Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - BDSM, Biologically Determined Dom/sub Roles, BDSM, Bad BDSM etiquette, Sadism, Masochism, Past Sexual Abuse, Sexual Slavery, Self-Harm, BDSM as a Form of Self-Harm, Minor Character Death(s), Arson, Shades of Black Widow Wei Wuxian, Extremely Dubious Consent, Rape/Non-Con Elements, Normalized Homosexuality and Bisexuality, Normalized Polyamory, Nonsexual BDSM, Slow Burn, Mutual Pining, Pining Wei Wuxian, Jealous Wei Wuxian, Touch-Starved Wei Wuxian, Professional Dominant Wei Wuxian, Sex Worker Wei Wuxian, Gentle Dom Lan Wangji, Mean Dom Lan Wangji, Oblivious Lan Wangji, Past Wen Chao/Wei Wuxian, Minor Jin Guangyao/Wei Wuxian, Mentioned Wei Wuxian/Others, Emotional Infidelity, Angst with a Happy Ending, Endgame Wangxian, Mo Xuanyu Also Gets a Happy Ending, the tags are scary but i promise there's some lightheartedness too, wangxian love one another so much, wei wuxian is healed by the power of nonsexual bdsm and friendship, and then gets bdsm'd quite sexually and happily by the love of his life, Additional Warnings In Author's Note
Content warnings:
- Wei Wuxian has a weird relationship with his appearance along with some dissatisfaction toward it as a result of how he's been made to look while playing a Dominant. I wouldn't go so far as to call it dysmorphia or body image issues, but if you're sensitive to the topic, it may be a little uncomfortable.
- Gentle... self-harm? Slight self-harm? Selves are harmed in the service of making tea.
After fussing with the base of his newest toy for a few hours, Wei Wuxian finally lifts his head and studies Jin Guangyao’s slack, sleeping face. As Wei Wuxian had worked, Jin Guangyao didn’t move even once, common for submissives who don’t get to go under often. Like this, he can see why Lan Xichen might find Jin Guangyao appealing. There’s certainly a dimpled, cherubic quality to his features that works in his favor. No doubt his slight stature is a draw—or maybe a lure, in his case.
Wei Wuxian has imagined what it might be like to be put under properly and can only conclude it would be a mess if he were to try. Luckily, he has only ever wanted Lan Zhan and Lan Zhan is the only one he’d trust himself with, so the chances of him finding out with a romantic partner are slim. Wei Wuxian knows one thing for certain: he won’t come to a facility like this to relieve the pressure.
He’ll probably have to find a clinic somewhere once his contract is up, dance around the reason he needs to be put under by artificial means, and call it good.
In the meantime, he turns the toy in his hand. The base is little more than a plain wooden box with an adjustable arm that won’t quite work the way he wants it to. Nothing terribly impressive, but it doesn’t have to be since it exists for his own edification, no one else’s.
Working in metal would probably be easier, but that would require obtaining permission from Madam Yang to pull from his banked back pay, and then she’d want to know why he wants to. Drawing scrutiny to himself is not what he wants to do. If she thinks something is wrong with him, it won’t go well.
Ordering blocks of wood, the equipment needed to carve, and other small items, it still raises questions, but they’re funny ones, far easier to answer. On the rare occasions others show interest, he simply says bodies have needs and then shows off some vicious looking dildos he sometimes casts in silicone for clients. They walk away impressed, requesting custom jobs of their own. Madam Yang doesn’t approve exactly, but it is convenient.
Everyone needs a hobby, even embarrassing ones. If anyone knew what he needs, they’d pity him or worse.
He jiggles the arm a few times, unable to figure out how to make it move around as smoothly as he wants it to. Maybe he should have done with it and make it a static toy. It could force him to hold a single position, never offering him a single bit of leeway or reprieve.
A pulse of arousal works through him.
The measurements would need to be precise. Placing it on the floor, he kneels next to it and considers what it would be like, owning something so unyielding.
Fuck it, he thinks. Why not?
*
In the morning, he washes again and dons a neutral colored tunic and matching trousers, wraps an equally neutral belt around his waist, and plays down the various suggestions of dominance that cling to him. He can’t change the broad, gym-won stretch of muscles across his chest and arms, but he can resettle the fabric across his shoulders until they seem smaller. He can wear his hair without parting it as severely as he’s used to. Even relaxing into his posture helps. By the time he’s done, he’s the image of conservative propriety and Jin Guangyao is hissing in the main lounge as he rouses from sleep.
Wei Wuxian guides him toward the guest washroom.
He is courteous, if not warm, as he tends to Jin Guangyao’s body, ignoring the way Jin Guangyao seems almost to curl away from his ministrations, repulsed, before finally shooing him out with a barked command that causes satisfaction to unfurl in the back of his mind.
Wei Wuxian begins neatening the room while he waits. When Jin Guangyao is finally ready to go, Wei Wuxian leads him outside, hiding how impressed he is by the steel that keeps him upright after the beating he received last night.
As they wait for Jin Guangyao’s car to arrive, he realizes he’s miscalculated in his attire somewhat. Contrasted against the aggressiveness of Jin Guangyao’s suit, Wei Wuxian’s garb looks submissive even with none of the expected markers attached. As masked office drones, hip university students, and parents pass them on the sidewalk, they might make assumptions about him. There’s a better than even chance, simply based on biases, they’d be right.
It’s well that these clothes hide many things, including Wei Wuxian’s reaction to such a thought, the fear and desire at war within him. To be seen and understood after so long, even only superficially, he’s not sure he can bear it. Better to consider something—anything—else.
Smog clogs the air and turns the sky an ugly, hazy shade of gray brown. Wei Wuxian feels dirty just getting caught up in it, like his clothes will stain the same ugly color if he stands out here for too long, but he prides himself on not showing it.
The car finally pulls up to the curb, black and gleaming with impenetrably dark windows. Though it will be stopped for a handful off seconds at most, it earns itself two pulses of another car’s horn and an angry shout from the driver, muffled by his windshield. The interior swallows Jin Guangyao as he sits, his posture perfect, and then the door shuts and then he is gone while Wei Wuxian is left at loose ends.
He ought to rest before tonight, but though he’s tired, he’s too keyed up to sleep. He stands around for so long that his legs start to ache, trying to make himself move.
A stretched-column shadow crosses behind him, overlapping his own, barely differentiated beneath the weak, diffused sunlight. He plans to ignore it, return to the club, find some way to occupy himself, and then start his daily routine anew, a day full of good intentions.
“Wei Ying.”
There is one man on this planet who would use his name so familiarly, though the sound of his voice would give him away just as well. When Wei Wuxian is finally able to turn toward Lan Zhan, his breath catches at the sight of him. Or the sight of his neck anyway. That’s as high as he’s able to lift his gaze.
Like Wei Wuxian, he’s dressed conservatively. Compared to Wei Wuxian, very conservatively. Appropriate for a man raised in Cloud Recesses.
His robes are the same undecorated beige as Wei Wuxian’s outfit, though far more striking despite the neutrality of the color. Only someone like Lan Zhan, who wanders the world with such upright, ancient dignity, could pull something like this off without coming across as prudish. Even the elderly rarely force themselves to dress in this manner.
Knowing how much he struggled for serenity when they were teens makes his current poise beautiful. Wei Wuxian would have liked to watch him grow into that confidence. It would surely have been a sight to behold.
“Lan Wangji,” he says, voice tight with the need to be informal, too. Informality is an awful idea for multiple reasons.
“Will you look at me?” Lan Zhan asks, taking one step closer. Not even a single thread of Dominance weaves through the question, leaving Wei Wuxian the choice of whether to comply or not.
In practice, this means he has little choice, but in the opposite direction. After having spent the evening pretending to be a dominant, he’ll need a few more hours to summon up the energy necessary to make such direct eye contact with—with someone Wei Wuxian esteems as highly as he does Lan Zhan. An order would make it easy, but without one, fatigue and overwork make it impossible.
But Lan Zhan wouldn’t know that Wei Wuxian isn’t the sort of submissive he used to be, one who’d have brazenly held Lan Zhan’s gaze as long as he, Wei Wuxian, wanted it, Lan Zhan’s wishes to the contrary be damned.
Back then, he could—and did—weasel his way out of direct orders. Back then, it was fun, the push and pull of power between himself and Lan Zhan. Now… now he would beg for one if his life didn’t demand otherwise from him.
Though Lan Zhan sighs, he doesn’t bully Wei Wuxian for something Wei Wuxian can’t give freely. “May I take you to breakfast?”
“Is that a good idea?”
“Is it not?”
Wei Wuxian chews his lower lip, catching himself too late to fully halt himself in the act. Squaring his shoulders, he finds a spot just over Lan Zhan’s shoulder to focus on and pulls himself together. “Do you want to be seen in company with a—” He cannot bring himself to call himself what he is. He isn’t ashamed of it, as he has had no choice in the matter, and it’s certainly better than what came before, but it is coarse language for a conversation conducted on the street. “—with me?”
“I would say it’s too late for that,” Lan Zhan replies, “but even if that were not the case, I would ask.”
“Why?” Why, upon seeing Wei Wuxian in a place like this—a place he would only have come to as a matter of duty to his family—would he come back for more? Why does he want something so innocent? Why is he here?
“Come to breakfast.” A tendril of Dominance leaks into his tone and curls around Wei Wuxian’s ability to withstand the offer. Even the weakest submissive could have batted it aside, but Wei Wuxian cannot. There’s no way Lan Zhan can know he’s so easily subdued or he wouldn’t have done it. The display was merely that: a display, a rhetorical device, an invitation, Lan Zhan wanting Wei Wuxian to share breakfast with him and making sure Wei Wuxian is perfectly aware of that fact.
He falls upon the order, a raving, starving creature. His stomach turns at the pleasure he takes from the involuntary smile that crosses his mouth. “Alright,” he says, relieved that Lan Zhan can’t see him for the slavering, needful thing he has become. “Take me to breakfast, Lan Zhan.”
*
What Lan Zhan does is bring him to a nearby hotel overflowing with business people doing handshake deals in the lobby and tourists behaving atrociously where everyone can see it. His stomach gives a nauseating lurch when he sees a thick leather leash wrapped in the fist of one, the submissive attached to it following along in a haze as they step outside. Though this place is only a few blocks from the club, it feels like he’s stepped into an entirely different world, a more depraved one than he left ten years ago.
At least three Dominants clock him from his wide-eyed reaction to his surroundings, eying him speculatively as Lan Zhan puts himself between Wei Wuxian and the sight of them. Wei Wuxian can’t tell whether Lan Zhan did it because he’s a gentleman or because instinct drives him.
Maybe it’s both, or neither. It’s equally possible he just doesn’t want Wei Wuxian to embarrass him by looking too backward and provincial. Before, he wouldn’t have considered himself to be like this, but if he thinks about it, he has been rather oddly sheltered. His experiences have no bearing at all on how the world really is. What he knows is perhaps the weirdest cross sections of life, nothing like the genteel years of his childhood, nor the particular cruelty of everything that’s come to him since then.
Needless to say, even at his most mischievous, he’d have never willingly agreed to walk around in public on a leash.
“Just how far away is this restaurant anyway?” Wei Wuxian asks, discomfited by this realization. Before this moment, he’d have called himself worldlier, more experienced than this.
“Not far,” Lan Zhan answers. “The other side of the lobby.”
It might as well be the other side of the planet for how excruciating the journey is. The soft armor of his clothing fails to protect him against how ridiculous and exposed he feels. His composure is thoroughly shot by the time they arrive.
The front of house greets Lan Zhan courteously and leads them through the restaurant. All the while, Wei Wuxian keeps his head raised and his eyes discreetly lowered the whole way, hoping he doesn’t give himself away again. If he’s not careful, a flagrant hand feeding might just end him.
When the waiter brings them to an entirely separate room, large, elegantly appointed, and blessedly empty, he nearly buckles under the weight of his relief.
She goes through the spiel, hands a pair of menus to Lan Zhan, and leaves, allowing Wei Wuxian the dignity of some privacy so he can kneel at the low wooden table waiting for them. Exhausted, he slumps over it and presses his palm to his face, his skin hot to the touch. Lan Zhan follows with far more grace. His expression, in the seconds before Wei Wuxian hid his eyes, was one of concern. Wei Wuxian is going to pretend he hasn’t seen it.
“You did all that on purpose,” Wei Wuxian says, senseless, his words muffled by his hand. If Lan Zhan were to ask, he wouldn’t be able to explain what he’s blaming Lan Zhan for, but if he performs well enough, Lan Zhan won’t think to ask. “Shame on you. Taking advantage of a poor—”
“I did no such thing.”
Wei Wuxian laughs, punch drunk and teetering on the edge of something he can’t allow himself to fall into. Lifting his hand, he sees he’s had no effect on Lan Zhan’s demeanor at all. Surely back when they were kids, he’d have gotten a flushed ear or two for his trouble.
Before Wei Wuxian can push further, the host returns with a tea setting. This, she places before Wei Wuxian, another indignity inflicted upon him as interest stirs itself within him. So much for discretion.
When Lan Zhan reaches across the table to take the tray, he slaps Lan Zhan’s hands aside, and realizing too late the liberty he’s taken. Pulling back, he gestures for Lan Zhan to do as he wishes, another mark against him. It’s not his place to give permission, nor does he want it to be. Lan Zhan isn’t his client. He’s not here to play dominant.
With pointed determination, he watches, agonized, as Lan Zhan passes one of the cups to him.
Though his throat is sand dry, the tea tastes like ash on his tongue. Eventually, he can’t help himself anymore.
“Give me that,” he says, snappish.
He expects Lan Zhan to scold him, but he merely relinquishes the tray with equanimity and grace. It’s been years since Wei Wuxian’s practiced serving tea properly—not that anything about this encounter is proper—but muscle memory sees him through spooning the appropriate amount of leaves into the strainer sitting atop Lan Zhan’s cup. After touching his knuckles to the ceramic kettle to ensure the temperature is correct, he spends enough time pouring the water to ensure it steeps appropriately.
“It has a temperature gauge,” Lan Zhan says. “Shufu was always complaining at you for doing this.” He takes Wei Wuxian’s hand, studies his knuckles, and relinquishes it only when Wei Wuxian tugs his way out of the hold. “It’s unsafe.”
“You’re docking points, Lan Zhan? The kettle’s properly insulated. Anyone else would be impressed.” It had been a bitch to learn how to tell by touch alone when the water is hot enough, and yeah, Lan-laoxiansheng had thrown many fits about it, done everything except call Wei Wuxian the whore he was trying to emulate, but he’d enjoyed the challenge back then. In those days, he wasn’t in any respect a proper submissive, but he could appreciate the performative, dramatic ritual of submission when it mattered to him, which that did. Now, too much of it matters, even the stuff he’d found distasteful then. “There’s a story about a courtesan who scarred the back of her hand doing this for the woman she loved. Did you ever read it or see it performed?”
“No.”
“Ah, of course not. Lan Zhan’s no silly romantic and I bet his dear uncle dissuaded him mercilessly. Let me tell you then. There was a courtesan so enchanting that she never experienced a day of peace in her life. Every night, she entertained the most important ministers—”
“Which ministers? What time period?”
“Aish, Lan Zhan. It doesn’t matter. It’s a story.”
“A true one?”
“It doesn’t matter. Obviously, it’s buried to time whether it’s true or not. But she definitely entertained important people, okay? She was beautiful and she played every instrument perfectly. She wrote and recited poetry and discoursed on every subject with perfect grace, and nobody made tea as she did and she was beloved for that as well. She was saved from disgrace by a pirate—”
“Wei Ying.”
“Shh. Just listen. It’s a good story. One autumn, this pirate came into port with the rest of her crew. They’d had a good score and the lot of them decided to visit the pleasure houses while they were in port. She’d earned enough to take her reprieve in the most prestigious, but didn’t have enough to pay for the courtesan’s company especially. By chance, they caught sight of one another and fell in love immediately.”
“That seems implausible.”
Wei Wuxian’s stomach sours. Maybe this was a bad idea, but he’s going to prevail, because he has a point. “You’re trying to ruin my favorite story, Lan Zhan. I’m crushed.”
Despite his inability to suspend disbelief, Lan Zhan dips his head in acknowledgment, as much a win as Wei Wuxian will collect from him.
“They fell in love at first sight, but the pirate couldn’t pay and the courtesan couldn’t refuse the client she was already scheduled to spend the evening with anyway. They didn’t see one another again for a year, but they were always in one another’s heart, wondering what the other was up to, dreaming about meeting again. The pirate saved every bit of money she earned that year, pushed her crew harder, and was finally able to afford a few hours with the courtesan. They came into port the following autumn. She paid. They stayed up all night just talking to one another. The madam complained about it in the morning.”
Lan Zhan levels a flat glare at Wei Wuxian, one that sends an inopportune thrill through him.
“Okay, okay. They probably did more than that, but in the version of the story I heard, they talked and they fell deeper into love. Year after year, the pirate saved her money just for another chance to… talk.”
“Why did she not simply buy out the courtesan’s contract?”
“Spoken like a true rich gege. Lan Zhan, how could she? Sure, a year could buy her one night with the courtesan, but even if she saved everything and nothing bad ever happened and she lucked into huge takes on the high seas, she could never have afforded it and they both knew it, but the courtesan had a plan.”
He pauses, waiting for Lan Zhan to make some choice remark, but he remains silent this time.
“She couldn’t outright disfigure herself. That would have been discovered and punished, but she could do what she always did: make the tea everyone loved. Day in and day out, she brushed the back of her hand over the pots she preferred, always just a little too long. Years of little burns finally left an indelible mark on her skin, at which point she could no longer take the richest clients, her beauty marred by such a little imperfection. Soon enough, her rates lowered. Fewer people wanted to be with her. They found newer courtesans to enjoy. She was happier this way, even while the madam despaired of her.”
Wei Wuxian stops, pours Lan Zhan another cup of tea. At the same time, the host returns to take their order. Lan Zhan is quick to list off the spiciest dishes on the menu, a menu Wei Wuxian tries to scan quickly so he can put in a request that will be to Lan Zhan’s tastes.
“That will be all,” Lan Zhan says, putting an end to Wei Wuxian’s plan.
Scowling, Wei Wuxian waits until the host leaves again.
He must pout a little too long, because Lan Zhan clears his throat and says, “Then what happened?”
“The pirate returned to port, money in hand, ready for her one night with the courtesan. After being surprised by the discovery that said money went a lot further than it used to, she was livid to discover the scar on the courtesan’s hand. She immediately went out to buy salve, wasting a fair portion of the evening trying to find an apothecary still open. When she returned, she smoothed it over the back of the courtesan’s hand, and dared to ask about her contract with the pleasure house.”
He stops again, this time to fill Lan Zhan’s cup one more time. Lan Zhan’s eyes flash with a hint of impatience. Maybe he’s a little more romantic than Wei Wuxian has given him credit for, desperate to hear the end of the story. Or maybe he just wants it done already.
“If she were willing to sell her knowledge of the seas, her ship, and her crew’s expertise, her whole life essentially, she could buy the courtesan’s contract.”
“And did she?”
“Of course, Lan Zhan! They disappeared into some village somewhere. The pirate kissed the back of the courtesan’s hand every morning before applying salve to it. They shared a happy life together.”
Lan Zhan’s lips thin. “Did the courtesan enjoy it?”
“Enjoy what?”
“Burning herself.”
“I have no idea,” Wei Wuxian replies. “Does it matter?”
“Were I the pirate, I would not have allowed the courtesan to harm herself in such a way.” His gaze darkens. If that’s the lesson he’s taken from it, he’s very much not a romantic. “I would perhaps have inflicted pain upon her body if that was her wish, but she would not have faced permanent injury on my account.”
Wei Wuxian very carefully ignores the part about Lan Wangji inflicting pain on willing bodies and focuses on what’s important: the endearing image of Lan Zhan riding in, shining like the brightest possible knight, to protect his lovely submissive’s perfect skin. “Rich gege, rich gege. Her years of devotion allowed her to spend the rest of her life with her lover. What’s a scar or two compared to that?”
Lan Zhan brings his cup to his mouth and sips, a perfectly gentlemanly excuse to avoid answering the question. Wei Wuxian is rather eager to hear his response, but as Lan Zhan’s eyes flutter closed in genuine pleasure, Wei Wuxian loses track of the conversation. It was a boring conversation anyway. Who needs to talk about old romances when satisfaction scours Wei Wuxian’s body so thoroughly clean of everything except this moment of Lan Zhan enjoying the tea he’s brewed?
He ducks his head, feeling shy, and lets the conversation fall into a lull. Eventually, the food arrives, giving them a good excuse to avoid speaking further. Wei Wuxian eats quickly and neatly, thinks he’s never tasted anything so good, the spice numbing his tongue to perfection. Lan Zhan is, to his utter lack of surprise, not nearly as motivated. Wei Wuxian pours more tea for him and smiles encouragingly. Eventually, they finish their meal.
Wei Wuxian feels more human than he has in ages, longer than he truly cares to consider.
When Lan Zhan has paid, he walks Wei Wuxian out, a distracted look on his face as they turn onto the sidewalk. The entire way back, he carries nervous energy in his shoulders. Wei Wuxian doesn’t know how to bring it up.
Once they’re back to the club, Wei Wuxian stops Lan Zhan with a hand on his arm. If he lets Lan Zhan go without addressing it, he’ll regret it. “Say what you want to say. I can tell you’ve been stewing about something.”
Lan Zhan draws in an uncharacteristically shuddering breath. This time, it’s he who won’t meet Wei Wuxian’s eyes. “Did you mean what you said? About that story being romantic?”
“Sure,” Wei Wuxian replies. Whatever he expected Lan Zhan to bring up, it wasn’t this. “Why?”
Lan Zhan’s gaze steadies, finds Wei Wuxian’s. It’s easier, after a few hours’ reprieve, to look at Lan Zhan. “Wei Ying, your contract—”
An arrow’s point of anxiety pierces Wei Wuxian’s breastbone, shattering in a starburst pattern across his rib cage. What does Lan Zhan know about his contract? “You’re right,” he says, voice tight and small and more than a little nasty. “I don’t like it.”
But Lan Zhan is unmoved. His nervousness has resolved itself. When Wei Wuxian steps past him, he grabs Wei Wuxian’s wrist and squeezes tight. “I intend to purchase it.”
“No—”
He pulls Wei Wuxian around, looks him right in the eye, no hesitation in him.
“It is not up for negotiation.” His knuckles sweep over Wei Wuxian’s cheek in a gentle, unobtrusive caress. This is highly, highly inappropriate behavior for Lan Zhan, so out of character that Wei Wuxian doesn’t know where to slot it into his understanding of Lan Zhan’s personality. Wei Wuxian would take a step back, except for how he’s locked into place, trembling, little stronger than the leaf clinging to its tree during the death throes of autumn.
It’s embarrassing. He should be able to stand against this.
“Lan Zhan!” The intimate name of their youth—the summers spent learning etiquette, the occasional run-ins at various intercity school events afterward, the encounters Wei Wuxian purposefully arranged when he got bored and missed Lan Zhan too terribly—spills from his mouth entirely against his intention. It’s the first time he’s saying it aloud in years and it’s being spoken in horror, in anger.
Lan Zhan can’t just do this.
Except, he can. Or at least he can try. Madam Yang has enough business acumen to know Wei Wuxian’s worth. To persuade her, Lan Zhan will have to be smarter, or he’ll have to throw a monumental wad of cash at her to make it worth her while. The economics of whorehouse Dominants, even false ones like Wei Wuxian, can be tricky to navigate. They’re just so hard to come by, fake and real alike, risky though the fake ones are.
Shame burns him from the inside out. Just imagining that negotiation… his face warms, and humiliation spreads rapidly within him, pooling low in his gut, where it mutates into something more disgraceful.
“I’m sorry,” Lan Zhan says, as though he’s the one responsible for the distastefulness of this moment and not Wei Wuxian. “Go inside and rest.”
This is an order, and Wei Wuxian can’t resist it anymore than the tide can resist the pull of the moon. No matter how upset it might make him, he can’t stop himself, can’t even turn around to look at Lan Zhan one last time as he steps inside the club.