his brother had changed quite a bit but he was still family and he wanted to be there for him so much. He knows it’s a bit odd being at the Lan sect and of course back at their sect, there is always people to follow and cling to or annoy. Thankfully, they’re here together and that is definitely worth it all.

         lian laughs a bit and shakes his head. “oh sure, it’s not that cold. we’re from the heat of summer, mountains are not a fun time for us,” he states, with a wide grin, thankful that the blanket is accepted. seeing his brother’s hands tighten on the blanket, lian almost wants to say that since his blanket is accepted, then xuan was feeling the cold, but he simply flops down next to him. “still dinner is important. at least have a snack,” he states, leaning back on his hands after handing his brother the bun. “the dinner was pretty terrible. makes me miss the delicious spices of home. and the alcohol…” he hums.

     “well there’s nothing in the rules about snacks and how sneak them in,” he states as though that was a perfectly valid response. “i just hid them in the sleeves in a bag.”

     Xuan keeps silent for a little while, he feels the sarcasm in the other’s voice, and it feels like that even though Xuan said it wasn’t too cold, he did not convince his brother in that. Perhaps his brother knows him too well, and can see through his small white lies, or perhaps it’s just that his brother can feel the cold too and knows Xuan isn’t the very best at handling the cold. “I miss hot weather, I usually have my hair in a ponytail, but this cold makes me want to have it lose just so I have some type of warm for my ears”

     Though Xuan can be a big eater, he can eat a whole cow sometimes, he’s also not always the best at eating, often at times he’ll skip a meal or multiple, and if it wasn’t for his brother, Xuan would probably forget to eat today. Xuan takes another bite of the bun, enjoying the taste, and savoring it now especially after the dinner. “Thank you”

     Xuan chuckles at his brother, of course the older misses alcohol. “I miss the food too, and we’ve only been here for a day. And no surprise you miss alcohol” he chuckles “I guess I miss alcohol too” he ends off with. “Do you remember the rules? Are we allowed to drink? If not, then why?”

       it’s a gradual shift:  he retracts the erhu to a horizontal position in his open palms and rises to his feet.  he then turns, slow, and rests the instrument against the pale cushion, noting the forty-five degree angle at which it should sit.  its paired bow follows shortly thereafter.  the movement, though incredibly unnecessary, comes with practiced grace—grace that does not extend into his subsequent action.

       he turns back to jingxuan, and without warning, without regard, he yanks the covers off and flings it to the tail-end of the mattress.  “sit up.”  there’s no grace in his demand, and no grace in his words that beckon the maids back in the room.

       “drink.”

       one of the maid sinks to her knees next to jingxuan’s bed and offers up a bowl of herbal soup;  the other starts dabbing away at jingxuan’s forehead.  he’s quick to chase the latter one away with a nudge of his foot so he can take her place.

       “what did you see?”

       there have been rumors of a certain clairvoyant wandering between the sects, telling tall tales of each clan’s inevitable future.  he holds his doubts for this sort of ability, but one of the elders had insisted, so he has no choice but to ask.

     Though Xuan surely is awake, he still partly feel like he’s sleeping, he does not feel fully awake. The other male asks if he’s still sleeping, to which he responds no, an answer which to himself is very true. He does not feel awake, hence he is not awake. The effort Xuan puts into convincing himself and Xiayi that he’s sleeping, Xiayi very carelessly ignores, instead just asking (or more so, commanding) that Xuan sits up.

     Xuan groans at the sudden coldness around him, and though mostly he wants to put his cover back on his body, he’s too lazy to do even such task, hence instead just turning to the side (note, away from Xiayi). And even though Xuan puts majority of his efforts into sleeping, suddenly he’s sitting and getting commanded to drink. 

     “I do not want to” Xuan says turning his head to the side and putting a flat hand on the drink.

     Xuan feels babied, as if he can’t do anything, the whole situation to him is getting too much. Xuan furrows his brows at the maid offering soup “I just woke up, I won’t eat” this is solely to prove how firm Xuan is to go back to sleep, truly he wants to eat.

starter for @xxjingxuan !

the journey from the burial mounds to cloud recesses is a long one, and xiaoyu had decided to make it alone. there were many things that frightened xiaoyu, and a lot of those things he knew he’d likely have to deal with to some extent during his journey to cloud recesses for the lectures. it seemed the perfect opportunity to expose himself to his fears, and confront them. 

he’s made much of the journey already, having had to light fires at night himself, and dealt with spending nights alone outside, where there were animals and insects and all kinds of unknown, invisible dangers. but he’s come to a stop at a slow running stream near gusu to rest and bathe. his clothes are laid neatly on a rock nearby, and he’s let his hair down to wash completely, seeing as he’s in no hurry yet - he’s still got plenty of time to get to cloud recesses. 

he’s crouched in the lower area of the stream, the water lazily rippling around his middle, crawling it’s way along down it’s path. the sun shines against the water and xiaoyu smiles at the beauty if it, sweeping his fingers through the water to watch as tiny waves are pushed in the opposite direction to the way the water’s flowing. he begins to hum a tune as he washes, wading a little further into the water so that it reaches up to his mid-chest now. 

     Xuan had wandered happily around, his hair swinging in the air as he had let it loose for once finally, it was not often he would be happy while at the same time being alone, but the thought of that lesson thing made his mood better. The male however stopped wandering around as he saw something, or rather someone. He stared at them for a while, for Xuan there existed three kind of people. People who seemed boring and he did not care to talk nor even look at, people who forced him to gain slight interest in them, and people who just somehow caught his attention. In this case, Xuan was hooked, he wanted a new friend. 

     Xuan didn’t care to much about if anybody was to see, he was confident, so in a second he dropped his clothes and put his hair back into his usual ponytail, and then he entered the water, he figured he could probably need getting cleaned anyway. He let the water soak around his body, splashed some water on his body and slowly moved towards the stranger. There was the option of saying something like a simple hi, but that didn’t fully satisfy him, so of course he got the idea of grabbing the stranger’s attention by splashing water on them. 

     He’s about to do it again though suddenly he’s the one with water on his face, he lifts a hand to as best as he can dry his face. “I’m bathing and naked too,you splashed water back” he says back loudly, lips pointing upwards as he scratches his shoulder.

       xiayi-ge!

      he remains still, poised in position – save for his eyes, which trail toward the door where a shadow of a man appears.  for a moment, he considers keeping his mouth shut and his presence concealed, but responsibility pushes him upright.  “enter.”

      the door slides open, and the man of short stature bows quickly.  it’s jiang jingxuan!  he’s having one of those episodes again.

      “how bad is it?”  he does not move toward his erhu.  “does it warrant tranquility, or are you here wasting my time for a slight annoyance?”

      it’s pretty bad.  we tried to calm him but to no avail.  we fear he may unintentionally hurt himself—

      without word, he brushes past, and with brisk steps, he makes his way to the guest corridors.  upon arrival, he’s quick to take his usual seat in the room – an arm’s length away from the bed where @xxjingxuan​ lies, closer to his head.  “leave,”  he tells the maids, his command curt.  a moment later, the doors slide close and on cue, he lifts his bow to play.

      for tranquility, he seeks to calm the mind.  he cannot fathom what jingxuan is experiencing in his night terrors, lest to what degree, but tranquility is a rather potent piece  ( one that he has grown familiar with over the last three years, in fact ).  he plays it once to its conclusion, then his bow stills, and he peers over.

      “are you awake?”

     Breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe. The words repeat in his head, they continue repeating, over and over, and over and over again. They repeat in his head as if they’re magic words, as if they would calm him down, when in reality it doesn’t help much, maybe it would work if the words didn’t repeat faster than light (slight, just slight exaggeration). His breath follows the words, it’s fast, it’s loud, and even though he’s breathing in and out way too fastly, and that should help him get more air into his body, it feels like he’s getting less and less.

     He’s confused, is the easiest way to explain it, in a way he knows what is going on, in another way he has no idea. He knows what is happening, kind of, kind of he doesn’t and he doesn’t know why, he’s not too sure, why he’s so scared, shaking, moments ago in panic and hitting out into the air trying to grip of something, anything. And though he’s sure he should calm down, he doesn’t know how, it’s like his body isn’t cooperating, like his body isn’t fully his.

     For him, it’s out of nowhere, a sound suddenly begins, and for a few seconds at first it bothers him, he wants quietness, but soon enough it’s like the music is around him, hugging him in a way. The words still repeat in his head, breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, but now they’re suddenly slower, and he suddenly doesn’t feel like he’s at the edge of dying anymore. 

     It stops, and he hears the question, he stares out into nothing, confused as to what happened. 

     “No”

@xxjingxuan

the lectures were going to be fairly boring in general and even upon arrival, lian can already see that this is going to be a chore yet again. lectures the last time around when he was younger were okay because he was young and he found ways to amuse himself, but now, he is older and doesn’t find the same old things amusing anymore. however, he still manages to hide snacks in his sleeves. in the evening, after their arrival to the lan sect, lian sidles up outside to his brother, deciding to go bother him before trying to see if he can sneak out to cayi town.

“are you still sitting outside? it’s getting chillier….at least put on a jacket..” he says, ungracefully dropping a blanket on top of his brother without even waiting for a response. lian cares deeply for his younger brother especially after that traumatic incident that may have flipped a switch for his brother. he loves and adores his baby brother to bits and pieces. he then reaches into his sleeves and pulls out a bun.

“did you manage to get snacks in after that godawful bland dinner?” he asks, offering his brother the red bean bun. “or am i going to force feed you?”

     Xuan doesn’t notice the cold, he’s busy staring out into nothing. It’s not too long ago since they arrived here, and Xuan’s mind is mostly filled with what to do now. Back at home, at the Jiang sect, he would probably have someone to annoy follow around right now and cling onto, here he doesn’t know that many people though, and he’s not too sure who to approach. 

     He flinches at the sudden voice, he would be unsure if it’s real or not but he recognizes the voice so easily comes to the conclusion that it’s real, he looks to the side to see his brother, fastly, a smile shows up on his lips. “It’s not that cold” he answers back, hands tightening around the blanket as he tries his best to adjusting it to fit better on him. As Xuan sees the bun his firm grip on the blanket loosens up. “I didn’t eat the dinner” he starts, letting go off the blanket and letting is fall slightly off his body “I tasted it, and I’m pretty sure it was poison. It tasted terrible”

          —  INTRODUCING 江静璇 JIANG JINGXUAN  —                        twenty-two.  inner disciple, jiang clan.

[ HE ] who wields JIAN and his trusted POUCH. skilled in GREAT SWORDSMANSHIP and SHARP REFLEXES. his ultimate desire? TO FIND AN ULTIMATE DESIRE.

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