( a very short, abbreviated not-quite-laugh and something much more like a shriek is what meets her response, and then: music. technically.
he's whistling, and it's not going well, but it is going, and then: pounding feet and further breaking up of the whistled song.
she may well arrive in time to see him throw himself through the door to the dungeon proper, hitting the stone rubble in the room's centre, while a canine like whining, beseeching play, trails after him. )
[ she does arrive in time to see that. the dog isn't threatening, she can tell, but she knows he hates dogs, even at play.
she whistles this time, higher pitched than wei wuxian's, hoping to catch the dog's attention, and looks around for something to throw to distract said dog. there isn't much in her immediate vicinity, but she does find a large rock in the rubble that she pitches it toward the dog, far enough away that he'd have to leave wei wuxian alone to chase it. ]
( the bone hound, which neither of them knew could not leave the confines of the dungeon proper, turns its massive bone head and chases after the rock for its trespass. the skeleton soldier who witnesses this likewise holds position, weapon almost at the ready, until the door naturally closes after the dog, and wei wuxian is left sitting, sprawling rather, behind the pedestal and its golden tablet he's clung to and hidden behind.
his voice, still a touch high, follows heartbeats after the door has politely closed itself on the prisoner still trapped inside. )
Is, um. It's gone? The...
( dog. the horror. the dead creature he could control, only it made the horribly thing incredibly fond of him. )
[ wen qing joins him behind the pedestal, peering down at him. she'll give him a few moments to compose himself before offering a hand to help him up. ]
( he's... rattled, yes, but with her confirmation his shoulders relax a fraction from how tightly pulled up they were around either side of his neck. his gaze lifts, slow and somewhat sheepish, beyond the adrenaline still carrying him and the exhaustion that arrives in its wake, thin and bittersweet and acrid on his tongue.
he accepts her hand, rising and offering a half smile, not quite devoting himself to fully masking. he's trying. he's not always managing, but taking her as he's claimed as a sister, in any sense, treating her as an equal and not one to be sacrificed for against her wishes, just as she had against his impossible ones, well. that's a dance for the two of them to continue learning.
so a half smile, and the averting of his gaze as he rubs at his lower back, discovering belatedly the bruising he'd given himself in the dungeon room evading the giant bone dog. )
Turns out there's one guarding the, ah, necromancer in there. I tried playing Chenqing, dead is dead, there's that, I thought there might be, but the dog was... very... pleased.
( A longer pause. He slowly lifts his eyes to hers. )
Either to eat me or to play with my bones, I don't know! Ahahaha... ha...
( When music backfires, and the ability to coax the dead makes loyal followers out of skeletal dogs. )
[ her face softens as she watches him, and helps him up. wei wuxian's never talked about the things he hates, but she's gathered from their time together, both in their world and here, that this is a long-held fear, one he can't hide.
she won't nudge it too much. ]
Is that where you got the golden tablet?
[ she gestures to the tablet still in his hand. ]
So we now know Chenqing makes dogs friendly. At least the skeletal ones. Do you think it works like that on other animals?
[ she has none of her salves with her, or anything else to help, but they are on the grounds, so she turns to head out of the dungeon, reaching out to grab his arm and tug him along, much like she would her brother. ]
( there will always be some degree of humour in his paralysing fear, and a deep held love for why jiang cheng had never told the world about it, when he could have. imagine the change if people had known how to fight him, carrying canines, balancing irrational fear against his driving need to protect the people he's dedicated himself to. what then?
they'll never know. here and now, it's the slow unraveling that keeps making itself known non-explicitly. until he's there, tablet in hand, and turning his eyes toward it, unaware he'd held it at all. too rattled and awkward with it after, settling the tablet back down as she speaks. )
No, ah, maybe?
( to the tablet? to other animals? she has him moving, tugged along like they were much younger people. he catches himself up, but doesn't try pulling his arm away. swallows and grimaces, still looking away, shoulders hitching higher again because up is where the other bone hounds roam. )
Did I ever tell you I'm not fond of... dogs? ( he hadn't. lan zhan had learned by circumstance instead of intent; jiang cheng knew. the sacrifices from childhood that persisted through wei wuxian's death as far as anyone knew, that meant the only dog jiang cheng ever had was the one he gifted to his nephew. funny, in a sad way, how that had been one of the first truths to break here. he doesn't let himself think about it. doesn't want to consider if that leaves him truly unwanted.
confesses in a low voice, straining to hear and see and sense the bone hounds as they climb the stairs: )
I'm, ah, you could say they frighten me?
( trying, awkwardly, to open it as something understood. to extend another of his less flattering aspects, of his vulnerabilities, instead of locking them away from her. family. )
[ wen qing falters slightly in her steps, although she catches herself before she can stumble and waves it off; luckily, with wei wuxian holding on to her and her own reflexes, it's easy to do.
she glances back to the room they just left, bone hound long gone, and then back to wei wuxian. her face softens, eyes unguarded for a moment. ]
You did not mention it. [ though now it makes some sense: the message, the whispers, the times before when he was out and careful not to be around dogs. ] It made that night you spent in the dungeon during the indoctrination camp even worse.
[ there were no secrets about the animals in the dungeons; her cousins were not circumspect. nor was her uncle, by that point. ]
I only saw a couple of the bone hounds on my way here, and I will keep them away. The ones I saw did not seem likely to attack. [ not that it makes much difference to fear. she knows the way it creeps inside, overpowering rationality. she squeezes his arm before they reach the doors. ]
( What is it about those words? Thank you, or I'm sorry? His mind skitters around them as his pulse calms, as the distance stretches and the bone hounds don't lurch out of the shadows of this tomb of a household, as he breathes, as breath steadies, as he's not the shadow of his own fears. Where he can almost laugh, not for the thank you, but for the dungeon. The indoctrination. His half laugh, half inhalation, and the confession that is part of what he doesn't want people to know, or see, but he called her sister, and what is it that means, what does it mean, but to crack open parts of the ugliness and vulnerability to share?
Jiang Yanli taught him many things. Every so often, he manages to not only remember, but see a way to acting on them, in some small or larger way. )
Wen Ning handled that creature. Before it handled me.
( So small, that cell with the massive wolf, or dog, or whatever it was, slavering and growling and chained on the opposite wall, but with too much reach. It had found his flesh, it had scored and bit and salivated over him. Wen Ning had won more of Wei Wuxian's regard for the simple, complicated kindness of sneaking in and putting the beast to rest for the time being. The Wens, by and large, left ignorant to a truth that would have been wielded as brutally as the knives that stole Lotus Pier from all of them, that slaughtered the Jiang Clan as if it were a due extracted from the world for failing to bow before greatness, when it was a cost of refusing to bow before depravity and festering ills.
There are days he remembers, and times he forgets. If she hadn't mentioned it, Wei Wuxian would have gladly left that dungeon forgotten for another lifetime, abandoned to the haze of unpleasant moments buried in his past. )
They like my playing. ( Another confession, another drop in his voice to a tone just shy of murmuring. To a grimace he doesn't disguise. ) Not because I'm coaxing them to anything, shijie, they just like it.
( Thus is his primary weapon against the dead turned against him in a way that's laughable, even as he rubs at his face, lets his grimace turn into a wry grin, or the shadow of one. )
Jiang Cheng's been yelling about it at me lately. How I should be beyond it.
( Jiang Cheng with the shepherd's dog from his arrival, back in the snows of Sa-Hareth; Jiang Cheng who rescues puppies, who had managed to hold no dog close since the arrival of Wei Wuxian at his doorstep and the fear that drove the same child into the dark and up trees, until Jiang Yanli and Jiang Cheng alike found him, brought him home. He doesn't know when that faith broke, not really. When his brother decided he would no longer tolerate a fear, and instead...
Wei Wuxian turns his thoughts aside. It's neither here nor there. He's well familiar with failing those he cares for. He's well familiar with not being enough. )
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he's whistling, and it's not going well, but it is going, and then: pounding feet and further breaking up of the whistled song.
she may well arrive in time to see him throw himself through the door to the dungeon proper, hitting the stone rubble in the room's centre, while a canine like whining, beseeching play, trails after him. )
no subject
she whistles this time, higher pitched than wei wuxian's, hoping to catch the dog's attention, and looks around for something to throw to distract said dog. there isn't much in her immediate vicinity, but she does find a large rock in the rubble that she pitches it toward the dog, far enough away that he'd have to leave wei wuxian alone to chase it. ]
no subject
his voice, still a touch high, follows heartbeats after the door has politely closed itself on the prisoner still trapped inside. )
Is, um. It's gone? The...
( dog. the horror. the dead creature he could control, only it made the horribly thing incredibly fond of him. )
no subject
[ wen qing joins him behind the pedestal, peering down at him. she'll give him a few moments to compose himself before offering a hand to help him up. ]
How did you end up with a dog chasing you?
no subject
he accepts her hand, rising and offering a half smile, not quite devoting himself to fully masking. he's trying. he's not always managing, but taking her as he's claimed as a sister, in any sense, treating her as an equal and not one to be sacrificed for against her wishes, just as she had against his impossible ones, well. that's a dance for the two of them to continue learning.
so a half smile, and the averting of his gaze as he rubs at his lower back, discovering belatedly the bruising he'd given himself in the dungeon room evading the giant bone dog. )
Turns out there's one guarding the, ah, necromancer in there. I tried playing Chenqing, dead is dead, there's that, I thought there might be, but the dog was... very... pleased.
( A longer pause. He slowly lifts his eyes to hers. )
Either to eat me or to play with my bones, I don't know! Ahahaha... ha...
( When music backfires, and the ability to coax the dead makes loyal followers out of skeletal dogs. )
no subject
she won't nudge it too much. ]
Is that where you got the golden tablet?
[ she gestures to the tablet still in his hand. ]
So we now know Chenqing makes dogs friendly. At least the skeletal ones. Do you think it works like that on other animals?
[ she has none of her salves with her, or anything else to help, but they are on the grounds, so she turns to head out of the dungeon, reaching out to grab his arm and tug him along, much like she would her brother. ]
no subject
they'll never know. here and now, it's the slow unraveling that keeps making itself known non-explicitly. until he's there, tablet in hand, and turning his eyes toward it, unaware he'd held it at all. too rattled and awkward with it after, settling the tablet back down as she speaks. )
No, ah, maybe?
( to the tablet? to other animals? she has him moving, tugged along like they were much younger people. he catches himself up, but doesn't try pulling his arm away. swallows and grimaces, still looking away, shoulders hitching higher again because up is where the other bone hounds roam. )
Did I ever tell you I'm not fond of... dogs? ( he hadn't. lan zhan had learned by circumstance instead of intent; jiang cheng knew. the sacrifices from childhood that persisted through wei wuxian's death as far as anyone knew, that meant the only dog jiang cheng ever had was the one he gifted to his nephew. funny, in a sad way, how that had been one of the first truths to break here. he doesn't let himself think about it. doesn't want to consider if that leaves him truly unwanted.
confesses in a low voice, straining to hear and see and sense the bone hounds as they climb the stairs: )
I'm, ah, you could say they frighten me?
( trying, awkwardly, to open it as something understood. to extend another of his less flattering aspects, of his vulnerabilities, instead of locking them away from her. family. )
no subject
she glances back to the room they just left, bone hound long gone, and then back to wei wuxian. her face softens, eyes unguarded for a moment. ]
You did not mention it. [ though now it makes some sense: the message, the whispers, the times before when he was out and careful not to be around dogs. ] It made that night you spent in the dungeon during the indoctrination camp even worse.
[ there were no secrets about the animals in the dungeons; her cousins were not circumspect. nor was her uncle, by that point. ]
I only saw a couple of the bone hounds on my way here, and I will keep them away. The ones I saw did not seem likely to attack. [ not that it makes much difference to fear. she knows the way it creeps inside, overpowering rationality. she squeezes his arm before they reach the doors. ]
Thank you for telling me.
no subject
Jiang Yanli taught him many things. Every so often, he manages to not only remember, but see a way to acting on them, in some small or larger way. )
Wen Ning handled that creature. Before it handled me.
( So small, that cell with the massive wolf, or dog, or whatever it was, slavering and growling and chained on the opposite wall, but with too much reach. It had found his flesh, it had scored and bit and salivated over him. Wen Ning had won more of Wei Wuxian's regard for the simple, complicated kindness of sneaking in and putting the beast to rest for the time being. The Wens, by and large, left ignorant to a truth that would have been wielded as brutally as the knives that stole Lotus Pier from all of them, that slaughtered the Jiang Clan as if it were a due extracted from the world for failing to bow before greatness, when it was a cost of refusing to bow before depravity and festering ills.
There are days he remembers, and times he forgets. If she hadn't mentioned it, Wei Wuxian would have gladly left that dungeon forgotten for another lifetime, abandoned to the haze of unpleasant moments buried in his past. )
They like my playing. ( Another confession, another drop in his voice to a tone just shy of murmuring. To a grimace he doesn't disguise. ) Not because I'm coaxing them to anything, shijie, they just like it.
( Thus is his primary weapon against the dead turned against him in a way that's laughable, even as he rubs at his face, lets his grimace turn into a wry grin, or the shadow of one. )
Jiang Cheng's been yelling about it at me lately. How I should be beyond it.
( Jiang Cheng with the shepherd's dog from his arrival, back in the snows of Sa-Hareth; Jiang Cheng who rescues puppies, who had managed to hold no dog close since the arrival of Wei Wuxian at his doorstep and the fear that drove the same child into the dark and up trees, until Jiang Yanli and Jiang Cheng alike found him, brought him home. He doesn't know when that faith broke, not really. When his brother decided he would no longer tolerate a fear, and instead...
Wei Wuxian turns his thoughts aside. It's neither here nor there. He's well familiar with failing those he cares for. He's well familiar with not being enough. )
You're sure none of them looked likely to attack?