Archive of Our Own

Hear my cry in my hungering search for you

Taste my breath on the wind

See the sky as it mirrors my colors

Hints and whispers begin

They all knew of the phoenix that soared over the battlefields, piercing cry as sweet as an immortal's flute. She chose no side but the innocents, and if skirmishes were to happen too close to villages, she would swoop in with brilliant wings bright as the sun and burn so hot that they would have to flee her wrath. If someone were attempting to escape the fight, sometimes a young woman would step in between the innocents and the blade, melting them beneath her touch as she glared with liquid silver eyes.

Lan Wangji had only seen her in the chaos of the battlefields, but she knew she was kind. What immortal being would enter a war solely to protect the innocents despite the heavens demanding that they stay out of the human's war if not for kindness?

Their paths crossed for the first time in the wake of the battle, when the survivors were limping away and the dead left for the carrion birds. Despite a gash on her leg that was closing slowly as her exhausted golden core knit flesh and muscle back together, she had painstakingly begun the rites of trying to lay the bodies to rest, so their resentment would not rise back up even if she could not bury them properly.

She had thought herself alone, sitting on torn earth with her guqin stretched out in front of her and the first notes of Rest vibrating in the air, and then she saw the firebird.

For once she did not blaze with the brightness of the sun, but her feathers shown the deep reds and blues and violets of just after the sun sunk below the horizon. She perched on the branch of a tree, deep red crest lilting to one side as she tilted her head curiously.

Wangji inclined her head in polite greeting and continued, willing sore fingers to work enough through the stiffness setting in with night.

She went through one rendition of Rest, then paused and felt the energy around her, the resentment of lives snuffed out in a war none of them had chosen to fight in. It still lingered in growing shadows and long gouges in the earth, but not so strong as it had been.

When she started again from the beginning, the phoenix joined in with her.

She had heard the phoenix-songs of battle in the air, trilling in rage as she swooped in and carried away a young child caught in the chaos and disappearing in a flash of flames, but this was different. It felt like warm mellow summer days, sitting in the library studying or out watching the wild rabbits running through the fields. It felt like the softness of sitting patiently in a little house once a month while her mother combed her hair till it hung perfectly smoothly.

It was Rest, and it was peace.

As the last notes of the guqin faded out, she blinked as if some spell over her had just ended. Casting her energy out, the lingering resentment seemed almost gone, the souls settled to rest and to reenter the cycles of reincarnation.

Her leg no longer hurt.

She made the mistake of looking away from the phoenix as she looked at the split in the fabric where a sword had caught her off guard and saw not even the thin white line of a healing scar, but whole, unblemished flesh beneath.

When she looked back, the tree was empty.

The village was so small as to not be marked on the maps of the area, nor even have a name. A small cluster of houses around a little temple and simple fields with a little river teeming with fish were inconsequential in the plans of generals and soldiers, and they were right on the outskirts of another planned clash.

This was unacceptable.

Lan Wangji arrived just after the break of dawn, jumping down from Bichen to alight upon the earth a small ways out. There had already been enough innocents caught in the fights and this late in the year any damage to the homes or crops would leave them fighting to survive the winter.

Her brother had only smiled at her knowingly when she announced she would travel by herself rather than with the army. Gusu had made a stronger effort than most of the sects when it came to trying to keep the worst of the war away from these little villages, but stronger effort often came to nothing in the heat of battle.

Even from here, she could already hear the sounds of metal growing in her ears, though whether it was truly the start of the fight or just the never ending battles blurring together in her mind was difficult to tell.

A young woman with her hair bound up in a red ribbon and in simple clothes came out of the village some time later, when she was certain the sound of the fighting had begun in truth, with an empty basket slung on her hip. Lan Wangji inclined her head to her, but made no movement from her vantage point. Here, she could leap up and fly at any fighter coming too close well before they reached the village.

“Good morrow, guniang,” the young woman said charmingly, her face lighting up like a break in the clouds. “Are you a part of the fight?”

Lan Wangji spared her a look, noticing the way her cheek dimpled in and bright gray eyes. “No harm will come to your village while I still fight.” she vowed, looking back ahead. Even now she could see golden and purple and white robes coming closer as carefully ordered armies scattered into pockets of combat, seeking an advantage over their foes. “I would recommend you return home.”

Instead of leaving, the young woman sat down on the grass by her, cheeky grin firmly in place. “How could I be in danger when guniang here stands as such a proud sentry?” she said, lacing her fingers over her knees and rocking back and forth. “But she looks so lonely, I thought I would come keep her company.”

She did not look back at her then, though her ears tingled at the teasing, “it is not safe out here, they are not looking for anyone beyond their next enemy.”

“Oh I know,” the young woman said as calmly as if she were discussing the weather, “I came out here for that reason too.”

She really did look over then, wondering what she had missed. The young woman leaned back on her arms, bare feet flexing on the grass, smirking at her. “You carry no weapon,” she said at last, unable to grasp onto what it was that she was seeing. For a second an old story flashed through her mind, but not clearly enough for her to follow.

“I don't need one,” she said with the confidence of a fighter, “I can whistle hard enough to scare them off.”

Lan Wangji doubted that, but she could not shake the feeling that indeed this young woman would have no trouble should the fight make it over.

Indeed, her fears were valid as a small pocket of Jin, Ouyang and Hao broke off from the larger group, violent sword beams slicing through branches and the ground without a care. In one practiced motion she pulled Wangji from her back and leaped forwards to intercept, the deep notes of battle music reverberating through the ground and her bones as the knot of cultivators separated.

High above them, she heard the same piercing cry of the phoenix as it blazed into battle as well, wings so hot they had gone white with blue at the center as two of the Hao leaped for her, probably assuming one lone cultivator would be no challenge. She never blinked as she dragged Wangji to one side and Bichen flashed out to catch his blade in a thundering crash.

The second cultivator dropped to his knees as unearthly fire circled around him. The other cultivators dealt with the remaining Hao, slitting their throats and dropping their bodies into the bloodied dust with thuds of finality. “Go back!” she commanded as they looked at her with suspicion, but she had no time for them as she disarmed the cultivator, then cut off his arm before he could summon his blade back.

Farther away, the phoenix cry sounded again, she caught only a glimpse of wings turning to all the oranges of sunset before the bird twisted and vanished in a flurry of flames again, only faint ashes falling to show where she had been.

The disarmed Hao cultivator stared at her in horror for a moment before fleeing, leaving his dead companions and his sword on the ground. She shook the blood from Bichen in one sharp motion before motioning for her loyal sword to sheathe itself.

Turning around, some part of her wasn't surprised that the young woman had fled when the fighting got too near, but there was something strange about the earth that she had rested on.

A single feather sat there, colored a mellow gold with a darker orange tip and perfectly straight on all the pinions. When she picked it up, it warmed to her touch until it sat perfectly pleasant in her hand.

Somehow she suspected if she held it in the dark it would glow.

Phoenixes take human shape when they find a human that interests them, her mother had told her once and her ears burned abruptly as curiosities slotted into place.

She looked back up at the empty sky and wondered if their paths would continue to cross.

The feather proved troublesome in how to keep it safe, because she could not return to Gusu to hide it under the floorboards of her home until the war was ended, but she was loathe to take the chance of losing an immortal's gift.

The solution she came up with in the short run was tying it into her hair, brushing against the back of her neck at every step. Sometimes it burned so warm she thought the veins of the feather would be branded into her skin, but always at the end of long days of battles and blood and Rest, she would untie it from beneath the back of her neck and hold it for a few moments as it pulsed with comfort and warmth on hands that had bled as she played the guqin with all of her might.

She saw the phoenix distantly in the sky one day, long tail fanning out behind her in a ribbon of sunset as she flew towards the horizon leisurely. Against her neck, the feather warmed and cooled as if in greeting. Absently, she brushed her fingers against the soft veins in acknowledgment as she flew on towards where the army was grouping up for another push against some of the border outposts, gain some ground into enemy territory.

She wondered if the phoenix was flying ahead to warn the ones who had no choice in where they lived as the ground rushed by beneath her. Several times now, she had arrived to protect a place only to find signs of battle outside and scorched earth beneath her.

“Oh yes, there was a young maiden with a red ribbon in her hair,” one grandmother told her politely, squinting up at her in the afternoon sunlight. “She wouldn't accept any token of thanks, but told us to tell you she came by if'n we saw you.”

Lan Wangji bowed and thanked her, and stroked the feather a bit irritably. After that first chance meeting she had not seen the phoenix close by again.

Why did you give this to me, she wanted to ask, but without an answer she couldn't let them fall free to be lost in the wind. What do you see up there in the heavens, watching this disaster unfold?

Her curiosity was piqued, she could not deny.

What did the immortal see when she looked at her? At any of them?

If there was a god above listening, she hoped they could hear her prayers.

They had been ambushed on their way to meet up with the Jiang and Nie forces, the Wens launching a nasty assault before they could pincer them. Many of the fighters she had traveled with had died in the rain and the mud and the muck and she had played the songs of battle till the strings on her guqin snapped. In the end it had been a retreat and a stalemate only won by the heavy rain that dragged her to the earth and fooled her enough that she'd taken a heavy wound before beheading the person that got through her guard.

Her golden core spun desperately as she took shelter beneath a sodden tree that kept the worst of the rain off, trying to stop the bleeding across her back and down her thigh before it became fatal. She didn't think she would die here, she knew her limits and she had not fully reached them, but with the cold and the darkness approaching she knew there was a growing chance.

With numb fingers, she reached up and stroked the feather still bound beneath her hair. It was as wet as the rest of her, but it still felt a little warmer to the touch.

Gingerly, she undid the ties that held it in place and pulled it out, watching the golden feather start to glow and warm up a little in the palms of her hand. Dimly, she wondered if she could call a phoenix with such a thing.

But immortals weren't meant to be caught and tamed. Without the freedom they had been born to, they would only shrink away and wither and die and leave the mortals around them confused and lost. This was a gift given freely and that was the only thing she could accept from any being of her kind.

As the dark settled in around her and the open wounds slowly, slowly knit themselves closed, the feather seemed to glow brighter, cutting through the shadows before they could land too deeply on her. Somewhere out in the growing deep, someone sloshed through the mud with muttered curses.

She blinked the water from her eyes and hurriedly tucked her treasure down into the bindings over her chest before whoever had stumbled on this tableau could see it.

Slowly the rain seemed to subside. No, it seemed to turn back into clouds before it could touch the ground, as if the air had become too warm for the rain to keep falling.

Against her chest, the feather began to pulse as well.

Out of the darkness, she saw a similar light to her feather appear, warm and golden. Even in her exhausted body and mind, she knew that someone had heard her suppressed call for help.

The phoenix appeared again in her human skin, smiling face grave. The whole world seemed to glow around her as she took in the sight before her. Lan Wangji felt both relieved and yet a little ashamed, to be seen as such in front of an immortal.

The phoenix didn't seem to care though. The second their eyes met she ran forwards, the squelching sounds of rain and mud following behind her as she dropped to her knees, stretching out her hands.

She leaned towards the warmth more openly than she would have for anyone else, recognizing in the back of her mind that the blood loss was making her more forwards than she would be otherwise. “Guniang,” the phoenix scolded her as she put burning hands against her chest. “How did you end up like this?”

Some of the cold that had settled into her chest melted at the touch, even through her sodden robes the other woman's hands felt as hot as a brand. “An ambush,” she said slowly, trying not to shiver as heat sank into her core, warming her through inside and out and soothing the deep ache of her wounds. “The rain drove them away.”

“Good,” the phoenix said as she pulled her hands away, although the burning heat of her fingers still lingered on her breast, burning her all the way down to her golden core. Her eyes seemed strangely wet even though her aura was so bright that none of the rain touched either of them now. She blinked once and she belatedly realized that in all of their previous encounters she had never seen the firebird blink before. “You shouldn't stay here, all of that resentment is still building.” she said more coolly, looking out into the darkness with eyes far beyond her own. “Can you walk on your own?”

The cut on her leg still burned with pain, but much dulled. It would most likely support her weight. At least long enough to gather back with the army “I thank you for your assistance, Xianren,” she said slowly, gathering her feet under her. “I will be fine now.”

She only made it one step before her leg buckled under her and she went straight back down. Strong hands caught her before she could hit the ground. “Guniang, don't lie to immortals,” the phoenix scolded her as Lan Zhan hurriedly uncurled her fingers from her robes. Of course it made sense that a being of fire would still be dry even in this downpour, but it was slightly strange to hear the rain falling around them and yet not feel it. “Where is your camp from here?”

“On the other side of the pass, beyond the river,” she said, inclining her head in the direction. “But you do not need to trouble yourself on my behalf. I will be able to return after I rest a little longer.”

“Oh?” the phoenix said, voice curling warmly around the drawn out sound, “You are very brave and resilient, guniang, the others should look to you as an example.” She felt her ears burn before suddenly the woman partially knelt before her.

She didn't have a chance to react before like a child she was picked up and slung across her back like a sack of rice. “Unfortunately, I like to interfere in these matters.” the phoenix said in a voice that could only be described as smug. “You can rest easy, no harm will come to you while I am here.”

A mix of mortification and indignation flooded her lungs. “Xianren! This is-this is not-” all protests of what an immortal should and should not do were lost as this particular immortal laughed. “What are you doing?”

“Interfering,” the phoenix said even more smugly. “It really wouldn't do for the beautiful Lan-guniang to stumble out of the woods covered in mud.” Her stride was long and smooth, almost like she were flying rather than walking through the mud and muck.

“But this is undignified!” she managed, trying to find a fine line between being respectful and also making her point. The fact that the phoenix was carrying her far faster than she could have managed was not making her task any easier.

“Undignified is for those who care more about appearance and not about what they do,” she said with true weight to her words and Lan Wangji was struck dumb by it. “I know who I am and what I will do, and what I will do is carry you if you can't walk.”

There was nothing she could say to that, so she did not try to. Seemingly satisfied with her no longer protesting, the phoenix carried on.

After a while, she began to hum an old tune, similar to the ones her mother would sing. With no battles to fight, not even for her survival, exhaustion sank into her body and she found her eyes closing before she forced them awake again.

The phoenix stopped singing for a moment to laugh, the sound warm in the cold and the dark. “Sleep, guniang, the healing works better if your body is resting too.”

Oh. Her ears burned again as the woman began to sing beneath her, glowing softly as what she recognized was an herbalist's chant. It stood to reason that a bird that could sing corpses to rest could do more than that given reason.

The music echoed and looped in her head as her eyes slid shut without her bidding again, but this time she no longer had the energy left to fight it.

She awoke to surprised shouting as the phoenix lowered her to the ground. “There you are, guniang, back with your army.” she whispered before leaning in right next to her ear, “I will see you on the other side of the war.”

Then she whispered something else that rang through her blood like the vibration of great bells, too powerful for her to understand immediately. Before she could respond, the firebird spread her great wings and took to the sky.

By the time the dark spots cleared from her vision and people from the camp surrounded her, asking questions at great speeds, the ringing had cleared into two words.

Or a name.

Wei Ying.

All of the elder immortals had told her not to get involved in the affairs of mortals. It would only lead to heartbreak and bitterness as their already short lives were ended by disease, hunger and war. It was better to wait and meet those lucky enough to ascend, taste of mortality that way.

She had thumbed her nose up at them and flown down on burning wings with the sunset, letting the doors to the heavens slam shut behind her. She would come home when ready.

They were all so wonderful, especially the ones who sang while they worked and whose children were happy to run after her, calling her pretty Xianren and teaching her their songs patiently. And under the mortal sky, with the passage of time still so clearly marked by the dance of the sun and moon, a day was a day was a day. Every one of them to be lived and enjoyed as they disappeared one after another.

She had been entranced at the first sight of the moonlit maiden, even before the war began, walking home alone long after night had fallen in her white robes with her white sword at her side. For the first time, she had wondered what it would be like to walk with someone, step after step and hand in hand.

So she had followed her, into war and pain and mortality. She had seen her weep for a father lost, stand in the way of any blade aimed towards an innocent and sing with her fingers to lay the dead to rest.

Wei Ying had not meant to, but she had fallen in love with this beautiful mortal, who shone more brightly than the moon and with her own soft subtle light. And she felt what it was like to be mortal herself, when her heart leaped in her chest every time she called her “Xianren,” or stroked the feather she gave her. Whether this beautiful mortal wanted her or not, joined her in the heavens or not, she would love her forever.

They were celebrating the end of the war, with fireworks and feasts and a fever born from an end. She had wandered through camps in her human form, smiling and laughing and asking after the moon maiden, and none of them looked at her and saw her as any different.

But when she looked away from the celebrations, she saw her, on the outskirts of all of it, looking up at the moon with an expression she couldn't name.

She muted her aura so she wouldn't be so easily noticed, and walked up quietly on bare feet, feeling the summer grass brushing up her legs. The maiden didn't seen to notice her until she stepped up next to her, concealing her surprise excellently. “Xianren,” she greeted, bowing.

Wei Ying pouted at her instead of bowing back, ducking her head a little to look up at her through her lashes. “Guniang, after all our time together.” she scolded lightly, and then smiled at the faint frown that crossed her face like a shadow over the moon. “Don't bow to me, it only makes me itch.”

She nodded and looked down at the ground, the moonlight drawing long shadows on her face. She was so beautiful she stole her breath away like a thief in the night. Did she know how much more Wei Ying wanted her to steal? “Will you return to the heavens then?” she asked after a long moment, some mournful note in her voice. “Now that the war has ended.”

Wei Ying shook her head rapidly, distracted momentarily by the brushing of her own long hair across the back of her neck. She would have to spend so much more time in this form if only her guniang would have her as it. “I was here long before the war started, I'm not ready to head back yet. I like it here more.”

The woman's eyes widened just slightly at that. “Oh, did you think I was coming to say good bye then?” she said in her own surprise. “That's not why I was looking for you.”

Her maiden blinked at her once as an expression of relief came into her golden eyes. She smiled wider. “Hanguang-zun, Lan-guniang, won't you share your name with me? You know mine after all.” she crooned, sliding across the grass to stand next to her.

She saw the brief flutter of lashes, the way she pressed those soft looking lips together and grinned at her.

“Lan Zhan,” she said at last, glancing away. So shy! But she knew inner fire when she sensed it, all fires were her domain and she wanted to see it burning in her eyes so much she could taste it.

“Lan Zhan,” she sang slightly, loving the way it sat on her tongue and begged to be said. “Lan Zhan, so beautiful a name for a beautiful guniang.”

She drew in a breath and Wei Ying could feel the kindling flame in her. She wanted to fuel her fire. “Zhan-er, tell me, what did you do with my feather? I know you still have it.”

Her fingers twitched and then she stilled them. “It is with me and safe,” she said, her voice suspiciously smooth even for her. “I would not wish to break the trust you placed in me with carelessness.”

“I think...” she let the words hang on the air as she stepped close enough that she could taste the air that Lan Zhan breathed, “I think you want to catch this bird in your hands. I think you want to pin me down.”

Her pupils shrunk, her breath stuttered on her lips. Wei Ying smirked.

“Zhan-er,” she called and spread her wings out behind her, letting them blaze with all the colors she had collected in her journey. The wind sang through her feathers as she let go of the world's weight and floated upwards, shining in all of her glory. Come find me, come catch me, she thought with all of her might. “An immortal can only be tamed if she wishes it.”

The surge of flame between the two of them grew and flared in her wings, the brilliant gold of her eyes. “Catch me,” she whispered and then twisted into the air, glancing behind her to see if she would follow.

She did.

Her heart thrummed in her chest as she beat her wings, shifting into her firebird form to fly faster, what was the point of a chase if not to have the hunter work for it? But she did not twist away, did not fly as fast as she could have.

Behind her, riding on the moonlight, Lan Zhan followed steadily, undeterred by her speed. She wanted to cry out her delight to the heavens, let them know what magic she had found in the mortal worlds.

Her heart pounded madly in her breast as she soared higher and higher, towards the moon and the heavens. There was nothing that could break this spell.

The second that Lan Zhan was close enough to reach out and touch her, she shifted back and let herself fall, tumbling into her arms to be caught safely within them and held close. “Guniang, you've caught this phoenix,” she asked the breathless woman holding her tightly, braced on her sword high up in the air. “How will you tame her?”

The flame in Lan Zhan's golden eyes had never burned so brightly before, hesitation and desire warring in her eyes as she let Wei Ying rest her feet across the width of her sword, arms tightly wrapped around her waist till she couldn't escape even if she wanted to.

Her answering kiss seared the breath from her lungs. Wei Ying closed her eyes and melted into it, threading her fingers into her hair as Lan Zhan pressed in for more, licking at her lips with a need she had never felt before.

She wanted more. So desperately she wanted more. She wanted to be pulled closer, pulled down.

Phoenixes were meant to fly free with the sun, but the sun set and rose by the turning of the world and she wanted to turn with the world and be held beneath the moon.

Lan Zhan wrapped her arms more tightly around her and bit her lower lip suddenly, swallowing her yelped surprise and thrusting her tongue into her mouth eagerly, some barrier between them rapidly being torn away with every burning kiss.

For the first time since she came to this mortal plain, time ceased to exist as sun and moon came together on the edge of a blade. suspended in the sky.

Strictly speaking she didn't need to keep breathing if she didn't want to, but to kiss like this, with tongue and teeth and hands spanning her waist and burning through the manifested robes like a brand of Lan Zhan's perfect slender fingers, it left her panting as Lan Zhan broke away to breathe desperately, parted lips slightly swollen from this new and exciting experience.

For the first time in her long, long life she felt like what it must be to be a sunrise, that first breaking of day. Gently pulling her hand free of Lan Zhan's hair, she pressed it against her cheek. “Lan Zhan, Hanguang-zun, Lan-guniang,” she whispered reverently as the wind picked up around them, the magic of an immortal's promise surging in the air around them, “Day into day, into day, I want to walk by your side and share every one of those endless days with you until the sun itself disappears.”

The magic hung in the air like the thousands of stars in the heavens, every one of them a lover's promise, a shining light that whispered We have been here, we have loved, our love endures. Despite the fragility of the moment, she felt no fear.

Lan Zhan reached up and pressed her hand over top, twining their fingers together. Her lips opened and closed soundlessly for a moment before she closed her eyes. “Day...into day, into day,” she repeated tremulously, “Even if we are separated by death, I will find my way back to you.” she vowed at last, eyes blazing brighter than the heavens. “I will always know the way back to your side.”

Oh, for all of her years and experiences, she was still unprepared for such a promise. Anything she could want to say wouldn't be enough to capture the feeling singing in her blood.

This time when she surged up to press their lips together again, her joy flashed out with her wings, the noonday sun in the midnight sky.

The grass was still warm even without the summer sun above them, but she couldn't really focus on more than that as Lan Zhan pressed her down into it with teeth in her neck, her long hair falling around them like a shroud of night to block unwanted eyes from seeing this sight. The ribbon holding her wrists above her head was perfectly tight enough to keep her from either stopping or encouraging Lan Zhan to keep going, though of course it didn't stop her from testing its limits every time new sensations ran through her body.

Silk had seemed like a good fabric to manifest when she'd taken human shape. But feeling it rubbing on nipples that had hardened with Lan Zhan's kisses and the night air through thin fabric was almost unbearable. As if able to hear her thoughts, the other woman reached up and curled her fingers into the delicate fabric and yanked it open roughly before abruptly cupping her breasts with a reverence that only made them ache more with desire.

“Jiejie,” she began to scold as Lan Zhan trailed burning lips down her chest, “an immortal is to be treated with resp-oh,” the last sound came out as an undignified moan when she bit down hard on her nipple before sucking on it fiercely.

It burned. It hurt just a little. It sent trails of fire through her veins from her breasts to her clit that made it throb with need. She arched her back and begged, words falling from her tongue like scattered embers to burn out in the darkness. “Jiejie, show some mercy,” she whimpered and was rewarded with wandering hands falling down from her waist to her thighs, pushing her robes up and off of her until she could run her hands unobstructed from knee to hip, gripping so fiercely that even her immortal skin would bruise with the pressure like ripe peaches.

She wanted every one of them to linger, keep them branded on her skin forever.

The flames beneath her skin surged as Lan Zhan continued to bite and suck with an intensity that blazed through them both, all thoughts of hesitation or inexperience drowned out in the fire and she had to stop herself from burning down the grass around them from the need surging in her breast. Her hands twitched with the urge to do something, but the ribbon wound round them prevented her from going and threading them through her hair again, to pull and press in closer until one of them could not be named from the other.

Lan Zhan's tongue was a gift from the heavens, she decided as the other woman licked over bite marks with a sort of low growl in her throat that thrummed in her blood. There was no other explanation for how much she craved the sensation on skin that had never before realized how starved it was for this sort of touch. She pressed up into it, strained against the ribbon and was suddenly, cruelly deprived of that as Lan Zhan sat up without warning and pressed her hand down against the center of her chest to stop her from following.

“Lan-Guniang, Jiejie,” she grumbled with real disappointment as even the hand was pulled away, but the other woman put a finger to her lips before the rustling of fabric followed.

Oh, of course, this was reasonable. She was already bared to the world in all the ways that mattered, manifestated robes hiked up to her waist and yanked open to the sash. But Lan Zhan was still fully dressed aside from her forehead ribbon currently tied round her wrist and that wouldn't be fair to Lan Zhan for her to be the only one feeling this amazing.

She could not look up easily, not with her arms bound above her head or Lan Zhan straddling her thighs, but she could look up enough to see a charming flush on her ears silvered by the moonlight, heavy white robes sliding off of strong, slender shoulders and lower to where her eyes caught immediately on the thing she most wanted to see in that moment.

She had wondered why Lan Zhan chose to wear so many layers, even in the heat of summer and turmoils of war. But of course it was reasonable that a modest woman like her might prefer to keep them concealed. They were round and full like the moon above them, hanging down and swaying slightly under their own weight as she tossed her robes aside to the ground. With the softest curve to her mouth that might have been a smile, she kissed the corner of her mouth before biting down on her lip hard, mingling the slow dying of embers and the surge of the leaping flame in her blood.

She could feel a wetness on her leg as Lan Zhan returned to ravishing her breasts again, further unbound by the moment they were caught up in and lifted her leg a little so the other woman could rub against it more easily. Above her, she heard her let out a soft surprised gasp into her chest before Lan Zhan ground her hips down onto her leg with a vengeance, spreading that delightful wetness over her thigh as she began to pleasure herself as well.

There was no experience in the heavens like this, there was no unearthly delight that could match the sight of her Lan Zhan unbridled beneath the moonlight, chasing this moment with her to what ends she did not know, but there was no one else she wanted to find them with.

Apparently considering that her poor Wei Ying might like to experience more too, Lan Zhan spread her fingers over her belly, digging in for a second before gripping her waist with one hand and sliding the other over the fine hairs between her legs and down in between to part open her lips with one slender callused finger, the rough tenderness of it the perfect mixture of sensation. She stroked sensitive skin cautiously, as if checking for some sign of either rejection or discomfort and only moving on further when she discovered none, drawing the tips of her fingers teasingly around a hole that had suddenly realized it desperately needed those fingers inside of it.

“Please, please,” she begged as every teasing touch took her further and further beyond the boundaries of what she could stand when it came to her Jiejie bullying her, “please stop waiting.” she grit out as Lan Zhan hesitated for a moment.

There was a moment when all she was aware of was her pulse pounding in her neck and her clit and Lan Zhan breathing out heavily against her nipple so chills ran up her spine from cold air on wet skin before she pressed two fingers in roughly at once.

She yelped and bucked her hips against the new sensation in places only she had ever touched before. Lan Zhan left off tormenting her poor breasts, now throbbing masses of sensation and lingering bite marks to run her tongue up her neck as she continued to work her fingers in and out of her

“You told me to not hold back anymore,” she breathed in a whisper that barely shook for how affected she must have been.

Wei Ying nodded eagerly in response, attempting to open her mouth and say something teasing before she pressed something that made her toes curl against the ground and all of her words were lost in a sound that vibrated out from her chest and hopefully conveyed how very much she wanted her to do that again.

Silky strands of hair fell onto her chest as Lan Zhan instead pulled her fingers free and brought them to Wei Ying's lips, the strange tangy taste of her own juices running over her tongue as she sucked on them pointedly. Her golden eyes widened a little as she used her tongue to pull her fingers all the way in, licking them clean. If Lan Zhan was going to bully her so well, she would just have to find ground wherever she could.

She swore she could feel her get even wetter against her leg. Lan Zhan visibly bit her own lip as she sucked on her slender fingers, enjoying the subtlest flare of emotion in her face even when a little saliva slipped free and ran down the side of her cheek into the grass.

Some last thread of control in her snapped as Wei Ying looked her right in the eye, trying to say with her face what she could not with her mouth at the time and she moved as fast as if she were in battle, pulling her fingers free and switching angles almost entirely. Wei Ying obediently let her pull her hands up higher so her arms were flush with her head and swinging one long leg over her head to straddle her face.

All around her was Lan Zhan, her thighs slick with sweet, bracing herself above her head with her hands on Wei Ying's bound wrists and soft wet skin that begged for her to lick it.

Lan Zhan had been more restrained than her when it came to making noise, no matter what she had done the most she had gotten was shuddering breathes and the slightest gasps, but the sound she made when Wei Ying turned her face into that wet slit and licked in deep burned from far above her straight down into her mouth. Her thighs slipped open a little more to give her better access and she threaded her fingers through Wei Ying's bound hands and squeezed hard in encouragement as she figured out how to take a tongue she'd used for talking her way through problems and found another different exciting way to use it.

Now perhaps more than ever she was glad she didn't really need to breathe, it made it much easier to keep up the pace of her tongue, drinking her in and tasting all the things that made her shudder and shake above her, all of Lan Zhan's tremendous strength focused on not collapsing on her so she could thrust her tongue in and out of her before returning her full attention to her clit, her heart beating so rapidly she could feel it on her tongue with every lick.

She thrust her tongue in deep, ran it from that little hole straight up the underside of her clit and sucked hard on that little bud and memorized every reaction, laughing breathlessly as Lan Zhan shook again and reached down and grabbed her hair and yanked her head up to make her keep going with a choked out growl.

She took the hint and continued her ministrations on that delicate bud, working it with her tongue and using just the edges of her teeth lightly, never hard enough to even be called a bite until Lan Zhan made a punched out noise in her chest and yanked her hair again and assuredly came with her tongue buried inside of her.

Wei Ying drew in a long breath as the tight grip on her hair slowly lessened and she ran her fingers through the mess she'd made of her hair tail, turning her head to kiss the unblemished skin on her inner thighs and nibble at it teasingly. “Well Jiejie,” she murmured teasingly against her leg, “are you pleased by my offerings?”

Lan Zhan's hand in her hair stopped for a second and she made a breathless sound she realized far too late was a laugh. Forgoing words, she moved away and turned around to kiss her, long hair swaying down around their faces like a curtain before moving down so they were yin and yang to each other, pinching the skin of her thighs until she'd spread her legs far enough.

Her jaw and tongue were a little worn, but not so sore that she couldn't return to attempting to draw out more secret noises from her lover, now presented with the advantage of a new angle and Lan Zhan no longer holding her arms so firmly in place that she couldn't pull them in to try and get some hold on her leg, even if the ribbon were holding fast from her admittedly hesitant attempts to pull herself free. And of course, Lan Zhan was doing the same to her now, practically kissing her as she went at her with some level of devotion and hunger so entwined in each other she couldn't begin to separate them.

She moaned again with the first proper movement of Lan Zhan's tongue and felt the other woman shudder as it ran through her body. Oh, that was a fun discovery, she thought somewhat dizzily as Lan Zhan made a similar sort of inaudible noise when she found that one spot most likely to make her react and pressed her tongue into it hard, and felt that inaudible noise vibrate through her body into the warm pool in her hips and disturb the kindling flame there.

Lan Zhan had the very unfair advantage of having both of her hands free even if she were using one of them to keep herself held up, she thought muzzily as the tingling warm pleasure in her body was temporarily stifled by her pulling her mouth away to spit on her fingers and wipe them off on her thigh before pressing them back inside her again.

Far faster than before, she could feel the heat and need rising in her again with every motion, helped along by having Lan Zhan's cunt right in her face still. She didn't think she would hold out for much longer at this pace.

She spread her legs further for her, straining to try and bring her back to those heights before she lost control entirely. Somewhere distant, unimportant, she thought she smelled the very edge of burning grass and flicked her fingers impatiently to put it out.

There was a single moment where everything seemed to come together at once- them, the moonlight, the fire in her breast and the strange timelessness of a midsummer night, and then the burning heat inside of her flared and burst all along her body as she shrieked in ecstasy and rocked her hips up hard, a gush of pure heat spilling forth from her body along the ground as she rode the wave of her orgasm to the end, toes curling and uncurling against the scorched earth until the white fog in her mind began to clear.

Lan Zhan collapsed next to her, lips shiny and swollen as she reached for her hands and undid the white ribbon. She immediately used her freed hands to wrap them around her lover and pull her close, nuzzling into her neck and hair.

Something familiar brushed against her nose and she stopped in surprise. Before Lan Zhan could back away from her, she reached forwards and threaded her fingers through her long dark hair until a bright feather appeared. It glowed as she touched it, lighting up a bright red ear and Lan Zhan steadfastly refusing to look at her.

She grinned helplessly, “You've kept it safe indeed, concealed from any prying eyes.” In fascination she let go of it and watched as the weight of the feather and the strength of the tie pulled it right back into her hair, not even the subtle glow escaping. “Zhan-er,” she called for her again, pulling her gaze back on her, right where she wanted it. “You're really great. I like you.”

Lan Zhan pulled her back into another long burning kiss, and the rest of the night melted away.

Every finger is touching, searching until

Your secrets come out

In the dance as it endlessly circles

I linger close to your mouth