“Aiyou, Lan Zhan,” Wei Wuxian said, pushing at Lan Zhan’s shoulder. “You’re the very best blanket a boy from Yunmeng could ask for, but I need to get up. Isn’t it time for bed anyway? All good Lans should take up the proper position, right?” Lan Zhan neither moved nor said anything. “Lan Zhan?”
“You have not stopped moving at all today,” Lan Zhan answered, words pressed quietly into his neck, “until now.”
“That’s because you wore me out, gege.”
From between Wei Wuxian’s legs, Lan Zhan rose to his knees and settled back onto his haunches. Seeing his chance, Wei Wuxian tried to roll out of the way, but he took hold of Wei Wuxian’s leg and dragged him back, settling one hand on Wei Wuxian’s hip. In one quick swipe of the other, he took hold of both of Wei Wuxian’s naughty, wandering hands as they crept their way up Lan Zhan’s flanks. “You don’t seem worn out.”
“I’m very worn out. I still need to get up.”
“You should rest.”
“I just had an idea,” Wei Wuxian insisted. It was a very good idea, one he would investigate properly just as soon as they made it back to Cloud Recesses so he could conduct research. Sadly, remote villages didn’t have the most current or comprehensive libraries of cultivation manuals to peruse. Truly, Lan Zhan was lucky that Wei Wuxian let it go at taking a few notes. It used to be, he’d sneak out of bed after Lan Zhan fell asleep to work until morning, only rousing when Lan Zhan pointedly deposited him within the nest of their bedding when he woke up.
“What is it? I will remember for you.”
“Ugh. Where’s the fun in that, Lan Zhan? If I tell you, it’ll take away the bafflement I’ll feel when I try to decipher my chicken scratch. It’s part of the process. What if the cultivation world loses out on an incredible invention because you’ve disrupted it?”
Lan Zhan was unmoved.
Time to take things into his own hands, literally.
He wrested one free—Lan Zhan’s hold was so tragically loose on his wrists, not even a single red mark to go along with it, it was like he didn’t even really want to keep Wei Wuxian here—and slapped at Lan Zhan’s hip. The sound resounded throughout the room.
Lan Zhan’s eyes widened. Wei Wuxian’s eyes widened. Neither of them moved.
A welt sprang up in the shape of Wei Wuxian’s hand. When Wei Wuxian stretched to look, he saw it wrapped around and curved down slightly toward his beautiful, beloved ass.
Wei Wuxian laughed, nervous. “Ah, Lan Zhan. I guess I don’t know my own strength these days.” Under his breath, he mumbled, “Golden cores, golden cores, gotta remember I’m not that weak anymore. Wow.” Massaging the spot carefully, he said, “Sorry.”
His skin was very hot beneath Wei Wuxian’s hand, but Wei Wuxian may have been imagining that because suddenly, Wei Wuxian was feeling very hot. It might have been him.
Lan Zhan still didn’t move and he didn’t speak and, frankly, Wei Wuxian was a little worried that he’d done something really, very wrong.
“I’m sorry. That was—I really didn’t mean…”
Lan Zhan let go of him, almost like he’d been burnt. “Take your notes.”
“Uh.” Cringing at his own inability to hold onto the thought in light of this, he said, “I might have forgotten. What it was I… I can’t entirely remember what I wanted to do. Uh, now.”
“Then we should sleep.”
Wei Wuxian’s shoulders slumped in relief. “Yes! Good idea! Good, I’ll just—” Without Lan Zhan to stop him, he hopped out of bed and gathered their robes. All the while, Lan Zhan remained kneeling on the bed, staring at nothing. When Wei Wuxian returned, taking gentle hold of his arm and threading it through his undershirt, he barely reacted. “Lan Zhan, did I hurt you terribly?”
“No.”
“I know it’s not…” Wei Wuxian didn’t like it when he got slapped. It stood to reason Lan Zhan would feel the same.
“It’s fine.” Lan Zhan’s mouth twitched. “It was an accident.”
“You can hit me back if you want. Turnabout and all that.”
“Wei Ying, I will not.” Turning toward Wei Wuxian, he pressed his hand to the back of Wei Wuxian’s neck, pulling him in for a thorough and thoroughly comforting kiss. “Come to bed.”
Nodding, he held out Lan Zhan’s trousers to him and then quickly slipped into his own.
Lan Zhan pulled him into a gentle embrace as soon as he wriggled under the quilt they shared. “You’re sure I didn’t hurt you?”
Lan Zhan closed his eyes and petted the back of Wei Ying’s head as he settled into his preferred position, head pressed against Lan Zhan’s chest, his legs twined around Lan Zhan’s. “Wei Ying, if I can assure you of nothing else, it’s that you haven’t hurt me.”
Though Wei Wuxian thought that was the end of it, and trust him, he spent a lot of time thinking about it and how bad he felt for doing that to Lan Zhan unprovoked, he noticed Lan Zhan was behaving a little strangely afterward. Like right now, a whole week later. As they were eating together before the little campfire Lan Zhan had built. It wasn’t the first time this week, once he thought about it. He wasn’t even sure he would have noticed if he wasn’t feeling self-conscious about the whole thing himself.
It was cozy and comfortable being here—or as comfortable as sitting in the woods could be, many li from any town or village that might take them, but for the purposes of this story, it was comfortable, especially once Wei Wuxian was snuggled into Lan Zhan’s side—and Wei Wuxian was happily chattering away about his part of their investigation today, not particularly fruitful, but interesting all the same.
Only Lan Zhan wasn’t listening to him. Instead, he focused entirely on the fire, barely humming as Wei Wuxian talked. “Lan Zhan, I fell into a creek and almost drowned and a ghost wound up—”
Lan Zhan looked over at him, gaze flicking down to his bowl that was still mostly full. “Eat more.”
“Lan Zhan, I’m not hungry right now. You know it takes me forever to—”
“Eat.”
He still hadn’t gotten to the part in his story where he took care of the ghost! It was the most exciting part, too. Sure, it had nothing to do with the hunt they were currently investigating, but hey. “Only Hanguang jun would be so unfeeling. He won’t listen to me and he bullies me about my food. There’s not even a hint of spice in this meal.” There was, in fact, quite a bit of spice in it, but these details hardly mattered. “His wife is suffering and he doesn’t care.”
“He cares.”
“He’s been ignoring me for days. Head in the clouds, Lan Zhan. I bet he couldn’t even tell me what I just said.”
Lan Zhan’s eyes narrowed. “What are the terms?”
“Ah?”
“The terms of this bet.”
“Well, I… I don’t know. I was just saying, Lan Zhan. You don’t have to take me so seriously all of a sudden.” Grumbling, he shoved rice into his mouth. “Who wants to bet with you?”
Lan Zhan’s lips thinned. If he were anyone else, Wei Wuxian would have said he was pouting, but this was Lan Zhan. Hanguang jun. The second and most refined and perfect jade of Gusu Lan. That man definitely wouldn’t pout, not without a bit of alcohol in him anyway. Wei Wuxian poked his cheek. “Lan Zhan, are you unhappy with your Wei Ying?”
Quick, Lan Zhan captured his hand and squeezed, bringing it to his mouth to press a delicate kiss to his fingertips. “Never.”
“Do you actually want to make a wager?”
“Gambling is forbidden.”
“You do want something though, don’t you? Tell your gege, I’m sure he can make it happen for you.”
After rolling out their bedding some time later, Lan Zhan gave Wei Wuxian at least four more pressing things to think about than his earlier fit of pique, but Lan Zhan couldn’t be cajoled once they were done, no matter what Wei Ying said or did to his person, which mostly consisted of sneaking his cold hands into Lan Zhan’s very warm robes and whining incessantly in Lan Zhan’s ear about how bullied and mistreated he was.
Figured. Lan Zhan was just too stubborn.
The thing was: it kept happening, Lan Zhan’s piqued mood, and Wei Wuxian still couldn’t figure out what was bringing it on or why. Everything they did was the same. Whenever Wei Wuxian tried to probe, Lan Zhan shut him down gently—or, happily, sometimes not so very gently. Every technique that usually worked to pry answers from Lan Zhan’s lips failed him.
But there was one he hadn’t yet tried, his and Lan Zhan’s least favorite method of resolving unresolved… things, whatever this was. Even though it was effective, they both found it tedious.
“I give up,” he said, sighing dramatically as they walked along a dirt path leading to what Wei Wuxian hoped was their next night hunt. “Hanguang jun, your wife is useless.” Between his fingers, he twirled Chenqing. At the same time, he watched Lan Zhan out of the corner of his eye. “Oh, to think you could have married someone—”
“Nonsense.”
Wei Wuxian suppressed the grin that threatened to form. “—with more sense and emotional sensitivity than this one.”
“I neither want nor asked for a sensible and sensitive wife.” Lan Zhan’s eyes blazed with annoyance, the kind that would find Wei Wuxian tumbled into the grass if he played his cards right. Softening, he continued, “You are the appropriate amount of both for me.”
Wei Wuxian could say nothing for long moments, truly speechless. Really, how could Lan Zhan say such things with a straight face? “Shoo shoo shoo, stop it. You didn’t marry a fisherman. I don’t need compliments.”
Lan Zhan scrutinized him. “What do you need?”
The answer was, of course, a tumble in the grass, but also to find out what was eating at Lan Zhan. He got the former, but was left scratching his head on the latter, and not only because there were bits of straw poking at his scalp in the aftermath of Lan Zhan’s thorough ministrations.
“Lan Zhan,” he said later, hanging off of Lan Zhan’s arm. The sky was beginning to purple, weary from holding up the sun all day, and no answers were forthcoming. “You really can tell me if something is bothering you, you know?”
Lan Zhan ran his fingers through Wei Wuxian’s unruly hair, mouth curved in a gentle smile. They came away with a burr stuck between them. This, he flicked away before cradling Wei Wuxian’s head and pulling him close to kiss the crown. “I know.”
It wasn’t the answer he wanted, of course. It wasn’t an answer at all. But it did leave him feeling content that at least Lan Zhan was aware that Wei Wuxian noticed him and cared enough to ask and was here for him when he needed.
At Wei Wuxian’s behest—“Lan Zhan, aren’t you tired of the wilderness yet? Wouldn’t you like to have me in a bed? It’s been so long and the wine in this region is purported to be very, very good.”—they stopped in one of the livelier towns they passed, a whole half-day earlier than they usually settled down for the night. They’d been at it for a long time, night hunt after night hunt, and Wei Wuxian was ready for some proper rest. He suspected Lan Zhan was, too, if he was willing to stop so soon when there was probably at least one more village within walking distance they could’ve chosen instead. “What shall we do with all this time on our hands?” he asked, perching his chin on his palm as they sat down for lunch. Beneath the table, one of his legs stretched entirely of its own accord to brush against Lan Zhan’s knee. “Lan er gege, you really know how to spoil me.”
As always, Lan Zhan had nothing to say about such things. Instead, he did what he always did: overfilled Wei Wuxian’s bowl and poured cup after cup of wine for him.
The wine was very good. By the end of their meal, Wei Wuxian was relaxed and happy and pleasantly full. Migrating to Lan Zhan’s side of the table made the sensation of contentment even better. Walking his fingers up Lan Zhan’s bicep, he asked, “You know how else you could spoil me?”
Lan Zhan’s attention, normally fully on him at this point, was instead drilling into the table where the jug of wine, little more than a mouthful or two left inside, sat. He reached for it and quickly splashed the remnants into Wei Wuxian’s cup, but before Wei Wuxian could accept it, Lan Zhan was pouring it into his own mouth.
Wei Wuxian’s stomach dropped. Didn’t they both know better than to let this happen again? Wei Wuxian had promised himself he wasn’t going to let Lan Zhan drink again after the last time. At least this time they couldn’t misunderstand one another, right? Right?
Aiyou.
“Lan Zhan?”
“Wei Ying, I think this time you should spoil me.” Already, his words were hazy. His fingertips, just like last time, all those years ago, pressed themselves gently between his furrowed eyebrows, elbow smacking the table hard as he slumped forward.
“Spoil you,” Wei Wuxian groused. “As though you’d let me.” Rummaging around in Lan Zhan’s sleeve for his money pouch, he surreptitiously glanced about the room and shifted to better shield Lan Zhan. Luckily, everyone else here was too busy drinking and carousing to pay much mind to some travel-weary cultivators. If only they knew who those travel-weary cultivators were.
Lan Zhan continued to sleep.
“What if I ravish you, huh?” Wei Ying whispered harshly. The clink of a silver ingot cut through his chastising words as he pressed it to the table, payment for services already rendered and services that will likely need to be rendered come morning. “Utterly shameless of you to leave yourself at my mercies. I’m going to have to haul you around like this. What do you think these fine, upstanding people will say? They’ll take me for a rogue. You really put me in a difficult position, Lan Zhan.” Lifting his hand, he shouted, “Waiter! Waiter, I need assistance, please.”
When the waiter scurried over, he said, gloomy, as he slid the ingot toward the edge of the table, “Please don’t kick us out in the middle of the night.”
The waiter’s eyes widened and his face went a little pale. “Esteemed guests, please…”
“I promise I’ll do my best to keep damages to a minimum.” Wei Wuxian reached into the pouch and retrieved a second ingot. “We can compensate you if necessary.” He did tuck this one back into the pouch though, only promising himself he’d hand it over if Lan Zhan really did get out of hand. It was one thing if Lan Zhan decided to recklessly splurge on every whim that passed Wei Wuxian’s fancy, but it was another entirely to throw money away at random. “Is our room prepared?”
“Yes, but—”
“If you hear any screaming,” Wei Wuxian warned, hauling Lan Zhan’s body up by the scruff of his neck, “let me assure you, it’s all just in good fun. Very. Good. Fun. I definitely promise that.” He shifted Lan Zhan’s weight onto him. “Nothing can possibly go wrong, right, Lan Zhan?”
Lan Zhan’s head lolled against Wei Wuxian’s neck, so delightfully undignified. Truly, nobody in this world was more shameless than him. Wei Wuxian very carefully turned Lan Zhan’s face so it was better hidden against Wei Wuxian’s throat. “Pretend you didn’t see anything,” he said to the waiter.
“I wish I didn’t,” the waiter replied, despondent, voice trailing away as Wei Wuxian shuffled past him in search of their accommodation.
With very little fanfare, Wei Wuxian deposited Lan Zhan on the bed, letting his limbs sprawl as they would while Lan Zhan slowly roused to drunken consciousness. Again, he rummaged in Lan Zhan’s sleeves, retrieving various pouches from within. Most of them carried knickknacks that belonged to Wei Wuxian.
“I really should cut you some slack,” he said as he sorted through the junk within, all of it arrayed around him on the floor where he was currently kneeling, hoping he might find something with which to amuse Lan Zhan. “So much stuff.” He opened another bag and found a diabolo they’d picked up almost a year ago. The sticks were cumbersome as he pulled them free, boggling at the thought that Lan Zhan had hoarded them this way. The accompanying discs were a little on the heavy side. This toy was absolutely unnecessary for Wei Wuxian’s continued happiness, but his heart felt overfull with affection regardless. “Why did you keep this, Lan Zhan?”
Lan Zhan clumsily pushed himself upright and extended his hand.
“You want to play?”
Lan Zhan nodded.
Who was Wei Wuxian to disoblige? When he tried to hand the sticks to Lan Zhan, letting them go as soon as Lan Zhan grabbed them, Lan Zhan huffed and stabbed at Wei Wuxian’s chest with them, then rapped the back of Wei Wuxian’s knuckles with one.
“Ouch! Lan Zhan, be nice.”
He was not nice. He kept prodding Wei Wuxian until he took hold of them again. “You want me to play?” He had gotten pretty good at it when they were traveling up north last winter, an attempt to keep himself warm while they walked that didn’t involve burrowing into Lan Zhan’s robes. Maybe Lan Zhan had liked watching him.
Lan Zhan, taciturn as always, shook his head.
“You just want me to hold onto the sticks, too?”
Another shake. He tugged again on the sticks and then pushed them back toward Wei Wuxian.
Deeply confused and charmed, Wei Wuxian did exactly as Lan Zhan modeled. Unlike Wei Wuxian, Lan Zhan kept a tight grip, struggling against giving the sticks up despite Wei Wuxian’s best efforts. Understanding dawned. Lan Zhan really was too cute. “Tug of war?”
A nod. No victory could be sweeter.
When it was Lan Zhan’s turn to pull, Wei Wuxian pulled back with all of his strength.
It shouldn’t have been enough to yank Lan Zhan into Wei Wuxian’s lap, his knees knocking hard against the floor, but Wei Wuxian suddenly found himself with an entire Lan cultivator straddling his thighs and nuzzling his neck. “That’s not how you play tug of war,” Wei Wuxian said. “You didn’t even put up a fight. Naughty, Lan Zhan.”
“Very.”
When Wei Wuxian was naughty, Lan Zhan had a whole panoply of ways to take revenge against him, but when Lan Zhan was naughty, Wei Wuxian could only be at a loss. “What am I supposed to do with you?”
“Punishment.”
Yeah, ha.
“Oh, punishment, eh? Punishment. Tell me, what is the punishment for throwing competitions? It must be a newer rule since I’ve never heard of it.”
Instead of answering—heavens above, why would Wei Wuxian ever expect an answer out of Lan Zhan when he was like this, he’d have an easier time prying Lan Zhan’s perfect teeth out of his head with only his fingernails—Lan Zhan wriggled. All over his lap. In fact, it went well beyond a wriggle and might better be called a grind and a filthy one at that.
Wei Wuxian’s dick was very on-board with the friction Lan Zhan was generating between them, but Wei Wuxian’s upstairs brain was smart and knew very well that something else was going on here than what it looked like. If what Lan Zhan wanted was to get fucked, Wei Wuxian was mostly certain he wouldn’t have had a problem saying as much.
Wei Ying’s hands curved over Lan Zhan’s hips and settled over the arc of his cheeks, skin very, very warm even through the layers of his robes. If Wei Wuxian hiked them up and pushed his palm inside of Lan Zhan’s trousers, he wondered if his skin would scald. “You’re going to have to be more specific, Lan Zhan.”
Lan Zhan only sniffed disdainfully. “You should know.”
“We’ve established your wife is silly and unobservant. Have mercy on me. I want to give you what you want.”
Rubbing his cheek against Wei Wuxian’s shoulder, he said, “You’re not unobservant.”
“Lan Zhan, pretend for a minute that I am unobservant,” he whined. “I know that’s probably very difficult because I’m a genius, but I really don’t know. You can tell me. I won’t tease.” I won’t tease too much. “It’s not like you want to get beaten with a stick, right?”
Lan Zhan went still. Wei Wuxian’s heart sank.
“No,” Lan Zhan said, and Wei Wuxian couldn’t tell if it was a mistruth or not. Lan Zhan wasn’t a liar, but he got slippery when he drank, and all sorts of misunderstandings ensued.
But too many things clicked into place all at once. Of course the Lan Sect would churn out a bunch of upstanding cultivators with fixations. Lan Zhan’s recent weird attitude, the way he’d—
No, no, it didn’t make any sense. Lan Zhan would’ve gotten himself into way, way more trouble if he got off on getting beaten with sticks.
But the way he’d reacted to Wei Wuxian smacking him?
The way he was ‘misbehaving’ now, a little childish?
Wei Wuxian forced himself to relaxed. If Lan Zhan really did want to get beaten with sticks, they’d work through it. Until then, he was going to improvise and redirect. Laughing, he asked, “Lan Zhan, do you want me to spank the answer out of you?”
Lan Zhan’s hands tightened into fists in Wei Wuxian’s robes. He exhaled wetly against Wei Wuxian’s neck. His body, a body Wei Wuxian knew better than his own, reacted.
Ah. There it was.
“You want me to spank you,” Wei Wuxian repeated. “That’s the answer, isn’t it?”
In exchange for the world tipping sideways, Wei Wuxian received one measly nod and Lan Zhan’s mouth latching itself to his throat, just another way for him to be a stubborn mule of a lover. If his mouth was occupied, he didn’t have to speak, did he?
“Couldn’t you have said just that?” he said into Lan Zhan’s precious hair, pained and delighted and baffled all at once, pained because he’d had no idea this was something Lan Zhan might want and delighted because it was something he could do for Lan Zhan and baffled because he didn’t have the first clue about how to make this good.
While Lan Zhan sucked marks into Wei Wuxian’s skin, Wei Wuxian thought. And thought. And thought. He was, deep down inside, a thinker. But more importantly, he was also a doer. Cupping Lan Zhan’s face in his hands, he lifted Lan Zhan’s head and looked into his eyes. His gaze was clearer now than before. “You’re sure?”
Lan Zhan nodded.
“Out loud.”
Averting his gaze, Lan Zhan said, “I am.”
“Do you—are you… Lan Zhan, I think you’re going to have to take charge of this.” Rifling through the library of pornographic mental images he carried in his head devoted entirely to all the things he wanted to do to Lan Zhan and all the things he wanted Lan Zhan to do to him, he couldn’t even begin to find one that matched this. He was never going to be as far-sighted as Lan Zhan when it came to such things. “You’ll have to tell me what you want. Can you do that?”
Rising smoothly to his feet, Lan Zhan belligerently untied his trousers and pushed them down his beautiful thighs. Unfortunately for him, he was still a little intoxicated and hadn’t thought this course of action through in its entirety.
“Lan Zhan, wait! Your boots!” Before Lan Zhan got mad and ripped up his trousers, Wei Wuxian took hold of Lan Zhan’s foot and pulled one boot free, then the other. Tossing them aside, he pulled Lan Zhan’s trousers off. These, too, he flung away before peeling Lan Zhan’s robes from his body.
He was already hard, the full length of him flushed pink as a drop of precome formed on the tip. Though Wei Wuxian longed to stroke him or take him in his mouth, what he wanted had to wait. This was Lan Zhan asking for something in the only way he knew how. That made it important.
“Bed,” Lan Zhan said, holding out his hand for Wei Wuxian to take. He levered Wei Wuxian to his feet and shoved him toward it. “Sit.”
What could Wei Wuxian do? He sat.
And suddenly found himself again with a lap full of Lan cultivator. Only this time, his dick was pressed against Wei Wuxian’s sadly too-clothed thigh. His toes touched the floor and so did his palms. His hair spilled over his shoulder, exposing his whole back for Wei Wuxian’s perusal. Like always, Wei Wuxian couldn’t help touching the crisscrossing scars. These days, he could spare a bit of spiritual energy and used it to soothe the aches that plagued him. He did so now though he didn’t know if he was experiencing any pain today. Lan Zhan hadn’t mentioned it. He dared not look any further than Lan Zhan’s lower back.
Lan Zhan snapped his hips, rubbing himself against Wei Wuxian, not his usual response to such a gentle pulse of energy. “Wei Ying.”
“This is really working for you, huh?”
“If you do not—” Lan Zhan breathed through his nose. “Begin.”
Wei Wuxian couldn’t help but tease, his stomach fluttering with butterflies. “Or what?”
“I will make you.”
And there Wei Wuxian was in all of this. “How will you make me, er gege?” he asked, breathless, body reacting.
“You won’t come on my cock until you do. I think I wouldn’t let you come at all.”
“L-Lan Zhan.” Wei Wuxian’s cheeks grew hot. “So forward for someone who might not even remember this happening.”
“I will remember. Begin.”
“Oh, have you practiced drinking in your copious free time?”
“I will not ask again.”
The problem was Wei Wuxian didn’t know the first thing about how to properly spank a person. Where should he hit him? How hard? What would Lan Zhan like best?
He touched the soft, smooth skin of Lan Zhan’s ass, enjoyed the way Lan Zhan wriggled and let out a breath. “You have to relax.”
“Wei Yi—”
He supposed jumping into it would be for the best. He wanted to come on Lan Zhan’s cock again sometime before they grew old and gray.
Like the first time, this smack resounded, catching Lan Zhan across the very center of his left cheek. Even though it was awkward like this—surely if Lan Zhan was properly on the bed it would be better, but let the heavens fall before he criticized Lan Zhan’s knowledge of best sexual practices—he enjoyed the flush that rose on Lan Zhan’s skin. “Okay?”
“Again.”
Wei Wuxian hit the same spot.
“Again.”
Wei Wuxian slapped the other cheek, his arm pulled back awkwardly to strike at the angle he wanted.
He didn’t wait for Lan Zhan to tell him what to do: he struck twice more, three times. His palm stung. He studied Lan Zhan for signs of distress. Though he was breathing heavily, he seemed otherwise well.
“Harder,” Lan Zhan said.
Wei Wuxian could only obey. He didn’t bring all of his strength to bear this time, but the stroke drew a gasp from Lan Zhan’s mouth, such a gorgeous sound that Wei Wuxian did the exact same thing again.
The next few dragged moans from deep within him, the likes of which Wei Wuxian had never heard before.
Soon Lan Zhan could only squirm on his lap, balancing on his hands as each strike drove him forward into Wei Wuxian’s thigh. He grunted with each blow until finally he was silent, head lowered, body lax. Wei Wuxian’s hand ached so much he wasn’t sure how much more he could take, let alone the brunt that Lan Zhan bore.
“Lan Zhan?”
“Ah…” Lan Zhan exhaled, shuddering. “Wei Ying.”
Beneath Wei Wuxian’s palm, Lan Zhan’s skin was hot and a bright, burning red.
Worse, Wei Wuxian’s hardness pressed against Lan Zhan’s abdomen, no doubt obvious to Lan Zhan in this position.
“Wei Ying, I want…” His hands tightened into fists against the floor, knuckles tapping against the wood a few times as he shuddered.
That was the only warning he got before Lan Zhan rose, far less graceful than usual, and plastered himself against Wei Wuxian’s body, tearing through Wei Wuxian’s clothes as he pushed him back onto the bed. To be honest, it was more warning than he really needed.
Lan Zhan’s eyes were red-rimmed, his face even pinker than his ass had been. His hair cascaded around his face, pieces flying in every direction. His lips, they were so very red, bruised, indented in one corner where he must have bit himself too hard. Wei Wuxian laved this spot with his tongue and sucked Lan Zhan’s lip between his. If Lan Zhan was allowed to nibble, then so could Wei Wuxian.
He’d lost his ribbon somewhere along the way; Wei Wuxian hadn’t noticed it before.
Wei Wuxian’s ruined trousers, in tatters, wound up somewhere around his knees. Without bothering to remove Wei Wuxian’s robes, Lan Zhan urged him further up the bed and crowded between his legs, parting his thighs. He stroked himself once and did the same to Wei Wuxian, gathering between them what little lubrication he could to open Wei Wuxian up. Luckily, he didn’t need much or want it really.
Wei Wuxian’s hands fisted in the bedding, hips thrusting upward as Lan Zhan teased at his entrance. Every centimeter of him lit up from within. “Lan Zhan!” he cried as Lan Zhan breached him, impatient. “Lan Zhan, you te—ahh. Ah, Lan Zhan. You’re a monster. How could you—”
Lan Zhan was rarely slow with him, rarely deliberate, and rarely gentle and that was how Wei Wuxian preferred it, but his usual had nothing on the way Lan Zhan touched him today. Every tight grip left behind a bruise. His bites drew blood. His fingernails stripped Wei Wuxian bare. And all Wei Wuxian could do was cling and weep as Lan Zhan forced pleasure from his body.
“Wha—what kind of punishment is this? You’re taking advantage of me, Lan Zhan.” He wrapped his arms around Lan Zhan’s neck and hid his face there, unable to believe not moments ago he’d been spanking Lan Zhan and that they both liked it and that maybe they were both left a little teary-eyed by the experience. “Lan Zhan, be kinder to your gege. Didn’t he treat you well? Don’t I treat you well? I think you like this too much.”
Lan Zhan only thrust deeper, harder, panting harshly against Wei Wuxian’s ear.
“I should—” Heavens, he really couldn’t think with Lan Zhan doing this to him. “I should punish you more often.”
“Mn.” But even that single syllable sounded shattered.
By the time they both came, Wei Wuxian wasn’t sure he’d survive doing this again.
That, of course, didn’t stop him from wanting to try doing it again immediately.
When Wei Wuxian finally awoke, Lan Zhan was staring down at him, such deep affection in his gaze that it took Wei Wuxian’s breath away.
“Lan Zhan, you can’t look at me like that. I’ll get shy. I’ll wither away in embarrassment. I won’t know what to—”
Lan Zhan leaned in and kissed the complaints from his mouth. “Thank you,” he said, lips featherlight against Wei Wuxian’s cheek.
He squeaked and covered his face with his hands, shoving Lan Zhan away. It was too much. Lan Zhan was too much. “How can you remember doing something so bold and still have that to say? Lan Zhan, do something wholesome for once.”
“Alright. Come eat breakfast.” Lan Zhan gestured at the table where a full meal was already spread out. “Have tea.”
Wei Wuxian looked out at the world from between his fingers.
It seemed Lan Zhan had also cleaned up the mess Wei Wuxian had made of all their gear because the floor was spotless. Slumping back, Wei Wuxian sighed. At least they wouldn’t be hounded out of yet another inn, never to be allowed back. Lan Zhan really had learned how to hold his liquor better. Provocative, he said, “That’s not the kind of breakfast I want.”
A tiny, nearly imperceptible smile pulled at Lan Zhan’s mouth, his hand finding its way into the fresh trousers Lan Zhan must have dressed him in. “What do you want? It doesn’t seem like it would be wholesome.”
Okay, so maybe it wasn’t, but nobody could blame him, not when Lan Zhan was staring at him like this.
Before Lan Zhan could get beyond massaging him to hardness, Wei Wuxian took hold of his wrist. “You know you could… you can… if there’s ever anything.”
Lan Zhan’s smile widened. “Wei Ying, I know.”
“Because I—I’m kind of gone on you, you know? Whatever you want to do, I want… I want to do it with you. I want you to do it to me and I want to do it to you and I never want you to feel like you can’t tell me, okay?”
“Did I not do so?”
“Ehh, technically? But Lan Zhan, what a big production. We could have been doing this for weeks.”
“I enjoyed the anticipation.”
“You liked tormenting me.”
“I will do better to assuage your concerns should this happen again.”
Lan Zhan resumed touching him, slow, and it was perfect, that touch, right up until—
Wei Wuxian pushed himself upright, heart pounding furiously as his mind raced around itself. “Stop! Stop, Lan Zhan, stop it.” He slapped Lan Zhan’s hand aside and bounded out of bed, determined to write it down this time. “I just remembered.”
Lan Zhan studied his hand like it was an entirely different creature from himself. There was a tiny red mark blooming across his knuckle. “What did you remember?”
“My great idea! The one from before! It was—” He stopped rummaging around in their various pouches for a spare bit of paper and his ink stone and really looked at Lan Zhan.
Wei Wuxian grabbed Lan Zhan’s hand and kissed the spot he’d hit. “This is a thing now, isn’t it, the hitting?”
Compared to the flush that was creeping up Lan Zhan’s neck, the way he was shyly rubbing circles into his knuckles, the slight nod of acknowledgment? Compared to all of that, Wei Wuxian could only say, wrapping his arms around Lan Zhan’s shoulders, “Who cares about the idea?”