[ the wagging tongues and the fluttering carrion birds of rumours don't reach wei wuxian's ears, buried deep within the mountains like some fell thing, some beast that haunts the night and children's dreams. they speak of him as some cursed creature, driven mad and insane, a man that has descended into something less than human; a demon, a devil, an evil terror that fleets through shade and shadow and everything dark.
he knows what they say. he knows what they whisper of his brother when they think he cannot here, and sometimes within his hearing, too. he knows that he would break every bone in their bodies for it.
the skeletal hands grab for his hands hold more strength than anyone would have guessed, but there is still a part of him that remains, even now, completely unsurprised - wei wuxian has always been someone on some higher pedestal, always just above and out of reach. just because he has shut himself away like a hermit within these mountains hasn't changed the fact.
jiang cheng doesn't break the hold. he lifts his head and stares into those eyes tinged with red, tinged with some sort of madness, and he doesn't flinch away.
perhaps it is because the same sort of madness that burns in him. the same smile, the same sort of strange, ghostly light that flickers in time with the way the fire and the smoke rises from the ashes of their home. ]
Idiot, [ he only ends up saying, in the end, reaching his free hand up to touch palm to the curve of a shoulder, briefly; a light touch from a hand that has only really know how to break and kill. ] you mean we could.
[ later, when they find themselves within the caves, he sits upon the seat directed and watches the candles light one by one, each tiny speck of light highlighting different parts of wei wuxian; a pale wrist here, a wisp of dark hairs falling over the line of his jaw, the eyes that still gleam and glow. they aren't the eyes of the dead. he is still - terrifyingly alive, even after everything that has happened to him and by him.
he almost doesn't catch the other's words, but when he does, jiang cheng nearly jumps out of the seat. ]
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he knows what they say. he knows what they whisper of his brother when they think he cannot here, and sometimes within his hearing, too. he knows that he would break every bone in their bodies for it.
the skeletal hands grab for his hands hold more strength than anyone would have guessed, but there is still a part of him that remains, even now, completely unsurprised - wei wuxian has always been someone on some higher pedestal, always just above and out of reach. just because he has shut himself away like a hermit within these mountains hasn't changed the fact.
jiang cheng doesn't break the hold. he lifts his head and stares into those eyes tinged with red, tinged with some sort of madness, and he doesn't flinch away.
perhaps it is because the same sort of madness that burns in him. the same smile, the same sort of strange, ghostly light that flickers in time with the way the fire and the smoke rises from the ashes of their home. ]
Idiot, [ he only ends up saying, in the end, reaching his free hand up to touch palm to the curve of a shoulder, briefly; a light touch from a hand that has only really know how to break and kill. ] you mean we could.
[ later, when they find themselves within the caves, he sits upon the seat directed and watches the candles light one by one, each tiny speck of light highlighting different parts of wei wuxian; a pale wrist here, a wisp of dark hairs falling over the line of his jaw, the eyes that still gleam and glow. they aren't the eyes of the dead. he is still - terrifyingly alive, even after everything that has happened to him and by him.
he almost doesn't catch the other's words, but when he does, jiang cheng nearly jumps out of the seat. ]
W-what?