[pfsb]

[acrookedpath]

The latest idea that struck Wei Wuxian mid-lunch: if he combined one of the theoretical energy talismans with a paper doll, would that allow him to search the grounds for resentful energy without having to blanket the whole inn with talismans?

It seems like a sound idea! It won't replace the planned night hunt with Lan Zhan -- nor would he want it to -- but if he succeeds, it will be a fun experiment.

First, though: combining a paper doll with a simpler talisman. Which brings us to Wei Wuxian at a table underneath the Observation Window, not an inch left uncovered by his notes, scribbling onto a tiny cutout with a ballpoint pen Bar gave him. (What an invention!) He completes the last character with a flourish and waves his hand over the doll; it springs to its "feet," and, grinning, he directs it toward the empty cup perched precariously on a corner of the table.

Comments

[we_bring_hell]

She quirks an eyebrow. By coincidence Emperor's Smile is also the name of a wine cultivated on the Third. "I do not drink," she says. "It is one of the forbearance of the Locked Tomb."

Also, she's seventeen.

[acrookedpath]

To be fair, Wei Wuxian tried to smuggle two bottles of wine into Gusu Lan when he was fifteen! (And he would have succeeded, too, if Lan Zhan hadn't intercepted him.)

He cracks a smile. "Ah, that is something you can bond over with Lan Zhan when you speak to him next. His sect is very strict -- he does not drink, either."

[we_bring_hell]

She hesitates, then, and nods. "Yes, but they have the pleasures of music."

"I have begun to explore them myself."

[acrookedpath]

"Oh?" he asks. He keeps up the smile, and hopes the flare of uncertainty in his belly doesn't make it to his face. "Has he played for you?"

[we_bring_hell]

"More than once," she says. "It is beautiful and soothing." She looks a little askance, embarrassed he has found her in public in need of being soothed more than once.

"I had always thought of music as either background for religious ritual or--decadent, I suppose."

[acrookedpath]

More than once. And yet nothing has changed, as far as he can tell, in the quiet pulse of resentful energy that beats so strong at her heart; strong enough he can sense it even without his flute, like a chill breeze brushing his skin.

Lan Zhan did promise he wouldn't harm her, he thinks. And perhaps he also sensed that if he drew out the resentful energy that has bound so tightly to the Ninth, it would harm her.

Wei Wuxian can hope.

"He's very skilled," he agrees, quiet. "One of the best in all of our cultivation. Did he tell you... what did he play? Which songs?"

[we_bring_hell]

"We did not discuss the names," she says. "But he used a sort of long flat harp.. a guqin?"

"It has encouraged me to explore other music."

[acrookedpath]

"I see." His smile settles firmly back into place. "I am not surprised there would be other musicians here! Unless you are hoping to learn an instrument yourself? I do not know the guqin as well as Lan Zhan, but if you ever wished to learn the flute..."

[we_bring_hell]

She smirks, behind her veil. But she has a very smirk-friendly face. "Wei Wuxian, in the future, or indeed in other realities, which ever it is, there are methods of recording sound to be replayed later."

"I had been aware of this but had never used it for music playback until recently."

"That being said, I am of course interested in the music of the flute."

[acrookedpath]

Wei Wuxian brightens. "Is that so? That -- hm. I wonder what could be done with that. I wonder if it would even work, if it could capture not only the music but the spiritual energy behind it -- "

He shakes himself out of that train of thought before it carries him too far, letting out a sheepish laugh. Grabbing the pen once more, he scrawls down the quickest of notes -- methods of recording sound, ask Madam Bar?

"My apologies, Ninth. I must find ways to occupy myself while I am here," he says, pressing the little button atop the pen that retracts the nib. "But one of those occupations could be playing for you, or teaching you to play for yourself. I would not even have to carve you a flute; I'm sure Madam Bar could provide one."

[we_bring_hell]

"I am not sure I have any particular gifts in that area," she says. "But I am enjoying my time as a consumer."

"You can use music as a vehicle for spellwork?"

[acrookedpath]

He pauses, surprised.

"Yes. Is that not what Lan Zhan -- ?"

Maybe he was mistaken, this whole time. Maybe Lan Zhan was simply playing for her. Which... should make him feel better, shouldn't it?

It should. Yes. Of course it should.

[we_bring_hell]

"If he was, he did not say," she says. Her voice sounds completely, tonelessly opaque.

[acrookedpath]

Wei Wuxian does his very, very best not to cringe. Between the Ninth's tone and her veil, she is practically impossible to read at the moment.

"Then I may have made assumptions I shouldn't have made," he says, trying for an easy, careless smile. "Yes, Gusu Lan is very skilled at cultivating through their music, but they do play simply to play sometimes. And Lan Zhan always asked for permission if he wished to play Cleansing for me, or... something similar."

[we_bring_hell]

"And what is Cleansing?" she asks, in the same unreadable voice.

Behind Wei Wuxian she sees a woman moving towards the table and raises her head to look at her sharply.

(There isn't anyone behind him.)

[acrookedpath]

"It's -- "

His brow furrows, and he glances over his shoulder, abruptly worried Lan Zhan may have just walked into the inn. Seeing no one -- maybe the Ninth recognized someone across the room that Wei Wuxian has yet to meet? -- he returns his attention to her.

Carefully: "It is used to suppress hostile or resentful energy. If he had used it on you, Ninth, you would know. And I know he would not have used it without asking your permission. Even when..." He hesitates before going on, lower, "Even when he worried I would do grievous harm to myself with my work, he never forced Cleansing on me."

[we_bring_hell]

"I see," she says.

She knows it's the Body now, and that She isn't real. Or at least, that no one else can see Her. Okay. Okay.

She tries to stop her eyes from stealing to Her face, to the cupid's bow of her lips. "I see," she says again, and tries to figure out how she feels about that.

The Body puts an ice-water hand on her scalp and smooths Her thumb over her brows, right through the niqab, which is a good piece of evidence that she's hallucinating. She clutches it tightly.

[acrookedpath]

"Ninth?"

He leans forward, the creases of his forehead deepening.

"Are you well? I'm sorry, I will speak to Lan Zhan when I see him next -- "

[we_bring_hell]

She closes her eyes. "By no means."

She realizes that could be read as I am by no means well, and corrects herself.

"You do not need to say anything to him. I was caught off guard. I imagine I would be able to tell if he was casting spells on me."

She opens her lightless eyes again. The Body is gone. "All is well, Wei Wuxian."

[acrookedpath]

"...All right."

He sounds uncertain, still, and not all of the furrows have smoothed from his brow as he offers the Ninth a small smile.

"I apologize for catching you off guard, then. As I said -- I assumed wrongly. I would be happy to continue discussing music with you, but I will understand if you'd rather not."

[we_bring_hell]

"By no means," she says again. "I have mostly confined myself to a single disc of recorded music, but I have tried a few. I was captivated by a ballad about a shipwreck, in fact, but most of the rest on that disc held little interest to me."

[acrookedpath]

He chuckles. "Well, I cannot promise as thrilling or despairing a song as that! But..."

Did he bring his flute downstairs with him? He must have. Wei Wuxian pats his belt, makes a face when he discovers it's not there, sifts through a few piles to the right -- "Aha! There we are."

He grabs the bamboo flute from where it was two centimeters away from rolling off the table. Fluttering his fingers over the holes, he considers what to play. (The problem, he thinks ruefully, is that he spent so many years honing his ability to summon resentful energy that nearly all the music he knows revolves around that singular talent. Which is extremely unhelpful when playing for someone like the Ninth.)

Finally, decision made, he raises the flute to his mouth.

The tune is clear, bright; a little wistful. It doesn't have the same depth or purity as Lan Zhan's guqin, but it sings sweetly all the same.

[we_bring_hell]

She sits and listens, head cocked a little like a bird's, and absorbs the music. There is something about the appreciation of music that is like learning a skill, or building a muscle, to use a metaphor that would please Gideon.

[acrookedpath]

There are old songs he remembers others singing, or playing, as they learned their instruments. Stories of cultivators past. Lullabies hummed to children. He shifts seamlessly from one tune to the next, embellishing the simpler melodies with flourishes and trills, eyes drifting closed as he lets himself fall into the music.

(There is another melody he could bring in, but despite how freely he played it in his earliest days at the inn, he finds himself fiercely guarding the song Lan Zhan hummed for him in the cave so many years ago. He doesn't want to examine that impulse too closely.)

It's -- nice. To simply play, as he put it. To follow the tune without expectation of more, for a time.

So he plays.

[we_bring_hell]

She closes her eyes again, and smiles behind the veil. She feels an ice cold hand slip into hers, but the hallucination does not alarm her. She makes a soft sound of appreciation.